Maroon 5 bring joy to a sun-kissed BST Hyde Park

Maroon 5 deliver an incredible show at a sun-kissed Hyde Park on a perfect summer Friday evening. A setlist of hit after hit demonstrates the prowess and popularity of the Los Angeles band, but it’s in the live performance that they reveal their rock credentials, even on their more pop-leaning numbers, thanks to a solid backbone of electric guitars and drums.

The show kicks off with Harder to Breathe and there’s no time for the excitement to fade before they launch into This Love, another success from their fortunate debut Songs About Jane. “We first came here in 2005 and played The Barfly,” explains singer Adam Levine. “There weren’t that many people there, probably 40, if we were lucky. To see all you people here tonight is an incredible incredible thing.”

Levine is a born showman, commanding the stage with magnetic presence and flair. Sporting sunglasses until the very moment the sun goes down, he makes an instrument of his body, muscles and tattoos always on display. But it’s his voice that impresses the most, hitting all the high notes and that groovy falsetto that is his trademark.

It’s perhaps with Animals that it all comes together: the infectious melody, the band’s intensity, Levine’s conviction – it’s the kind of moment when one realises they are witnessing an act at the peak of their powers.

A personal favourite – and also of the frontman’s – is Won’t Go Home Without You, a splendid ballad that draws inspiration from The Police’s Every Breath You Take before blossoming into a soaring chorus: a masterclass in songwriting.

Throughout the set the mood swings from daring and cheeky to feel-good and uplifting, the only exception being the performance of Memories, a song that serves as a tribute to those no longer with us – for Levine, in particular, his best friend and the band’s former manager Jordan Feldstein, brother of actor Jonah Hill.

She Will Be Loved and Maps are played back to back, to the rapture of the crowd. All of a sudden, the sky is turning dark, the light show now part of the experience, as Girls Like You and the groovy Moves Like Jagger close the set. But there’s time for an encore: earworms Payphone and Sugar are saved for last, in a final celebration of pure, unadulterated fun.