Wilton’s is an exquisite throwback, the oldest grand music hall in Britain, and Lianne La Havas knows all about curious venues. Just over a year ago, the London singer hit the news when Prince chose her East End flat as the unlikely base for a press conference to launch his latest series of UK guerrilla gigs.

This offbeat superstar patronage increased the idea of La Havas as a star-in-waiting, the nu-soul tyro most likely to break big, and she is clearly up for this home show. An elegant and vivacious human dynamo in scarlet, she punctuates the evening with earnest soliloquies about just how nervous and excited she is to be here.

La Havas is launching her imminent second album, Blood, yet despite a fervently supportive crowd, it appears unlikely to be the creative leap she craves. The new songs that she previews are proficient and pretty, but little more: Unstoppable, the album’s slick lead single, veers dangerously near to supper-club jazz.

She has an engaging and upbeat stage presence, but as a soul-baring siren La Havas lacks the brittle genius of Amy Winehouse or the exquisite understatement of Laura Mvula. Even her heartbreak songs are sophisticated yet overly mannered. Tracks such as the new pop-soul trifle Tokyo seep from your memory before their last meticulous chords have faded away.

It’s all resolutely pleasant and unobjectionable, but only her solo encore of a quixotic old single, Age, implies that La Havas is set to grow into a special or maverick performer. For now, this tenacious trier is easy to like, but impossible to love.

• At How The Light Gets In festival, Hay-on-Wye, 30 May.