The Plastic Bag Awards 2016

The awards season has arrived again so it's time for the Plastic Bag Awards for 2016. The judging panel has been locked away scrutinising the nominations and they're ready for the big announcement. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Baggies 2016!

Best Theatre - Shakespeare

2016 was the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare so there was lots of Shakespeare all over the place, not only productions of his works but also exhibitions and a host of events. I saw quite a few and saw big productions at The Globe but it was productions at the small Sam Wanamaker Playhouse that got the most nominations. The nominations are:

Cymbeline @ Sam Wanamaker Playhouse
Richard III @ the Almeida
The Winter's Tale @ Sam Wanamaker Playhouse
The Tempest @ Sam Wanamaker Playhouse
King Lear @ The Old Vic

The judges were split between 'Lear' with the astonishing performance from Glenda Jackson and 'Richard III' with Ralph Fiennes in the title role but it came down on the side of Richard for the instant menace he seemed to be able to turn on at the drop of a hat. He was scary!

Best Theatre - Drama

There doesn't seem to be much 'drama' in the West End at the moment - or, at least, drama the appeals to me to buy tickets, so these nominations span the far east and west on London as well as the Southbank.

The Philanderer @ The Orange Tree Theatre
Kenny Morgan @ The Arcola Theatre
Ivanov @ The National Theatre
The Plough and The Stars @ The National Theatre
Amadeus @ The National Theatre

The Orange Tree Theatre at Richmond is doing a good job of introducing me to old plays that are rarely performed and the Arcola came up with a gem of a play in 'Kenny Morgan'. The National Theatre's short Chekov season was worth a visit over the summer and it's another National Theatre production that wins the Baggy - 'The Plough and The Stars' at the Lyttelton. The Sean O'Casey play was hard work and emotionally exhausting and I regret only seeing it once.

Best Theatre - Musical

There were lots of musicals on in 2016 and it looks like there'll be more in 2017. I could easily have added 'Kinky Boots' to the list but I think that was nominated last year. This years' nominees are:

Billy Elliot @ Victoria Palace
Showboat @ The Crucible
The Threepenny Opera @ The National Theatre
Titanic @ Charing Cross
She Loves Me @ Menier Chocolate Factory

'Billy Elliot' has been on for a decade or more but I finally saw it in 2016 shortly before it closed in Victoria. The other four nominees are much older and that makes me wonder what's happened to the modern musical (but not too much). I loved 'Showboat' and 'She Loves Me', both classic musicals, and 'Titanic' is a show that should be on in the West End at some point, it really is that good. But the Baggy goes to 'The Threepenny Opera' for it's songs and plot, it's menace and threat and all the rolls of brown paper used in the sets - well done people, I loved it!

Best Entertainment

An 'entertainment' is something that doesn't really fit into any of the other categories and this year we have one-woman shows, poetry readings and walks up and down the Southbank and Bankside to see short videos of all Shakespeare's plays. And mad juggling and acrobatics, obvs.

Ellen Terry With Eileen Atkins @ Sam Wanamaker Playhouse
Poems That Make Grown Women Cry @ The National Theatre
The Complete Walk @ Southbank & Bankside
Barbu by Cirque Alphonse @ Wonderground
Longing Last Longer by Penny Arcade @ Soho Theatre

The award goes to Penny Arcade for her latest show, 'Longing Last Longer' at the Soho Theatre. Challenging, scary and familiar as Penny paints a picture of modern living I recognise and, in parts, abhor as she leads us through her urban jungle with words and performance. Well worth seeing.

Best Gig

I only went to four gigs this year and all were 'oldies':

Pet Shop Boys @ Royal Opera House
Petula Clark @ Theatre Royal, Drury Lane
Suzanne Vega @ Cadogan Hall
The Human League - Royal Festival Hall

Pet Shop Boys and Suzanne Vega were promoting their new records and it's nice that they're still recording. However, the Baggy must go to the Pet Shop Boys for a truly spectacular show at the Royal Opera House with lasers shooting all over that grand old building and me wondering if the balconies would survive the bone rattling volume.

Best Live Performance

This award is for an individual performance that leaves you feeling 'wow!' Spoken word, song, dance... anything that moved me.

Eileen Atkins as Juliet in 'Ellen Terry With Eileen Atkins' @ Sam Wanamaker Playhouse
Petula Clark singing 'I Can't Live Without Your Love' @ Drury Lane
Rebecca Trehearn singing 'Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man' in 'Showboat'
Itziar Mendizabal as Paulina in 'The Winter's Tale'
Victoria Serra singing 'Lady's Maid' in 'Titanic'
The Human League singing 'Love Action (I Believe In Love)'

Eileen Atkins playing a 13 year old girl and making me believe she really is Juliet and the sheer elegance of Itziar Mendizabal as Paulina were both astonishing. The sad truth of Rebecca singing about love and the simplicity of Victoria as she throws her arms wide in joy at the prospect of becoming a maid were heartbreaking moments. Petula and the Human league singing their classics were a joy to behold. There has to be one winner however and, after  tie-break, the panel awarded the Baggy to Rebecca Trehearn for her marvellous and tragic performance in 'Showboat' and, in particular, *that* song.

Best Dance

This is only the second year for this award since I discovered the beauty of classical ballet and the Royal Ballet at the Royal Opera House. I was also lucky to see four productions by the Bolshoi Ballet that took over the Opera House for a three week season over the summer. The nominees are:

Giselle by the Royal Ballet @ the Royal Opera House
The Winter's Tale by the Royal Ballet @ the Royal Opera House
Jekyll & Hyde by the McOnie Company @ The Old Vic
Swan Lake by the Bolshoi Ballet @ the Royal Opera House
The Red Shoes by Matthew Bourne/New Adventures @ Sadler's Wells

I loved the drama of 'The Winter's Tale' and the freshness of 'Jekyll & Hyde' but the Baggy must go to 'The Red Shoes, the new Matthew Bourne production that I saw just before Christmas (and have booked to see it again at Wimbledon on tour). The sheer originality of the thing, the characterisation, the marvellous dancing and the great sets all make this an instant favourite.

Best Exhibition

I saw lots of exhibitions in 2016 due to having the time to visit them. From a fascinating exhibition about the history of Sicily at the British Museum to a small Punk exhibition at the British Library to a lovely little exhibition of the paintings of Caillebotte at the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid. Exhibitions about all sorts of things so it's a little bit strange that all the nominees are exhibitions  about paintings.

Painting the Modern Garden - From Monet to Matisse @ the Royal Academy
Delacroix and the Rise of Modern Art @ the National Gallery
Georgia O'Keeffe @ Tate Modern
Paul Nash @ Tate Britain
Impressionists and Moderns @ CaixaForum Madrid
A Thyssen Never Seen @CaixaForum Barcelona

The O'Keeffe and Nash exhibitions helped me to explore artists I wasn't particularly aware of and both were really good, giving me a glimpse into the artists in a way I haven't had before. The two CaixaForum exhibitions were excellent - brilliant paintings well laid out in light and spacious surroundings and I'll certainly keep my eyes on CaixaForum in future for interesting exhibitions. The Baggy, however, must go to 'Painting the Modern Garden', the best exhibition I've seen at the Royal Academy for years, gorgeous painting after gorgeous painting, a marvellous flower tent and Kandinsky in shorts tilling his garden. What more could you ask. I'll treasure memories of that exhibition for a long time to come.

So there we are, The Plastic Bag Awards 2016. Some of the winners are a bit of a surprise but all deserve it. Let's see what 2017 brings!

Two Gigs - Pet Shop Boys and Proms 19 Bowie Night

In the last month or so I've been to two big gigs: Pet Shop Boys 'Inner Sanctum' show at the Royal Opera House to promote their new record, 'Super'; and the Proms tribute night to David Bowie with string arrangements of some of his classic songs at the Royal Albert Hall. Rather than gigs, these were really concerts given the venues and despite the pop/rock nature of them both. And there's nothing wrong with a concert.

As recent convert to all things Royal Opera House I was interested to see what the Pet Shop Boys would do with that venerable red and gold auditorium and how the place would cope with marauding Pet Shop Boys fans... well, not quite marauding because your average PSB fan is, shall we say, largely past the marauding age. The bar seemed to have discovered beer and the ushers even allowed you to take glasses into the auditorium (something unheard of!). Ten the lights went down, the grand curtains lifted and the thump-thump-thump of electronic beats started. It was time for the Pet Shop Boys!

The show opened with lasers flashing and two big domes slowly turning revealing the lads to the sound of 'Inner Sanctum' from the new album and then mayhem was released with the best laser show ever - the '80s were good for something after all! It really was astonishing sitting there with these incredible lights and lasers firing off everywhere and creating patterns and shapes of wonder with those loud beats (phat beats anyone?) pulsing around the auditorium. At one point I looked round wondering when one of the balconies might collapse due to the endless thumping.

Song after song kept the atmosphere electric with a very eclectic selection of hits and favourites as well as a liberal sprinkling of songs from the new record. 'West End Girls' was, surprisingly, the second song to be played, and I quite liked that - get the obvious hit out of the way to keep us guessing later on. I loved hearing 'Winner', their Olympic song from London 2012 and the best song that summer, 'The Sodom and Gomorrah Show', the bouncy 'Love, Etc', 'New York City Boy', 'The Pop Kids' from the new record, 'It's A Sin' and the great 'Go West'. The encore was 'Domino Dancing' and 'Always On My Mind' with an outdo version of 'The Pop Kids' for good measure. The 'fat-suit' dancers at the end were inspired, something totally alien to that stage which is used to the athletic, powerful bodies of ballet dancers.

The second concert was on the stage of the Royal Albert Hall as part of the BBC Proms summer series and was dedicated to the music of David Bowie. Back in January, Amanda Palmer and Jherek Bischoff released an EP of six Bowie songs as a tribute to his passing. All were rearranged by Jherek for a string quartet and they made a suitably startling attempt at reinterpreting some of Mr Bowie's classics. That worked really well, but would it translate into a two-hour concert with various composers and arrangers re-arranging his music for the string orchestra that filled the stage?

It was a strange affair put together by Andre de Ridder and his chamber orchestra Stargaze. I had to keep reminding myself that this wasn't a long-rehearsed show of hits, but rather a set of re-arrangements for strings with guest vocalists but what worked for half an hour on Amanda's EP didn't really manage to sustain it over a full two-hours show. Possibly the problem was having too many different people doing the arrangements and too many different singers? If you're going to do something like this then you need big names and with the best will in the world you can't really consider someone like Neil Hannon 'big'.  The biggest pop name was Marc Almond and he wasn't really on form, only starting to come alive with a sing-along 'Starman'. The biggest 'cult' name was John Cale who actually brought most a band onstage for his three-song mini-set of 'Valentine's Day' 'Sorrow' and 'Space Oddity'. I liked his 'Sorrow' but 'Space Oddity' just went on and on and on ...

The women were far more powerful and imposing than the men. Anna Calvi did a haunting version of 'Lady Grinning Soul', Laura Mvula did a good job at trying to funk up a string version of 'Fame' and Amanda Palmer did a powerful 'Heroes'. Highlight of the evening was Amanda's and Anna's duet on 'Backstair' with Jherek prowling behind them with his guitar slashes.  That received a huge round of applause and, no doubt, lots of new fans for the two singers.

The concert ended with the usual 'get everyone back on stage for a sing-along' to the frankly weird choice of 'After All' from 'The Man Who Sold The World'. Why that song? Who chose it when there are so many great songs to send us out into the night on a high? Amanda, of course, brought her baby son on stage for that encore - what a collection of baby photos he's going to have when he grows up!

If a winner is needed then the gold medal easily goes to those Pet Shop Boys for a fabulous show - I want to live in that laser show! The Proms comes second for a worthy idea that, for me at least, didn't really work. But good on ye for trying.

All photos nicked from the internet, with thanks.

Advent #9 - 'It Doesn't Often Snow At Christmas'

Back in 2009 those pesky Pet Shop Boys scheduled a big show at the the O2 Arena as the culmination of their 'Pandemonium' tour in the UK so we, naturally, had to go. It was just a few days before Christmas and the weather gods decided to dump a whole load of snow unexpectedly onto London which messed up the transport system. That's what Neil refers to in the introduction to the song - there was snow and slush and ice outside the arena as they played.

This is a great song and ought to be played a lot more. I always have to join in with the emphatic 'BING CROSBY!' line and love the memory of the dancing Christmas Trees in their red wellies. Great stuff. Watch the video and then download the song!

Pet Shop Boys at The O2 Arena

On Tuesday we went to see those Pet Shop Boys and their new 'Electric' show at the big barn that is the O2 Arena (it was called the North Greenwich Arena during the Olympics). The lads have a new album out in July (also called 'Electric') so it was a chance to hear some of the new music before it's released. A ever, they delivered a spectacular show and had an astonishing light show.

As is often the case at the O2 we were seated miles from the stage so saw little people moving around and it was easier to see the close ups on the video screens. Chris, of course, stood behind his keyboards while Neil traversed the stage, usually accompanied by dancers. The lack of sight was made up by the spectacle of the show and it seems like the lads have re-discovered lasers in a big way since we were treated to some spectacular visuals. The sound was excellent and the new songs have a banging beat going on that made my foot tap tap tap which is encouraging for the new album.

There were some odd sequences with dancers (and, at one point, PSB too) wearing horned head-dresses that I assume is something to do with the new album but it made little sense to me. Some of the other costumes were more fun, especially Chris coming on wearing a glitter-ball as a helmet and sending shards of light around the arena and Chris wearing a mirrored bowler hat that didn't work as well as Chris's. Both are obviously influenced by the mirrored top hat of Sir Noddy Holder!

While the new songs sound good it was the hits that got me (and most of the crowd) excited. We were treated to 'Opportunities', 'Suburbia', 'Integral' and 'Domino Dancing'. My favourites were 'Rent', 'Love, etc', 'It's A Sin', 'Always On My Mind' and a big version of 'Go West'. The encore was (of course) 'West End Girls' with a follow-up of 'Vocal', the new single.

It's a show designed to be filmed and released as a DVD. A lot of money has obviously gone into it so I expect a live album/DVD pack like for the 'Pandemonium' tour. I'll be disappointed if we don't get it!

Pet Shop Boys 'Battleship Potemkin' - Meltdown 2013

This evening I was lucky enough to see the 1925 film, 'Battleship Potemkin' with the Pet Shop Boys soundtrack at the British Film Institute as part of Yoko Ono's Meltdown. Apparently this was a world first to see the film with the soundtrack as a film, rather than as a PSB performance.

It opened with a 20 minute interview with Neil Tennant about how they came to write the soundtrack and stage it with a full orchestra, first in London and then in other cities around Europe. It sounds like an amazing challenge and he described watching the film on DVD for the first time with Chris Lowe at his home in Durham with the sound turned off so they wouldn't be influenced by the existing soundtrack.  Neil then took his seat in the audience and the film started.

'Battleship Potemkin' is a silent film from 1925 with a cast of thousands (literally). It is masterfully directed by Sergei Eisenstein and tells the tale of the rebellion of the crew of the battleship in 1905 in support of the first Russian revolution, their support by the people of Odessa who are cruelly mowed down by Cossack bullets  and ends on the high of the battleship sailing unharmed through the squadron of ships sent to end its rebellion. I've never seen it before but it was marvellous.

It's a powerful film with so much going on I wouldn't dream of listing all of it. So many film techniques were used in this film and have been copied ever since. Like the baby in the pram bouncing down the Odessa steps, the Cossacks marching relentlessly down the steps like Cybermen, close-ups of maggots in the meat and so much more. At one level a simple story and at another a metaphor for so much more. A tale of minor grievances escalating into nationwide revolution. I was mightily impressed.

At the BFI you get a printed A4 narrative about films and the cast as you go in and so I am pleased to name some of my favourites in the film. All probably long-ago left us, but their names and images live on.  I liked:

- Aleksandr Antonov as Vakulinchuk, the sailor who starts the rebellion on the battleship and whose dead body on the pier of Odessa starts the revolution in the city;
- Beatrice Vitoldi as the 'woman with a pram' who is shot down by the Cossacks on the Odessa steps and who looked like a young Siouxsie;
- Propkopenko as the mother of the boy who is shot on the steps and carries his body boldly towards the Cossacks only to be shot herself; and
- N. Poltavtseva as the teacher with pince-nez who encourages people to approach the Cossacks as brothers and ask them to stop shooting only to be shot down herself.

They gave some powerful performances and I want their names recorded in this blog. It is a film of terrible beauty and power.

And the music? Pet Shop Boys have done themselves proud, with the soundtrack adding another level to the film. My favourite section was when the revolution whipped itself up to the music of 'Nyet' which was instantly re-named 'Disco Revolution'. Another favourite section was when the battleship sailed out to engage the squadron of ships sent to capture it and the music slowly speeded up the closer they came to ultimate engagement... and I won't tell you what happened next.

Thank you to PSB for taking on the challenge of writing the soundtrack ten years ago and thank you to Yoko for adding this to Meltdown. I've had my eyes and ears opened. That's a good thing.

London 2012 Olympic Songs

With less than two weeks until the opening of the London 2012 Olympic Games there seem to be two main pop songs in contention to grab our attention and become part of our memories of the greatest show on earth.  The 'official' song is 'Survival' by Muse and the challengers are the Pet Shop Boys with 'Winner'. I'm not sure if it's a generational thing or a pop sensibilities thing, but I prefer the humanity of the PSB song. It works on a more human and inclusive level.

The Muse song has a great video of sporting achievement and builds as the song builds but I'm not terribly keen on the overall sound or sentiment of the thing. I think 'bombast' when I hear it and think of the prog rock of the '70s. The lyrics are very 'me generation' from the '80s - *I* will survive, *I'm* gonna win'. Very Thatcher. Whereas the PSB song is inclusive and says, 'I'm a winner, you're a winner' and tells the tale of an athlete working up to the Olympics and how we're all winners. It's more in tune with the original sentiment of the Olympics, that's it's about competing, not winning..

Here are both videos so you can make your own mind up.