Paloma Faith, Shepherd's Bush Empire, March 29 BEFORE launching into a burst of songs by artists who've influenced her, Paloma Faith - taking a break from fluttering her eyelashes and flirting with the 2,000 fans packed into the Empire – tells us one reporter claimed that paying homage to the likes of Billie Holiday must mean she's lacking in confidence. But if Paloma's the shy and retiring type, the rest of us might as well draw the curtains, dim the lights and lock the doors now. Strutting on stage in a canary yellow catsuit with a headdress and orange feather fans, she looks like Margarita Pracatan at a funeral. Even without the outfit, she knows how to pack a punch, picking single Stone Cold Sober as her second song of the night. It's a gutsy, warbler of a song that Amy Winehouse would kill for. Unlike Winehouse, however, she's one for all the family, and the crowd is united in a collective 'awww' when, after asking for a young man to "charm the pants off me", she invites a 10-year-old from the front the row to join her on stage, and serenades him with album favourite Romance Is Dead. It's all good fun, but it takes a closer look at her set to see the talent behind the wacky outfits. With just one album to her name, anyone in her situation was going to have to turn to cover versions but, in true Paloma style, they're far from obvious choices. She delves into her record collection and plucks out The Beatles' You Never Give Me Your Money, Billie Holiday's God Bless The Child and even David Guetta and Akon's Sexy Bitch. The former is a slightly mortifying experience that hovers uncomfortably, never quite going anywhere, but the other two are brilliant. Of the latter she says: "I'm sorry if I offend anyone but I think this song is truly horrendous. I decided to challenge myself and see if I could learn to like a song I hate..." Back on safer territory, new single Upside Down is the sort of upbeat song that suits her best – as kooky and fresh as you'd hope, it's a welcome relief from some of the album fillers she's forced to cart out. One such filler, Do You Want The Truth Or Something Beautiful, is rescued as it's given what she calls "the greatest remix ever". and escalates from the straight-up ballad that provides the title to her first album, into a Donna Summer-esque slab of disco-funk. For her encore she cavorts around the mirrored stage to purr her way through a spine-tingling version of Etta James' At Last, earning herself a standing ovation from the upper levels that continues into last song of the night, the anthemic New York. If she had any feelings of doubt, tonight must have wiped them out – she laps up the applause, stretching her arms out as the lights go down, like a true diva. Her friendly, flirty on-stage banter and the theatrical lessons she learned in her previous job as a magician's assistant, have melded to brilliant effect. "I'm quite confident really!" she laughs.