In January, on the snowy streets of Brooklyn New York, a stranger told me I had to go to a gig that night to see the man with the best voice he’d ever heard. His exact description of this mysterious musician, Markee, was that he had ‘the voice of God’. I scribbled the name in my diary, but never got round to seeing the show. On Tuesday night as I stood amongst the crowd waiting to see James Blake, the memory of this brief encounter came rushing back halfway through the support set from Marques Toliver. This man was charismatic, cool and from the U.S.A. He opened his show with nothing but an auto-harp and his voice – which carried out across the space powerfully. As the set progressed, the epic, sonorous voice from Marques continued to soar when he played the glockenspiel and the violin. I watched and listened in awe as this little known (in Australia) talent captivated all the patrons in the place.

Toward the end of the set, Marques took a leap of faith by unplugging his violin and jumping into the audience. The crowd formed a respectful circle around the man as he performed another song from his EP Butterflies are not Free. Word is even the towering figure that is James Blake got himself amongst the patrons to witness this organic performance. It was then that the whispers about this man Markee came crawling back into my memory. I had to find out for sure. And when I fought my way through the full house to buy his EP, he told me he was, indeed, in Williamsburg in the second week of January. I would have been satisfied if, then and there, James Blake cancelled the show and Marques continued to entertain.

But of course, no such thing happened. And I could not be more thankful for that, as there’s no way I could have predicted just how awesome the forthcoming performance would be. Kicking off the set with ‘Unluck’, the BBC Sounds of 2011 runner-up far exceeded my expectations. As is the nature of most electronic music, you can’t garner the full experience until you are plunged into the right atmosphere and, most importantly, surrounded by some fucking loud speaker systems. And The Prince Bandroom was the perfect venue to ensure such requirements were met; awesome sound and intimating intimacy while still retaining that dark, club feel.

Regardless of whether he was gently sweeping his fingers over the piano and singing, such as the beginning of ‘Limit to your love’ or if he was powering through a heavy dubstep number with his band, Blake interacted with the music passionately, effortlessly and continuously. He often closed his eyes as he performed, heightening his sexy, talented aura. Following many songs with a quiet ‘thank-you’, Blake kept the crowd hypnotised. Many tracks on the setlist were from Blake’s self-titled album released earlier this year, including ‘Lindesfarne’ and ‘To Care (Like You)’. ‘I Never Learnt To Share’ was a definite highlight, as the intense nature of the performance meant the contrast of no bass to heavy bass and everything in between was amplified to its best levels. But Blake did exactly as I hoped he would do; mixing it up by including some songs from other releases. ‘CMYK’ was met with cheers of approval, and it proved to be truly incredible as every beat and note on the synths went through you, blood and bones.

The final song before the inevitable encore was ‘The Wilhelm Scream’, prompting many of the audience to singalong quietly. When the band re-emerged, Blake said they were to do a song that they would only perform if the vibe was right. And that it was. The song - called ‘AWD’, I believe - was epic electronica, building slowly off drum beats and echoing vocals before growing irrevocably to a high peak. Following this, the band left Blake alone on stage to perform his final song solo, proving to everybody his versatile musical and production talent. If this set had continued for another 10 hours, I still don’t think I would have got sick of it.