The Scotsman review of our Edinburgh Fringe gig
By SUE WILSON
THE TIGER LILLIES ****
SPIEGEL GARDEN (VENUE 87)
TAKING terms like "not for the easily offended" and "not suitable for children" into an entirely new dimension, the Tiger Lillies return to delight their many Edinburgh Fringe fans with another musical wallow in filth and depravity. Their pioneering approach to the currently burgeoning genre of postmodern cabaret combines a Brel-esque fondness for the demi-monde's dark side, with the incongruous (yet hilarious) chirpiness of old-fashioned English music hall, all underpinned by sharp, expert musicianship.
The show's deliciously disturbing off-kilter ambience is compellingly centred in lead singer Martyn Jacques's remarkable voice, an operatic mezzo-soprano that would be hard to credit without having witnessed it emerging from his burly frame, causing this reviewer to wonder momentarily if the castrato tradition really is a thing of the past. Combined with Jacques's grotesquely smeared face-paint (its effect augmented by a fine display of contorted grimaces and eyebrow action), the effect is to bump up the queasily camp sexual ambiguity that pervades the performance, which features Adrian Stout on bass and Adrian Plump on drums alongside Jacques's accordion, piano and ukulele.
Ambiguity is the least of it in some of the more outrageous songs, which touch on recreational murder and infanticide, compulsive masturbation and doing unspeakable things to choirboys, while Jacques's ukulele evokes a diabolically twisted reincarnation of George Formby.
Performed with a manic crispness and glee that reduced the audience to helpless paroxysms, such material also points an implicit accusing finger back at us: what on Earth are we doing, laughing at this stuff? Heightening the unease further are a series of slow, strung-out, gutter-trawling torch-songs, sensually suffused with anguish, on such topics as suicide, despair and love for sale. When the trio solicited audience requests for an encore, one fan was heard shouting for The Hamster Song. Perhaps mercifully, said rodent's fate was left to our imaginations on this occasion: they opted instead for a rousing rendition of their Banging in the Nails - sung from the viewpoint of a particularly enthusiastic assistant at Jesus's crucifixion.
