If there's one thing you’re guaranteed of at an Avril Lavigne concert, it's noise. Not just from the guitar-wielding, stage-strutting pint sized Lavigne, but also from the frenzied audience. The collected shrieks of a stadium filled with tweens must rate as one of the more disturbing receptions a rock star can get.

Of course with a fistful of top 10 singles, and a couple of world tours under her belt, Lavigne should be used to it by now, and it shows in the professionalism of her performance. Kicking off in a blaze of lights and crashing guitar chords, the young Canadian who’s come to symbolise well marketed teenage angst launched into a set that covered all the highlights (and there are plenty) of her two smash hit albums.

There’s no denying her appeal, with an audience that included everyone from ironic students to yuppies and hundreds of pre-teen Avril clones bouncing in time to another radio friendly chorus. Not forgetting of course the chaperones huddled in slightly embarrassed groups near the back, swaying in time.

They were rarely left unable to sing along, with crowd pleasers like ‘Take Me Away’, ‘He Wasn’t’ and the powerful ‘Happy Ending’ almost lifting the roof by sheer force of audience participation.

As staging goes, it was formulaic stuff, with two backdrops, and some light and sound wizardry, but then when you have a collection of hits as long as Lavigne does, you’ll do exactly what's expected of you.

She’s a consummate performer, happy enough thrashing out the guitar chords but equally comfortable leaving the music to her backing band while she charges up and down the stage, blonde hair trailing behind her as she pulls the crowd through another radio-friendly sing-along chorus.

The mayhem was stalled mid-set by the arrival of a grand piano, and a couple of slow-tempo numbers like ‘Fall to Pieces’ that showcase the young star’s undeniable talent, then it was back to all-cylinders with a high octane rendition of the evergreen ‘Sk8ter Boi’.

There was good work earlier in the evening too, with local favourites Tweak proving that South African bands can easily hold their own in exalted company.

With a clever nod to her elders with an accomplished cover of Green Day’s ‘American Idiot’ that carried the added irony of her Canadian roots, and an encore that included Blur’s ‘Song 2’ Lavigne had the audience singing out of the palm of her hand, and isn’t that what rock concerts are all about?