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inulroIt was incredible! The performance was fantastic and Almond himself comes across as completely lovely.
I'm not all that familiar with his solo work. <i>Non Stop Erotic Cabaret</i> is my idea of pop perfection[1], but despite my best intentions I never kept up with him afterwards, though I have heard some of it and have the single of "Jacky" around here somewhere.
The material ranged from upbeat pop numbers to cabaret torch songs. As you might expect.
This was one of those gigs where not knowing a lot of the material wasn't a problem - the songs are all beautifully crafted and, as mentioned above, the performance was superb. There was quite a bit of new material that isn't even out yet (which I will be purchasing as soon as it does). The one that stuck with me had "eyeliner" in the title, and while it's about coming out in the 70s and 80s, it resonates with me because being out as weird in a small town in those days wasn't easy either. There was a very unexpected cover of David Bowie's The London Boys (a track you have to nerd for Bowie as sadly as I do to even know; it's on the same album as The Laughing Gnome). I may worship at the alter of Bowie, but I have to say I preferred the Marc Almond version.
The tempo got pretty frantic towards the end and "Jacky" was done at approximately 3 times the recorded speed. Awesome.
Just when I was thinking that it was all pretty damn perfect even though he hadn't done any Soft Cell numbers, the second-to-last encore was "Say Hello Wave Goodbye". That's probably on my list of Top 10, or at least Top 20, songs that make me tear up every time I hear it. And it was live and so moving, even with the audience singing along.
He was on stage for over two hours. At one stage he was perching on the drum risers and shortly thereafter a chair magically appeared onstage for him, but he didn't end up using it.[2]
I'm so glad I went! What I get around to doing can be pretty random, and I wouldn't have pegged this as a priority except that I was given 15 minutes to say whether I was in or out (stop sniggering at the back), so I said why not. Many thanks tozoo_music_girl for arranging it all, especially getting such excellent seats. Isn't it amazing what you can do when you're organised enough to buy tickets as soon as they go on sale.
So. Um. Massive back catalogue to get collecting, I think. Apparently he's planning to do more shows next year. Must try to pay attention.
[1] I was 12 when it came out. Even in the land of both kinds of music, Tainted Love was all over the radio and I *loved* that song, but there was no way I could bring an album with that title home at that age. It wasn't till much later that I got to know the whole thing. And gosh, it's just possible that not being exposed to "Sex Dwarf" (one of my favourite dance floor tracks to this day) at the age of 12 was a good thing.
[2] Some years ago he was in a really bad motorcycle accident and it looks like his legs still aren't too reliable!
I'm not all that familiar with his solo work. <i>Non Stop Erotic Cabaret</i> is my idea of pop perfection[1], but despite my best intentions I never kept up with him afterwards, though I have heard some of it and have the single of "Jacky" around here somewhere.
The material ranged from upbeat pop numbers to cabaret torch songs. As you might expect.
This was one of those gigs where not knowing a lot of the material wasn't a problem - the songs are all beautifully crafted and, as mentioned above, the performance was superb. There was quite a bit of new material that isn't even out yet (which I will be purchasing as soon as it does). The one that stuck with me had "eyeliner" in the title, and while it's about coming out in the 70s and 80s, it resonates with me because being out as weird in a small town in those days wasn't easy either. There was a very unexpected cover of David Bowie's The London Boys (a track you have to nerd for Bowie as sadly as I do to even know; it's on the same album as The Laughing Gnome). I may worship at the alter of Bowie, but I have to say I preferred the Marc Almond version.
The tempo got pretty frantic towards the end and "Jacky" was done at approximately 3 times the recorded speed. Awesome.
Just when I was thinking that it was all pretty damn perfect even though he hadn't done any Soft Cell numbers, the second-to-last encore was "Say Hello Wave Goodbye". That's probably on my list of Top 10, or at least Top 20, songs that make me tear up every time I hear it. And it was live and so moving, even with the audience singing along.
He was on stage for over two hours. At one stage he was perching on the drum risers and shortly thereafter a chair magically appeared onstage for him, but he didn't end up using it.[2]
I'm so glad I went! What I get around to doing can be pretty random, and I wouldn't have pegged this as a priority except that I was given 15 minutes to say whether I was in or out (stop sniggering at the back), so I said why not. Many thanks to
zoo_music_girl for arranging it all, especially getting such excellent seats. Isn't it amazing what you can do when you're organised enough to buy tickets as soon as they go on sale.So. Um. Massive back catalogue to get collecting, I think. Apparently he's planning to do more shows next year. Must try to pay attention.
[1] I was 12 when it came out. Even in the land of both kinds of music, Tainted Love was all over the radio and I *loved* that song, but there was no way I could bring an album with that title home at that age. It wasn't till much later that I got to know the whole thing. And gosh, it's just possible that not being exposed to "Sex Dwarf" (one of my favourite dance floor tracks to this day) at the age of 12 was a good thing.
[2] Some years ago he was in a really bad motorcycle accident and it looks like his legs still aren't too reliable!
