Judy, Judy, Judy

After his acclaimed Garland recreation at Carnegie Hall, it was The London Palladium's turn to submit to the ultimate gay fan-boy tribute. There was certainly a crackle of electric anticipation as the celeb heavy crowd took their seats. Black suited Paul Morley anxiously read text messages, and no doubt already started to stitch together his end-piece in next months Observer Music Magazine. The chubby one from Keane happily posed for photo's and signed autographs, and Kink Ray Davies sneaked in late (and out early) with an unfeasibly young lady on his arm. Elsewhere, spotted by Hywel and Joe, were Mark Gatis and Julia Davis.

The orchestra assembled and a youthful, raven haired, conductor led them through the overture, melding together instrumental glimpses of the Garland catalogue, before a be-jewelled, gold-suited Rufus took the stage and started belting out those funny, familiar, forgotten show-tune classics. He made a decent fist of it, considering these were songs selected for a 40 year old woman to sing 45 years ago, in a different key, they didn't sit too awkwardly on the young pretenders shoulders. There was an obvious and long standing love for the material, which elevated his delivery above Robbie's sham Sinatra-esque warbling. However the limits of the Wainwright vocal range were highlighted, and in songs littered with the word 'me', his pronounciation of the personal pronoun as an elongated 'may' palled after a while.

When the show started to sag a little he invited his sister Martha on to sing Stormy Weather, and she received the biggest cheer of the night so far, as her delivery totally eclipsed that of her brother, as did her sincerity and emotional honesty. For one thing that Rufus failed to maintain was a genuine respect for the material. These are songs that were crafted by some of the finest tunesmiths of the twentieth century, but somehow his giggling self-deprecation robbed them of some of their dignity. He even seemed to snigger during 'Over the Rainbow' which is a song that simply must be played absolutely straight (ha ha) in order for it to work.

A tremendous round of applause of the end of the re-created show, set up an extended encore, which saw Martha returning to sing a divine "Someone to Watch Over Me". Things got a bit cheesy in a That's Entertainment kind of way when Rufus was joined by Garland's daughter Lorna Luft for a number before the house lights finally came up, and the greasepaint finally came off.

So not the momentous event that might have been, but a pretty unmissable one-off (well two-off anyway as he's back next week).

Is this a Bafta I see before me?

Two superb central performances, a vividly evoked sense of place, and a welcome capacity not to simplify events make this pretty much unmissable. Forest Whitaker was totally deserving of his recent Bafta and is surely fave for the Oscar for his all consuming Amin, James McAvoy is also totally believable as the willingly gullible, deeply flawed and wildly ambitious personal physician. The fact that his character is a construct of a number of real people, help to make this an impressionistic version of events, and somehow, because it doesn't stick slavishly to documentary realism, gives a far more believable portrayal of the man and his brutal times.

There's nothing you can know that isn't known.

Who'd a thunk that we'd be sharing our Burlesque Valentines evening, at Swanky 1940's supper club The Pigalle, with Lily Savage, Cilla, Pauline Fowler and Fanny the Wonder Dog's owner!

A New Career In A New Town

At last, the position I was born to take up, sadly not paid, but the power to play ones own peculiar brand of crap music to a captive audience is irresistible.

Poker is definitely not the new career though after another appalling night chez Chandos. I blame the cards again, didn't get a single pocket pair all night. We started playing at 19:30 and I didn't win my first hand until 10:55. Exasperated at my steady trickle of losses, chasing flops with garbage, I finally went all in pre-flop with the first decent hand I'd had all night; AK. Sadly someone with a crap hand matched me (more out of sympathy then anything) and ended up with two pair, while I ended up with ace high. Bolleux.

Schlock Book

In the early 1970's Paul Verhoeven made a series of films in Holland that were unconventional, sexy and toyed with the radical ideas of the spirit of '68. Rutger Hauer often starred in them, and while they weren't outstanding they signalled a director who wasn't afraid to film what interested him, was very happy to press the 'shock' button, and who was reluctant to compromise. Then came Hollywood and a series of mainstream fare; 'Robo-Cop', 'Basic Instinct' and the schlockiest of the lot 'Showgirls'. There was some critical defense of these ultra-commercial films, and much was made about their supposed radical sub-texts.

'Black Book' is touted as being a return to the more honest film making of his early days. However to me it looks like once you're up to ears in schlock there's just no way back. This was poorly plotted, simplistic, cliched stuff, and didn't even have the tension or suspense to make it a decent war movie. There was no serious attempt at delving into the disturbing psychological impact that the events at the end of the second world war had on the subjugated Dutch population, and in comparison to some of the complex, and difficult films that Fassbinder made about this period, this twaddle seems insultingly trivial, gratuitously titillating, and maybe even anti-Semitic.

Glam Folk

The last time I saw Jim Moray was at Madame JoJo's, a gay disco in Soho, at the launch gig for his second album last spring. This was a much more down-home event, in a very typical folk club, in Twickenham. Last time he had a full electric band, this time it was just the lad (in sane) himself on piano, guitar and mandolin, and occasional support from a fiddle player and an accordianist. The set was all traditional songs, and this stripped down band showed up a slight lack of character and variation in his voice, but also what an excellent folk guitar player he is. Reminded me very much of Martin Carthy, using the guitar as an agressive percussion instrument, rather than to play the melody. He also seemed more relaxed and at home, but I also felt he was playing to the wrinkly, ponytailed, graying folkies, and accordingly restrained himself from any but the most subtle electronic interference.

Support came from Lisa Knapp, not someone I'd ever heard of previously, but she was excellent. Playing guitar, auto-harp and fiddle, her voice was beautifully clear and plaintive, and her choice of songs was inspired. I bought her CD afterwards, and it is probably one of the better albums of last year.

I See A Darkness

The first support act for Bonnie 'Prince' Billy at the Queen Elizabeth Hall were a British three-piece called ...Bender. I'd never heard of them, but checking up later they've been around for years and have been churning out albums as well, God help us. They were one of the most pointless bands I've ever seen. They seemed to think looking moody and making some fuzzy guitar noises was somehow acceptable in 2007. I would have been ashamed to be churning this stuff out 30 years ago.

Next up was Dawn McCarthy, singer from Faun Fables, she had a pleasant enough voice, but her delivery was amateurish in the extreme, not just naively unpolished, but downright sloppy. Her songs didn't have enough of a melody to hold your attention for more than a few seconds, and the lyrics seemed wholly inconsequential. She sings back-up on most of Billy's new album, and she came back later and acquitted herself perfectly well singing those tunes, but as a solo artiste, just didn't hack it.

The Bonnie 'Prince' himself was in very good humour, exchanging banter with the keyboard player, do his funny little one-legged jigs and generally seeming to be having a great time. He played a wide-ranging set , with a fair amount of the new album which I've been listening to a lot. His voice is quite slight, if charming, and sometimes he can hardly seem to be there, he's so under-stated. The band were good in a country rock, Crazy Horse-lite kind of way. I found it odd that they came back for an encore, and played for another half an hour, and by the end I was ready to hit the road.

Take a Punt To Cuba

Come along.