It has been 27 years since the Clash released their classic tribute to dub reggae nights in west London, (White Man) In Hammersmith Palais, but both the venue and the style are still going strong.

Fat Freddys Drop are an intriguing and unlikely bunch of dub and reggae enthusiasts, who are not from Jamaica but New Zealand. They have updated the music by adding in hi-tech sampling, soul and jazz influences, and set out to re-work and blend different styles from the other side of the world. They have done so remarkably well. Their debut studio album, Based on a True Story, picked up the Radio 1 Worldwide Music Award earlier in the week, and then, at Hammersmith Palais, they played one of their famously lengthy sets, which ended well after one in the morning.

On one side of the stage was the Maori singer Dallas Tamaira, dressed in regulation T-shirt and woolly hat and showing off the easy-going soulful vocals that have rightly been compared to Bill Withers. Behind him were keyboards and sampler, providing electronic beats and thumping bass lines, while across the stage were a guitarist and a remarkably fine horn trio, all graduates of Wellington Jazz School.

They started out with cool, throbbing reggae bass lines and clattering dub effects, interspersed with an unexpected reggae treatment of the Eurythmics' Sweet Dreams Are Made of This, but the fusion only came to life when the electronic beats were matched by solo work from saxophonist Warryn Maxwell, trumpeter Toby Laing or trombone-player Joe Lindsay.

So it continued for the next two-and-a-half hours, with Tamaira shifting from slow, hypnotic reggae to soul and dance songs. For the finale, he was joined by the British singers Vanessa Freeman and Alice Russell for an inspired and rousing improvised work-out on Wandering Eye, with the brass section once again on impressive form. If they had a few more musicians and singers to balance the electronics, Fat Freddy would be unstoppable.