What's the life expectancy of a boy band? Blue have managed four and a half years, and Simon is certain that this is not the end. "Are we splitting up? No! But Blue are all taking a break to do solo projects."

To judge by tonight's show, the break has already started. Each member of the band plays two new songs, relegating Blue material to less than half of the running time.

So Lee bigs up world peace and plays two lukewarm ballads, Antony looks uncomfortable and sings Mustang Sally, Duncan gives us some confident, swelling pop and Simon tells us he's determined not to be pushed into hip-hop just because he's black, before rapping his way through a song about living in the ghetto.

But Blue remain most entertaining as an ensemble, not so much for the music - a catchy but insubstantial take on American R&B - as for the comic disjunction between their laddish personae and their pre-teen appeal. Anthony is escorted to the front of the stage by two shapely backing singers. "Hang on girls," he declares, pushing them aside and pointing at the crowd. "I'm with this lot." Later, their hands clasped in prayer, their voices raised as one over the final notes of Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word, the quartet come close to collapsing into giggles.

Still, the audience has a fine old time, waggling their glow sticks until the auditorium resembles a Christmas tree, texting in droves for the chance to get serenaded and raising their fingers to One Love. The girls scream whenever a video plays or a song starts, and scream when the camera pans slowly over Simon's crotch.

As a rebranding, it counts as a moderate success; at least a couple of these four likely lads will still have careers in a year's time.

· At Wembley Arena tonight. Box office: 0870 060 0870. Then touring.