Reviews
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Re-Enactment: The Diggers, Mark Thomas, Victoria Melody and the Brighton Folk Choir
“Your freedom to uphold / seeing Cavaliers of old / to kill you if they could / and rights from you withhold /Stand up now Diggers all!” Was it all just a fever dream? A sunny Saturday lunchtime, and my folk choir is singing a 17th century folk ballad in Whitehawk, encouraging gardeners with pitchforks… Read more
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Review: Paul Merton and Suki Webster’s Improv Show, Comedy Store
Note – a shorter version of this review is in today’s Morning Star newspaper. The Comedy Store is showing its age. The logo is very eighties, as are much of its regular clientele. Most are here to see Paul Merton, him off the telly, who has been doing improv for longer than your correspondent can… Read more
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Review: Julia Masli, Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, Soho Theatre
This article first appeared in the Morning Star newspaper. Can clowns save the world? This probably wasn’t what Julia Masli, an Estonian performer trained by the notorious Parisian pedagogue Philippe Gaulier, had set out to achieve with her latest. Still, you never know. Masli always aims high, with seemingly limitless reserves of care, poise, and… Read more
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This Machine Kills Wasps with MJ Hibbett, The Highchurches, Jo Burke, Shelf, Selena Mersey, and Mikey Bligh Smith
I arrive early, and the sound guy is already there. Conveniently, his name is Guy. Guy, the sound guy. Sound guy Guy. Guy Guy sound. He is friendly, and Australian. We have a nice chat, and as he sets up the stage, I learn his interest in experimental rock, music theory, and production. This is… Read more
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The Ace Doctor Who Podcast reviews The 2023 Christmas Special: The Church On Ruby Road
It was a very interesting experience, editing this in a pub in New Year’s Eve, removing pregnant pauses to a banging soundtrack of Heaven 17 and The Human League. I uploaded it before midnight, which was met in our local by a crack addict falsely announcing that he had just proposed to his newly pregnant… Read more
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Brighton Toy and Model Museum
Underneath Brighton station is a treasure trove of forgotten dreams. Brighton Toy and Model Museum, once the Sussex Toy and Model Museum, specialises in “the golden age of British and European toymaking”, and there isn’t much in here beyond the 1970s. Each of these four Victorian cellars is intensely packed with dolls, boats, trains, and… Read more
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Jim Bob review: Chalk, Brighton 19th November 2023
Jim Bob, former Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine frontman and professional rabble rouser, is on stage in sunglasses and a particularly sparkly jacket. This is a rearranged gig from the summer, postponed when the hotel next to the venue burned down just before showtime. The singer addresses the walrus in the room. “We were gonna… Read more
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REVIEW: A Tokyo Romance: A Memoir, by Ian Buruma
Note – this first appeared in my substack newsletter, which you can subscribe to here You know how it is. It’s the mid-seventies, you’re an upper-middle-class Anglo-Dutch student, and you’re macho-posing in a red jockstrap to Tom Jones’ “It’s Not Unusual” in a seedy theatre behind Kyoto station while a topless dancer writhes around you.… Read more
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Review: Lower Decks Season 3, Episode 6: Hear All, Trust Nothing
Much post-modern Trek has left me cold. This isn’t really Star Trek’s fault, as such. Though known as being more erudite than most franchises, it has inevitably surrendered to the endless reboots, prequels, and ironic regurgitations of classic source material that defines and sustains today’s pop-culture industry. Franco Berardi wrote about the “slow cancellation of… Read more
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