Dub him king of Inglan

LKJ and his friends of the second generation were not prepared to tolerate such racism and inequality.

They resisted and rebelled. Johnson did so with words and music. He combined lyrical observations and radical politics with reggae to create his own genre, "dub poetry", and founded his own record label to put it out.

Now, with almost 40 years of creativity, dissent and vocal prowess behind him - which includes him being one of two living poets published by Penguin Classics - he has a rare charisma and stature.

Striking in a white trilby, orange jacket and sharp strides and backed by his "partner in crime", the ace producer and bassist Dennis Bovell and his Dub Band, Johnson said some of his show might be a bit of a nostalgia trip for the over-40s in the audience. It was, instead, a living history lesson of black experience in London to a reggae beat.

The fear in the black and Asian communities that followed Enoch Powell's infamous "rivers of blood" speech expressed in Fite Dem Back, the inner-city riots in the 1980s given a voice in Di Great Insohreckshan, the suspicious deaths of black youths in police custody in the 1990s exposed in Licence To Kill.

As he recited his work, in chronological order, it gathered a powerful momentum with his words made still more potent by the sharp dub that drove it along.

The music was perfectly mixed and executed by a band who displayed effortless competence. And Johnson's voice was as commanding as the words he let slip, no more so than in the heartbreaking Sonny's Lettah played as an encore.

As a set of work, it starkly showed how lacking so much of today's music is of political commitment.

As a performance, it was a very special, charged show from a master and creator of his form at the top of his game and thoroughly deserved the spontaneous standing ovation it received.

Linton Kwesi Johnson, The Dennis Bovell Dub Band, Winston Francis And Jean 'Binta' Breeze
Barbican Hall, Barbican Centre
Silk Street, EC2Y 8DS