Review: Susan Boyle in Concert, Cambridge Corn Exchange, Wednesday, April 16

Susan Boyle

A SuBo concert isn’t everyone’s first choice for mid-week entertainment.

Show tunes and big ballads, sobbing fans and schmaltz? Yeah, I’d have rather been doing Orange Wednesdays.

But you can’t write Susan Boyle off – she just makes people so happy.

The Scottish singer broke into public consciousness in 2009 after braving the Britain’s Got Talent judges and nailing “I Dreamed a Dream” from Les Misérables, much to the general shock of absolutely everyone.

A hop, skip and a Cowell driven makeover later, she was beaten by Diversity in the final, but nabbed a record deal and a worldwide following anyway.

Five years on she’s tackling her debut nationwide tour, and while there have been charity concerts, American X Factor appearances and performances for the Queen, this is the first time the tabloid darling has actually schlepped round the UK night after night.

So far she appears to be bearing up under the pressure… and is seemingly only faintly out of tune with the tightly orchestrated strings being not-so invisibly tugged and twisted behind the scenes.

Strictly Come Dancing’s slick suited vocalist Lance Ellington warmed up the sold out Cambridge Corn Exchange crowd (mums, daughters and sweet old couples holding hands that were enough to start you blubbering before Boyle even turned up), he was a good choice; the guy has a nerve-settling charm about him.

Then the lights fizzed out and a silhouetted Boyle arched and wiggled as the opening introduction of her BGT audition blared, Cowell’s excruciating scepticism fading into a slip of cocooning light.

Shiny haired and all a-glitter, she launched into the emotional vice of Irene Cara’s Out Here On My Own, momentarily stilling a Bambi-ish vulnerability and tentativeness that has you worried she might cut and run (Boyle’s stage fright and nerves are well documented). Swaddling her in sequins – however glamorously – and making it difficult to totter about properly doesn’t exactly help her look comfortable.

Her voice though, it’s practically faultless. Slinking powerfully from Somewhere Over the Rainbow into ABBA’s The Winner Takes It All, she nearly lost me, but blame that on personal taste; clawing it back magnificently with a booming rendition of Wild Horses.

You forget she’s funny too, flirting with her pianist “Lucifer”, shimmying at the front rows, blowing kisses, chuckling at wolf whistles and joking that “the doors are locked!”

It was enough to make you forgive the limp, wavering song choices in the second half, which featured tracks backed by the very enthusiastic Cambridge Show Choir that muddled the distinction between epic/goose bump inducing and just plain shouty. Attempts at dancier tracks really did not work, no matter how brilliant Susan’s jazz hands: Boyle can sing, she cannot do funk.

The odd faltering moments were swallowed up in the thrum and overwhelming feeling that every single person in that auditorium was willing her to do well though. Her voice suffusing you with a strange warmth and hope, needling tear ducts and nudging smiles., she is brilliantly likeable and loved, so loved, properly, whole heartedly adored. That’s hard to dismiss however much a non-fan you are.

Those string pullers just need to let her loose a bit more, let her soar. She’s more than got it in her.

First published by Cambridge News.

Review: Russell Brand, Cambridge Corn Exchange, Tuesday, April 1

Russell Brand

My head is still throbbing from trying to make sense of the manic bundle of leather clad energy that is Russell Brand.

The man is a vortex, sucking you into a world of heroes (Ghandi, Malcolm X, Jesus and Che Guevara), and villains (McDonald’s, Gillette, the Daily Mail), all the while trying to convince you, in his meandering, wayward style, that he’s more like the former than the latter, despite being a celebrity.

It’s a lean frame to hang the show – Messiah Complex – on, but it suits the wild eyed comic’s scattergun storytelling; he’s like a dog on a lead, being yanked back to how he really is more like Ghandi than you’d think.

He stalked on stage in a “sexy” pair of boots (his words), with huge loops of beads swinging from his neck, before demanding the lights to blaze. Then he hopped off stage and took an anxiety inducing tour of the Corn Exchange. It was terrifying, despite an anecdote about him screaming at Simba in the Lion King musical to steady our nerves. It was also absolutely hilarious. He grabbed at crutches, embarrassed some twins and then went and sat on the lap of a punter in a wheelchair and had him drive him round the auditorium. It was incredible – particularly seeing as Jamie, the guy in the wheelchair, was funny enough to give Brand a run for his money.

The rest of the set went by in a blur.

He slinked and sashayed, gyrated and screeched his way around the stage, dissolving the boundaries between highbrow ideas – wordily railing against corporations, governments and consumerism – and the crude stuff, suddenly switching tack to explain what he used to get up to with his mum’s Henry Hoover…

He’s much more self-deprecating than you’d expect, honest about his “acting”, throwing up photos of himself looking borderline insane on the big screen, and whipping out some of his most embarrassing moments (considering Brand has spent large chunks of his life off his face on drugs and doing anything for attention, you can imagine these tales are pretty magic).

Although a master at showing off (“I beat Paxman in an argument!”), irritatingly so at times, he’s got a knack for brainwashing you with his point of view (and to be honest, the majority of his ideas make a lot of sense, even if in practical reality they might flounder), the next you’re thinking, how does he sustain that level of mania on stage for a solid 90 minutes? He’s brilliantly, wondrously exhausting, meaning we left the venue close to mental collapse, nervous system agog, throats aching from laughter.

An orchestrated tangle of a show, you can’t help believing Brand has a touch of hysterical genius to him. He’s certainly entertaining.

First published by the Cambridge News.

Review: Chvrches, Cambridge Junction, Wednesday, March 12

Chvrches

Oh they’re good Chvrches, ever so good.

The Glaswegian trio – deceptively sweet and elfin Lauren Mayberry on vocals, Iain Cook on synths, guitar and bass, and Martin Doherty on synths and samplers – underline tracks of synthed up electro pop loveliness with wrenching, nerve jangling lyrics.

In fact, their debut album, The Bones of What You Believe, is a great contender for best breakup album of 2013. Not because it’ll make you weep (although arguably, Recover could give your tear ducts cause to wobble), but because it’ll make your skin shiver and your feet jitter and your body spin. You just want to go out, dance and forget.

Not that every track isn’t shot through with a tingling sense of giddiness, from the achingly wonderful The Mother of We Share to the punchy, angsty Gun (“I will be a gun/And it’s you I’ll come for”).

Cambridge Junction was completely sold out, everyone’s chilly, mist clogged clothes fogging up the room, as they trooped on stage: Cook taking up a shadowy corner, ready to aggressively play guitar, Doherty, trucker hat in place, arched over his panel of buttons, while Mayberry appeared, her face serenely moody.

Forming in 2011, Chvrches staked their claim on the mainstream after coming fifth in the BBC’s Sound of 2013, thanks to their first EP Recover, and followed up with a stack of festival slots, gracing crowds with a whole lot of strobe lighting and Mayberry’s sharp, soaring vocals.

It’s funny though, she might look blank and moody at first, but that evaporates between tracks (and, to be fair, I’ve seen her rap giddily Missy Elliot style in the past). Half Chvrches’ charm is her chatting away animatedly; this time on everything from someone getting cigarette ash in her couscous (“you can’t get a more first world problem than that”), to how life on stage is basically their office equivalent now (“in my head I’ve got a swivelly chair and a stress ball up here”), to brilliantly putting down a shouty punter flailing around, hacking everybody off.

And when she sings, she’s something else.

Each track was spliced with sputtering, glittering lights, dousing the band in waves of bright white, shards of electric green and flutters of blue, Mayberry punching the air through Lies, lethally flicking the mic chord and tearing down the air in the brilliant, brilliant Tether (the drop, oh the drop).

Doherty turned lead vocalist on album track Under the Tide and absolutely went for it. Giddy and leaping and sweating, his voice shifting and thrumming over the base making you happy just to be looking at how completely and utterly in it he was.

They finished with haunting, ethereal By The Throat, and we could have stayed, glued and mesmerised for another hour at least.

First published by Cambridge News.

REVIEW: London Grammar, Cambridge Corn Exchange, Saturday, February 1

London Grammar

Add a cello to practically anything and its amazingness will multiply.

Add an entire string quartet to a London Grammar set and your mind will be  absolutely blown.

It was a very, very good move on the part of the ever so elusive trio:  vocalist Hannah Reid, angular fellow founder Dan Rothman on guitar (the pair met  in halls at Nottingham University), and Dot Major (recruited from the year  below), he with the scatty mop of hair, on keys, drums and the djembe.

Compared to the likes of Adele, Joni Mitchell and Florence Welch, it’s  Hannah’s voice, arcing powerfully over the sparing backdrop of keys, guitar and  the bare bones of percussion on their debut album If You Wait, that make  them.

But with a string quartet at a thrumming, packed out Cambridge Corn Exchange,  they marched into the kind of territory you can only mark as indescribably  stunning.

And, for a band that shies from the media and is fronted by a dangerously  nervous singer, they weren’t nearly as cold and remote as we’d prepared for. You  can’t quite call them charismatic, but they do nail an effortless cool that  doesn’t spill into stand-offish.

The boys loped on stage before Hannah appeared enigmatic, still, quiet and  understated, hands clasped as if in prayer, her trademark hank of a blonde high  ponytail barely swishing.

Matched note for note by a blazing backdrop that sputtered and popped with  brightness, haloing Hannah in a rush of shadow and sparks, the favourites were  achingly good: the lacerating Wasting My Young Years, skin-shivery Strong (“Feel  free to sing-a-long,” Hannah murmured) and Hey Now, and some tracks that fade  sweetly out of your mind on the album, live, just exploded (namely Flickers).

But with barely more than 10 songs in their arsenal – to be fair, their music  career has spun out of control in the space of a year, you couldn’t expect the  song-count to keep up – the set raced upsettingly by.

Still, their tremulous cover of Kavinsky’s Nightcall (best known for  soundtracking Ryan Gosling’s scorpion emblazoned hero in Drive), seemed to drag  out time, wringing the heart out of every single burning note while the strings  skipped on and off stage, sawing through the haunting tendrils of Sights.

They finished on Metal & Dust: it soared, it smouldered and it left you  reeling.

First published by the Cambridge News.

Review: Nathaniel Rateliff, The Portland Arms, Cambridge

Nathaniel Rateliff

Nathaniel Rateliff, The Portland Arms, Cambridge, Thursday, January  30

Listening to Nathaniel Rateliff is like leaping into really, really deep cool  water.

Plunged into a moment that is simultaneously heavy and weightless, you find  yourself strangely calm, whirling in the possibility of being beautifully  crushed or infinitely suspended.

And he manages to convey that on the bleak joint of Mitcham’s Corner on a  drizzly Thursday night in January (thankfully, The Portland’s swish, newly  redecorated gig room out the back is comfortingly dry).

I stumbled across Rateliff just a few weeks ago – thanks to a rather  brilliant friend with the best taste in music – and have been cramming his 2013  album, Falling Faster Than You Can Run, into every spare second available to my  ears.

The Denver born singer splices folk with haunting opening chords, the  beardedness of Bon Iver (he has almost certainly spent time brooding, drinking  and strumming in cabins), the intensity of The National (it’s in the eyes) and  wrinkles of good old country music.

A knotted red ‘kerchief at his neck and busting out of a denim jacket, thin  strips of black tattoo peeking from beneath the cuffs, he strolled on stage,  backed by a wondrous cellist and two moustachioed gents on keys and drums,  promising us “a few good depressing songs” with a rueful grin.

Then he went and delivered, almost shattering my tear ducts in the process.

Weaving stories with gruff charm (pools of blood around his bootlegger of a  granddad seeped palpably into the room during You Should’ve Seen the Other Guy),  his vocals thrumming densely with velvet, knocking out riffs over the soaring,  aching cello and then whipping out a harmonica just to giddily break your heart  further.

But then, the melancholy – of which there is much – does also battle bravely  with an undercurrent that makes you want to throw your arms out and just spin  and spin and spin.

By the time they played Still Trying, the yelled words “I don’t know” ripping  from Rateliff’s throat, the place was just mesmerised.

First published by Cambridge News.

Hammer and Tongue: Simon Munnery

Simon Munnery

It was mainly down to Cambridge spoken word poet Hollie McNish.

After seeing the incredible Poets  vs Rappers night she curated for Cambridge Junction as part of the Festival  Ideas, I basically got a massive live poetry crush.

And a hankering for more grimy, inspired word battles (8-Mile style or  otherwise).

So, I got Googling and stumbled across Hammer & Tongue, a monthly spoken word and poetry night held upstairs at The  Fountain on Regent Street.

As we arrived – shedding an assortment of fog soaked scarves, coats and  steamed up glasses (an absolute nightmare, I assure you) – and stamped up the  stairs, I somehow ended up being one of five punters handed a judging score  card… oh, this was going to be fun.

A three-parter of a night, the show, compered by the fluttery Fay Roberts,  opened with a set from former teacher James McKay who’s patter and chatter  comprised silly, sexy haikus and a “hypnotic” love story with additional  pendulum swing. The room was certainly amused.

After a short break, during which I and my friend discussed how there was no  way in hell we’d ever be brave enough to stand up and spew out thought up  imaginings in front of a packed audience – a discerning, ‘Cambridge’ one at that  where a lot of blazers and well-crafted beards were in attendance – then came  the slam.

Armed with my judging card and told to ignore the cheers, cries, oohs and  ahhs of the crowd (shouts of “It’s not personal,” were frequently reiterated;  the night might have a competitive edge but generally poetry lovers are quite an  affectionate, welcoming bunch it seems), a slew of amateur wordsmiths took their  turn braving the mic for three minutes a pop.

There were slam virgins, surreal veterans, tentative have-a-goers, not so  tentative have-more-than-a-goers… My favourites (as announced by my score card,  yes, I very much enjoyed the power), included an awkwardly hilarious, completely  absurd piece called 1 minute past 3 that had anguished pauses, head-butting God  and peanut butter sandwiches firmly crammed in, and a guy who performed a poem  about how to perform a poem at his first slam, clever no? Funny too. Probably  why he went on to win.

The acts ricocheted between raucous, fantastic, painful, bizarre and  uncomfortable, but all were fantastically impressive for getting up there at  all.

But then it was the turn of headline act, Simon Munnery, who is just  obscenely wonderful.

I wish I could tell you all the fantastical, face-achingly funny, trippy,  strangely sensible nonsense and brilliance the truly experimental stand-up threw  at us, but I can’t. I got too caught up in it, and also, the man has pace. He  talked, sang, yelled and played harmonica for a solid hour, barely taking a  breath, racing through anecdotes, piling on detail, layering in sub stories and  memories and randomness so fast, so slickly and so completely without fault that  he’s practically indescribable.

All I know is, if there are more poets like Simon Munnery out there, my crush  might become full blown love.

First published by Cambridge News.

REVIEW: Public Service Broadcasting, Cambridge Junction, November 18

Public Service Broadcasting

It’s not often the support act is so effortlessly brilliant you feel anxious  for the main act.

But in the case of The Joker & The Thief, a suited and booted soulful  rock ‘n’ roll trio complete with wondrous, bouffant hair, it began to feel like  a serious issue. Largely to blame was saxophonist and accordionist Josh who it  was difficult not to fall in love with (go find them – that’s an order).

Pseudonymous duo Public Service Broadcasting chose their warm-up dangerously  well.

But then, these boys know exactly what they’re doing.

Pottering about since 2010 with EP One, it was their debut album,  Inform-Educate-Entertain, released in March this year, that chucked them into  the festival and touring fray proper.

If you haven’t yet stumbled upon them, they punch buttons as vintage public  service information films reel away and snatched voices from the 1930s clip  along in place of vocals. Then they overlay it with live music and are nothing  less than mysterious, quirky and chock-full of wit.

So, we were already jittery and abuzz, and then out saunters J. Willgoose,  Esq, corduroy clad with staple dickie bow jauntily askew ready to play banjo,  piano and “everything else”, followed by curly mopped Wrigglesworth on drums.  The stage a clutter of stacked retro TVs flickering with black and white archive  footage, they swung into London Can Take It, an air raid siren sending a  collective electric shudder through our bones.

There was absolutely no need to have worried… the loud, brash, thundering  Signal 30 bolted through the room; new single Night Mail spliced shivers with a  slow-burn ache and the lighting – flitting from blinding to blazing – skittered  your vision in the best possible ways.

Not only are PSB mind shatteringly brilliant to watch, they’re funny too,  despite – or perhaps because of – the fact they use electronic sound bites to  chat instead (it could be gimmicky but it works, honest). The set started with a  skit on not wafting your camera phone about (sweet and sensible advice – finally), and they laughingly introduced two new tracks with: “They’re about ice  skating and they’re in Dutch. It seemed like the logical next step for us,” – all delivered with J’s raised eyebrows, wry grins, nonchalant shrugs and ironic  pointing. Swoon.

And the new tracks, backed by spooling images of sepia tinted ice skating  racing were pretty darn wonderful.

Then they disappeared with knowing nods and a “Thank you very, very, very  much,” spiel before stepping back out, of course, for ROYGBIV. Strung through  with an ace country dancing riff (not a technical term, clearly), it thrashed  and soared – and then it was the turn of Everest. Oh, Everest. It makes you  dizzy and giddy, your skin on fire and your brain all a-whir.

The only thing is, there wasn’t quite enough dancing for my liking…

First published by Cambridge News.

Review: Nick Mulvey, Cambridge, November 15

Nick Mulvey

It’s rather strange going to a gig in a church – especially on a freezing  Friday night with alcohol coursing warmly through your body.

We trekked up to the rafters (downstairs was rammed with a congregation  intent on drinking miniature bottles of wine, rather than the usual sacramental  stuff), and nabbed a pew. It was as cold and uncomfortable as you’d recall if  you too were forced to go to Sunday school as a child (oh, woe).

But as bizarre as it was, and if you ignored the creeping feeling you ought  to be praying or confessing or something, the Emmanuel United Reform Church is  quite a magnificent setting.

And the acoustics are incredible. With the ceiling grandly hollowed out in  arcs and domes, high ornate windows and lattice work throwing off criss-crossing  patterns, and shadows ricocheting off the pulpit, as singer-songwriter Rhodes  finished off his support set, the air thrummed with sound. You felt surrounded  by it; enveloped by it.

But, no matter how good Rhodes was, we weren’t there for him.

In fact it was a homecoming gig for Nick Mulvey, former member of Mercury  Music Prize nominated band Portico Quartet (he left them in 2011 to go solo),  and by the sounds of it, the first few rows were purely friends and family.

The 26-year-old, who released his brilliant, melodic EP Fever to the Form  earlier this year, told What’s On a few weeks back: “I always find it very  difficult to describe my sound because it’s quite limiting putting words on it.  I can always have a conversation about it, we can talk all afternoon if you  like, but putting it in a sentence I always find it very like, from my end  there’s so much going on, so when someone says put it in a sentence, it’s like  arghh!”

He’s right. He is difficult to distil down to just words. I can tell you that  he can still a room with a single chord, can make you feel all buttery with more  than a few “Mmmm, mmmms” (a Nick Mulvey staple sound), while Cucurucu had your  limbs happily shivering, Nitrous meant nodding giddily along and Fever to the  Form itself induced mad, hysterical grinning.

Unassuming, relaxed and effortless, the man has presence, batting back  applause humbly and announcing he’s just finished his album, due for release  next year, and slotting in tales between sips of water. You felt the need to  reach out and grab him.

However, the crowd was admittedly a bit odd at times. We were surrounded by  some angry drunks who kept thrashing their feet around (it’s not that kind of  gig), but they grew bored and trooped out, slamming the door harshly behind  them. There was also one heckler who got a bit carried away… there are only so  many times you can shout “I love you Nick!” without needing to be massively  shushed. Which escalated into a whole lot of shushing rippling through the  room…

Perhaps there’s a reason why you don’t often find gigs in churches, they make  people go a bit crazy. It must be the sense of oppression and guilt seeping out  of the walls, you feel like a naughty child again. That might just be me though.  Don’t blame Nick.

First published by Cambridge News.

Bill Wyman: “Glamorous stories? There aren’t any. It’s glamorous from the outside, not the inside.”

Bill Wyman

Ella Walker grapples with former Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman over his  crazy past, the Stones and his current tour with his band, the Rhythm Kings.

So, what exactly do you ask a former Rolling Stone when you’re told – in no  uncertain terms – not to ask about the Rolling Stones?

This was the conundrum I faced pulling together questions to ask legendary  bassist Bill Wyman who’s visiting Cambridge Corn Exchange with his classic  rhythm and blues band, the Rhythm Kings.

One friend said to just start by asking him: HOW ARE YOU SO AWESOME? (Capital  letters not optional).

Twitter responded in a slightly less fangirl manner i.e. Ask him about going  out with teenagers when he was 50; ask him about The Beatles; and one clever  clogs said: “Please end every question with ‘Bill, why man?’” Safe to say that  wasn’t an option.

In the end I went for the old lure him into a false sense of security tactic,  and then hit him with questions that should stir up memories of his Stones years  (all 30 of them). It was that or get hung up on.

So, the Rhythm Kings… Wyman’s been touring with them for 12 years now and is  upfront about the fact: “It’s not a career move for me by any stretch of the  imagination. It’s not a money earner either. We just do it for the love of  playing together and for the love of the music.

“It’s just a joy. That’s the only reason I do it.”

They’ve got Geraint Watkins on piano (“Bob Dylan’s favourite British  pianist,”), Georgie Fame on organ and “the great” Albert Lee on guitar, plus  special guest Maria Maulder (Bill sings her most famous song, Midnight at the  Oasis, gruffly, but sweetly, down the phone).

And I figure that’s that then. We can move onto other topics.

However, at 76, it turns out Wyman’s still pretty wily and is an absolute  expert at turning anything and everything back around to the Kings and his other  projects – of which there are oh so very many, from photography and archaeology  to designing metal detectors and writing books.

For instance: Life on tour must have changed quite dramatically since your  early days in the music business (read: during the Stones’ heyday)? “[It’s] more  pleasurable, not as crazy,” he admits. “Not as violent, not as loud, not as  aggressive, not as mad – I mean mad as in crazy girls leaping all over you and  doing two chords of a song and then it was all over because they all poured on  stage or something. It’s not like that obviously.” He says it with only a  grazing sense of nostalgia, before cutting swiftly back to today’s pre-approved  topic of conversation: “It’s much more pleasurable now because we play to an  audience that really appreciates us.”

It seems facetious to suggest you couldn’t get fans more appreciative than  Stones fans, but this is the problem with not being able to ask outright about  his former band: despite Bill publicly announcing he still considers them  friends, you can’t help but hear hard edges to every vague reference he makes to  them. From whether he feels like he’s different since those mental early days: “I feel the same actually,” he says laughing. “I’m still next to the drums  playing bass, I’m not a frontman, never was.” To what he’s most proud of: “I was  proud of my 30 years in the Stones and I really love the 12 years I’ve had with  this band. It’s very easy going, there’s no pressure on having hit records or  charting, or anything like that.”

And then, just as you feel you’re getting somewhere, he’ll fox you completely  by going on a bizarre tangent about the struggles of getting your laundry done  when you’re performing in a different town every night. This alone shows he must  have changed since his Stones days; surely he didn’t give a toss about clean  shirts when he was bedding those 1000 women Maxim magazine feted him for?!

“People have to do it themselves, they do their undies, hang ‘em up in the  bathroom, I don’t, I just bring more than I need,” he chatters. “That’s probably  the most difficult thing when you’re travelling on tour – it sounds absurd but  it’s a fact. You’re laughing!”

I was expecting glamorous stories I tell him. “Glamorous stories? There  aren’t any,” he says raising his voice. “It’s glamorous from the outside, not  the inside. The glamour is two hours on stage every night, that’s where the  glamour is. The rest of it is hard work and boring stuff, travelling in a bus  for four hours.”

Despite the slight digs at his old band mates, filtered through passion for  his current ones, Wyman did join the Stones onstage for their 50th anniversary  gigs at London’s O2 Arena last November. Disappointingly he was only asked along  for two songs, didn’t get invited to Glastonbury and told the Huffington Post  afterwards: “I’ve always maintained that you can’t go back to things, and they  can never be the same.”

He’s adamant his comments weren’t presented in quite the right way though. “I  never said that. Mick always says that, he don’t like looking back and the past.  I do because I write lots of books, I keep diaries, so I have to refer back,” he  says, unable to not mention those nine books of his. “I have no problems about  looking back into the past at all. The hard thing is looking into the  future.”

So I press him on the past. Of all the people he’s recorded with,  photographed and written about, who has been the most inspiring and exciting to  work with? “That’s difficult. There’s so many,” he says before proving his point  by reeling off the likes of Supremes’ Mary Wilson, Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler,  George Harrison, Chris Rea and Paul Carrack (no Jagger you’ll note).

You get the feeling he could never run out of names to drop, or projects to  keep him occupied, and he’s a family man too (“Who am I listening to at the  moment? My wife telling me how good the girls are doing at school,”).

Next up he’s writing another solo album: “Which is a bit crazy at my age but  it’s turning out quite nice actually, quite different, I like it. I’m singing  very low, friends of mine like Bob Geldof are saying it sounds a bit like Tom  Waits, J.J. Cale and people like that.”

He’s also working on a continuation of his life story, because his first only  told up until the end of the sixties. Does he ever see himself retiring? “I see  no point really. If I’d thought of retiring I’d have retired 20 years ago, I  just enjoy continuing with five, six, seven projects, taking them to wherever  they’re going to take me. Whether it’s finishing a book, or doing a photo  exhibition, or upgrading the restaurant or doing archaeology, or whatever I do,  you know? I just do it and get pleasure out of it. I’m very lucky.”

He sure is that.

First published by the Cambridge News: http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Whats-on-leisure/Choice/Bill-Wyman-Glamorous-stories-There-arent-any-Its-glamorous-from-the-outside-not-the-inside-20131031060000.htm#ixzz2jm8NT0qp

REVIEW: James and the Giant Peach, Cambridge Arts Theatre

James and the Giant Peach

James and the Giant Peach, Cambridge Arts Theatre, Tuesday, October  29

It’s rather a struggle to explain just how utterly ingenious, mesmerising and  giddily brilliant this production of James and the Giant Peach is.

The Birmingham Stage Company have done Roald Dahl’s tale of an orphan, a  giant peach, a gaggle of seagulls and a motley collection of oversized insects,  justice – and that’s saying something.

It pops with sound and colour, whip smart jokes and songs that soar and fizz,  telling the story of James (Tom Gillies), who, after being orphaned by an  escaped rhino, is sent to live with his two gruesome aunts, Spiker and Sponge.  Cruel, self-obsessed and smelly to boot, they treat James like a slave until one  day a wizened old man turns up with a bag of glowing crocodile tongues packed  full of magic. James promptly trips and drops the lot and then something rather  wonderful happens… the dried up old tree at the end of the garden sprouts a  perfectly humungous peach.

By half time my brain was a-buzz, my mind agog and reeling with the pace of  it. The cast, all dolled up in fabulous outfits (Centipede with his many legs,  Spider looking oh so Parisian in a beret, Ladybird in polka dots and Grasshopper  dapper in green), race around playing instruments live, and tumble about the set  magnificently springing puppets, dipping into UV and singing away – the  choreography is unreal.

Earthworm (Rhys Saunders) is hysterically morose, jiggling like a mad thing  when used as bait for a horde of seagulls, while Gillies is suitably kind and  thoughtful as James. But it’s the supporting cast of Giovanna Ryan and Oliver  Lynes that look like they’re having the most fun. Lynes gets to run about as a  set upon reporter (potato masher in hand as a mic); they don Victorian striped  bathing suits and flippers, squawking and flapping with fluffy seagulls pinned  to their heads, and slither and scoot around the stage as hungry sharks – they  are the witty details that shimmer, shake and bring in most of the laughs (of  which there are many).

The attention to detail is as perfect as the set is fantastical: there are no  behind the scenes, everything from props to actors-in-waiting are disgorged,  ready to leap into focus and brandish their magic, while the peach, well, we  wouldn’t want to give it away, but it comes in a fair few guises and at one  point is launched into the crowd….

Clever, bright and endlessly enchanting, the sinister edge that undercuts the  book wriggles in, the darkness rubbing up against the lightness of escape and  making new friends, but it’s funny (yes, being eaten by a rhino is rather  hilarious), heartfelt and will leave you grinning manically.

What an adventure. I’d quite like to get caught up in it again.

First published by the Cambridge News.