Well, James beat me to getting the first Birmingham gig review to the list, but hey, I always prefer to come second. (That sentence was specifically included for the benefit of Dale) Another day, another sparkling B&S gig. The Alexandra Theatre is conveniently situated between The Foundry on one side, which was hosting a goth / skatekid nedfest at the time; and a strip club on the other side. Where did the band go after the show? Place your bets now... Inside the theatre, it was hotter than a vindaloo in a microwave in the Sahara. But the walls were decorated with pictures of past performers, including Sid Little and Eddie Large's autographs, and Lionel Blair on top of Maureen Lipman. Which you don't see every day. The auditorium went up and up forever, hence Stuart announcing after the first song (Le Pastie, introduced as being "A song about a cake") that he'd have to play the rest of the gig lying on his back so everyone could see him; and the band later worrying about whether they had bald spots which could be seen from the upper circle. Stuart then went on to talk about how he was bullied at school for having a bald spot from the age of 12, and how he wished all the other kids had now turned completely bald. I didn't make notes as I went along as to what the setlist was, but it was more-or-less the same as the previous nights, with a few alterations. Slow Graffiti made an appearance (despite Stuart fluffing his lines), as did Mayfly. They also played You Made Me Forget My Dreams, which Stuart said he was very nervous about because they hadn't practiced it. Stevie's voice has finally revovered, enabling him to reach the high notes on Jonathan David (not an easy task, as anyone who has tried singing along in the comfort of their own room will know). The cover in the middle was Heroes by David Bowie; for once noone accused them of planning and practicing it beforehand, and Stevie apologised to any Bowie fans at the end. Stevie also announced that he wanted to have kids, at which point Stuart said by the time he was old enough, they might have invented a way for men to have babies; and Stevie replied "Adoption?". At another point, a large Scottish flag was draped across the front of the stage by someone on the front row; prompting Stuart to talk about how he wasn't into all the SNP Scottish independence stuff; not least because if Scotland was independent, England would permanently be ruled by the Conservatives. But the big news: another new song! Instead of I Love My Car, they played a different new one; a Northern Soul / Motown style song all about a relationship coming to an end in a not-very-amicable fashion. Stuart said they hadn't decided on a name for it yet; I'm wondering if it's going to be the new single? It would certainly sound good with a 40-piece string section behind it (the string players on stage were going at it all the way through), it would be a lot more logical choice for a single than the time-signature-morphing I Love My Car, and the name confusion would explain the delay in confirming the details of the new EP. And David Moore and others will be pleased to know that it's another song which is absolutely impossible to sing along to, Stuart almost sounded like he was yodelling in the chorus... The atmosphere wasn't up to Scarborough standards, partly because the stewards refused to let anyone dance in the aisles, even by the end of Legal Man only about 10 people were stood up. But never mind, the sound was good and the band played really well. Three girls were dragged up onstage during Wrong Girl and again during Legal Man to dance (and received their disco dancing medals); half the audience were jealous, and the other half felt sorry for them because they looked so embarrassed. It was too hot in there to do much dancing anyway; Stuart even suggested at one point that the band and the audience should all take all their clothes off to cool down, but he chickened out... Post-gig, the bar was already shut (at 10.15!), forcing us to, erm, go to the pub instead. And then 5 of us took an impromptu tour around the sights of Birmingham looking for a chipshop (the city mysteriously appears to have more lap-dancing bars than food outlets), before getting the hell out of the city. Let's face it, there aren't many places in the world that make Preston look glamourous. Well, that's my gig-going over with. They're so much better live now than a few years ago; it's the first tour where loads of songs have sounded better than they do on the record (Legal Man, Too Much Love, The Model etc). Here's hoping it's not another 3 years until the next one! Big Stu +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail sinister@missprint.org. To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to majordomo@missprint.org. 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