I have to admit that I wasn't exactly looking forward to seeing Will Young again, I think once was enough, however he was very good and put on a decent show. He played a few numbers from his new Trip-Pop album 'Echoes' as well as the oldies that his middle aged female followers love so much. It was an odd audience demographic, normally at gigs people turn up just before the main act appears but everyone was loyaly in place before the slightly dull Lawson came on stage. There was no beer throwing or people throwing pints of piss, or fights. People in their 60s were looking very out of place at such a hip venue as the O2. However, the place was rammed, so he's certainly still popular and serves up his brand of pop very well. And he can sing, which is more than can be said for many acts out there.
Unfortunately these two were not on the same bill, I would have loved to have seen that! Mickey Mouse v Randy Orton, for example.
NIA, Birmingham
As everyone had been suffering from Disney withdrawal symptoms it was off to Birmingham to get close to that 'magic' feeling which we had all had in Florida. However, Florida this wasn't. In fact, the NIA in November is probably about as far as you can get from the atmosphere of the Magic Kingdom.
Nevertheless, we were all excited about seeing the Mouse-father again (albeit from a distance) and his hussey. The first half was a bit odd, starting with the Mouse-father breaking down in a car, to the car then being rescued by the characters of Cars. It was all very confusing.
Then, as if by (Disney) magic the show became all about Tinkerbell. This was nice and Tilly absolutely loved it, but I was bored shitless after a while. Thankfully the interval intervened just as I was about to start gnawing my own arm off. The second half was an entire recreation of Toy Story 3 on ice, which was very good and I quite enjoyed. The whole thing finished with a good old Disney sing song (above). And then the mouse and his followers disappeared.
Then, two days later Leo and I went to see another from of American stupidity. WWE wrestling.
I have to say that this was bloody brilliant. Why anyone would enjoy watching a fixed wrestling match was a question I kept asking myself, but I decided that it was OK because it is just entertainment. Nothing more, nothing less. You know who is going to 'win' before the match even starts, but somehow that doesn't spoil it. The athleticism and fitness of the guys (and gals) doing it is quite something. How they don't seriously hurt themselves is quite remarkable.
We watched a number of 'matches' each with their own bit of drama, comedy and ridiculous pants. My favourite of the evening was Sheamus v. Christian, a highly entertaining bout with insults (Shameus wiping Christian's t-shirt on his arse after Christian insulted Birmingham), comedy (Sheamus slamming Christian's bollocks onto the guard rail) and gravity defying throws (Sheamus throwing Christian over his head with one arm). The atmosphere was great, it was full of dads with their sons booing and cheering and it had a real pantomime atmosphere to it, which is precisely what it is. You have your goodies and your badies, except in this pantomime they throw each other over their heads and kick each other in the nuts.
Highly enjoyable stupidity which I fully recommend.
It's been a while since I've seen Neil Hannon, but every time I've seen him (often with completely different combinations of backing musicians as The Divine Comedy evolves) I come away thoroughly pleased with the evening's entertainment. I've been a fan since the 1990s and although he had some success with 'National Express' he is little known by the pop loving masses. This is a real shame because he is a top class composer, lyricist and all round musician.
I was a little concerned about seeing him solo, because much of his music relies on heavy orchestration. However, I actually really enjoyed the stripped down versions, most of which he played on the piano (which was handy as our seats were slap bang opposite). He was his usual witty self, dealing with the expected heckles with aplomb and making the odd mistake which cued a characteristic humorous expletive.
The surroundings of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and his Hamlet/Richard III/Banker costumes added to the atmosphere of a fantastic evening listening to a fantastic musician.
I wouldn't have gone to see Alan Carr ordinarily, but it was Vick's birthday and she likes him. I managed to get some tickets for the hospitality boxes, which was a steal because it was cheap, but we had our own balcony and bar. This made it a little more special than it would have been ordinarily.
His act was good. I'm struggling to remember any of the jokes, but he made a laugh for a couple of hours which was the main thing. A lot of it was observational with not as much smut as you would expect, although some crept in. I would have been disappointed if it hadn't.
Trigger Happy TV always made me laugh, so we took to chance to see it's creator and recent 'I'm A Celebrity' contestant Dom Joly. Unfortunately, despite the viewership of said reality programme not many had turned out to see him which I thought was a shame.
I have to admit that I was expecting more comedy from him. It turned out to be an abridged story of his life, how he went to the same school as Osama Bin Laden (yes, really) and how Trigger Happy came about. This was all interspersed with clips and cameo appearances from some of the Trigger Happy 'characters'. It felt a little disjointed and you could tell that he was trying to find his feet in the early days of his tour (this is ironic, because one of his feet was in a cast after he bust it on Celebrity Total Wipeout).
Overall it was a very enjoyable evening if not side splitting, but I'm not sure we'll see him do it again.
