At Venue on Thursday, February 27. Continues February 28

Ravid Kahalani could have been forgiven for coming out and completely dogging it. You want a sight that’s guaranteed to give even the most upbeat of performers a whopping case of the blues? Try looking out into a club that’s maybe a quarter full on a weekday night, the added insult being that you’ve flown halfway around the world to take the stage.

Kahalani made the pilgrimage to Vancouver from Tel Aviv. Most of the city, however, was evidently more interested in staying home and finishing off Season 2 of House of Cards.

Too bad, Lotuslanders, because you missed something truly amazing.

If Kahalani was disappointed at the less-than-capacity turnout, he certainly didn’t show it. Backed by the six musicians who make up his band, Yemen Blues, the singer took the stage looking both impossibly dapper (black boots and a colour-blocked dress shirt seemingly inpired by Piet Mondrian) and on a major mission, namely connecting with the assembled. Making that doubly challenging was the fact that those on the dance floor seemed determined to maintain at least 15 feet of distance between themselves and the stage.

The opening number, “Eli”, set the tone for the evening in more ways than one. Most importanly, it made it clear that Kahalani was going to be wasting no time getting the party started. With Rony Iwryn and Itamar Doari playing two-man percussion army, the singer locked into a groove that was part Mick Jagger swagger and part Tom Waits boho shuffle. At the start of the song, his waist-length mini-dreads were piled high on his head in a mini-bun. Halfway through, right around the time the horns roared in, Kahalani took flight, doing his best to stomp his foot through Venue’s stage, sending his dreadlocks airborne.

From that point on he never slowed down, sometimes lost in a trance of his own making, sometimes standing at the front of the stage, urging those in the crowd to clap their hands and join in the celebration.

That this actually happened, to the point where the booths along the side walls in Venue gradually emptied, and the dance floor filled up with gyrating bodies, was a testimony to both the singer and his crack band.

To western ears (with the exception of those who can identify a guembri on sight), Yemen Blues definitely falls on the exotic end of the spectrum. As a vocalist Kahalani possesses a set of pipes that are nothing sort of wondrous, the singer channelling the keening spirit of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan before effortlessly shifting from a Prince-like falsetto to a singing-in-tongues gutter-blues growl. As if that wasn’t impressive enough, songs were delivered in Hebrew, Yemenite, Arabic, and French.

Shining just as bright was the crack band. Multitasking ace bassist and oud master Shanir Blumenkranz led the way, anchoring things with an almost effortless cool. Major props also went to the percussionists Iwryn and Doari, who utilitzed everything from battered olive-oil cans and ropes of seashells to congo drums and triangles. Giving much of the night a Middle East–meets–Cuba’s Tropicana vibe was trumpeter Itamar Borochov.

Whether mashing up Latin jazz and Sahara desert blues (“Yaman”), or transporting audiences to the back alleys of Tel Aviv (the gloriously ramshackle “Zion”), Yemen Blues pretty much left Venue transfixed. By the end of the night, the dance floor was filled with sweat-dripping dancers.

Not content to be upstaged, Kahalani finished off the night by removing his shoes, and then leaping around the stage like a man who’d just won 28 million shekels in the lottery.

From the look on his face, he couldn’t have been more thrilled, this confirmed when he thanked the audience for its love and its energy. The crowd, of course, was only giving back what it was getting from the stage. Yes, it was that amazing.