Coffee-Table Notes

Dundee Rep - Sat 8-Sat 29 March 2008 3 stars The broken-down piano on which Romeo pounds out a restless opening medley in James Brining’s new production of Shakespeare’s tragedy of teenage kicks suggests too much energy married to a lack focus beyond a few bars of lovesick blues. Kevin Lennon’s tousle-headed Romeo is soon distracted from his letting-off-steam routine when the rest of the boys come calling, and drag him out partying. It’s a powerful opening on Neil Warmington’s wide-open set, a decrepit ballroom stained with dust, then whitewashed as some wonky retro student bar for poshos to pick fights with each other in. Elsewhere, Emily Winter’s Lady Capulet is a primpingly perfect social climber straight out of Wisteria Lane, who wants her little girl to marry into even more money on the right side of society. Cliff Burnett’s Friar Lawrence is some laid-back hippy guru confidante who doles out guidance to the rich, but whose string-pulling of the lovers’ fake suicide pact goes horr...

Voodoo Rooms, Edinburgh, Tuesday April 1st 2008 Oran Mor, Glasgow, Wednesday April 2nd 2008 Barry Adamson is making his pitch. The way the composer, crooner, ex Magazine and Bad Seeds bassist and now big(ish) band leader tells it regarding his forthcoming eighth album, ‘Back To The Cat,’ though, sounds like making movies. But then, the absorbed iconography of a million first-generation pulp-fiction flicks has always filtered into Adamson’s back-catalogue. Titles like ‘Moss Side Story’ and ‘Taming Of The Shrewd’ cast arch little clues of the noir-flavoured narratives within, not so much concepts as studiedly cool, genre-savvy scenes. On the eve of Adamson’s first ever tour, the action goes like this. “There’s panorama,” he says, “and big ideas, but it’s taking a small point of view. There’s the cat as an outsider, living off scraps in the gutter, but living off his wits as well.” ‘Back To The Cat’ is a restless, freshened-up burst of vintage after-hours apparel. From warped, finger-popp...

Marks and Spencer’s women’s-wear department isn’t renowned for it’s 1920s drama queen range, let alone any appropriate for sunnier climes. It’s here, however, nouveau cabaret troupe 1927 are to be found stocking up on uncharacteristically loose-fitting outfits. The night before they fly out to Sri Lanka with last year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe hit, Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea, in tow, such purchases, it seems, are essential. “I look like my Mum,” opines Suzanne Andrade, who makes up a quarter of 1927. “All we’ve got is these wintry vintage outfits that we wear onstage, but now we’re all kitted out.” Regardless of any sartorial inelegance, one can’t help but wonder what Sri Lankan audiences more used to vintage Shakespeare will make of Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea’s black-humoured irreverence. “I have absolutely no idea,” Andrade says of the Herald Angel award-winner, which arrives in Glasgow this week as part of an Arches showcase of fringe works. “We’re ...

The Ark, Edinburgh Friday 14 March 2008 4 stars With scheduled headliners, Italian skronk power trio Zu, depleted in ranks by a broken-limbed drummer, last-minute reinforcements come in the shape of ubiquitous sticks-man Chris Corsano, briefly home on shore-leave from his extended gig with Bjork. The timing is fortuitous, as a project with Zu bassist Massimo Pupillo (with guitarist David Chalmin) as Dimension X has already produced an album based on a 1950s science-fiction radio show. Before the main event, however, things are enlivened by two somewhat refreshed young men jumping onstage and grabbing the mikes to inform one of the support bands at length how shit they are. While they’re still playing. One dance-floor fracas later, and Corsano and Pupillo’s twin rhythm unit bring some kind of well-drilled harmony to the room. Both parties lead, as Corsano’s restless cymbal and mallet play feeds off Pupillo’s distorted bass. Keeping any heaviosity to a minimum of busy, low-attention-span...