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For a man whose career has, at best, meandered gently, Shane MacGowan has maintained an extraordinary popular presence. Since leaving the Pogues in 1991, he has produced only two albums, but he has been the subject of a television film, a contributor to the BBC's version of Perfect Day, and the face of Aer Lingus advertisements. And, just in case anyone failed to notice all this, he was arrested during his current tour with his band, the Popes.
Much of the attention is, of course, owed to his reputation as the man who wrote Fairytale of New York and A Pair of Brown Eyes, and who invested folk styles with punk passion. But there is another side to his fame: his legendary drinking. Read any interview with MacGowan and you find a detailed account of his intake of half-pints of Martini.
So, watching him play live, you try to concentrate on the music, but it is almost impossible. From the moment he shuffled cautiously across the Waterfront stage, one wondered about his health. His six-piece band - accordion, banjo, whistle, fiddle, guitar and drums - may kick the songs into life, but MacGowan doesn't so much sing as recite the words between drags on his cigarette.
There is little force to the once bitter, raucous voice, and there is a bemused look on his face, whether he is performing old songs or new, whether Irish dance tunes or the cajun rock of Paddy Rolling Stone. Only briefly do you glimpse the rough-edged sentimentality that established his reputation. It is there in the melancholic chorus of Lonesome Highway when he pleads "don't let me go, I love you so"; or on Ewan MacColl's Dirty Old Town, when he reaches desperately for the notes.
But whatever he does, the audience adores him, cheering him on, vicariously relishing the sadly careless way he treats both himself and his songs.