Friday 24 September 2010

Which Features Mr Mitch Benn, Rock Star

Last night found me in Bath once again, even though it was a work night and I was knackered and feeling somewhat battered, due to my visit to the Chiropractor on Wednesday (of which more later)

I was in Bath because the fabulous Mr Mitch Benn was there, performing at Komedia. I haven't been to Komedia before. I've previously seen Mitch at the Rondo Theatre, which is a nice but tiny theatre on the edge of Bath - a bit like a pub with tiered seating.

Komedia is a converted cinema, all red and blue and gold and fancy plasterwork, and an echo.

And Mitch Benn is a comedian and singer, and if you don't know him and all his works, you should. Go here and look, go here and download. You know you want to.

Anyway, I had fortified myself with a nice half of Bellringer Beer and some rather disappointing potato wedges at a pub down the road (Memo to the Westgate Pub - please check the definition of 'crispy' as it applies to bacon, and do not raise expectations which you cannot satisfy) and so was already beginning to de-stress by the time I got to Komedia.

Mr Benn certainly competed the de-stressing process! Having been to several of his gigs before I knew pretty much what to expect . There were lots of songs I was familiar with - 'Sing Like an Angel', 'Size Zero', 'African Baby' 'Now He's Gone' & IKEA.

There was the wonderful 'Macbeth'

Mitch commented that if you hang around with Thespians, then sooner or later, one of them will come out with the old chestnut that if Shakespeare were alive today, he'd be writing Eastenders. Mitch's comment was that no he bloody wouldn't (Doctor Who, maybe, "he's been in it, after all, and Neil' s doing it, so Shakespear can't be far behind" )

Macbeth is his take on what Shakespeare might, in fact, write if he were around now. And it's Awesome!


We also had some newer songs; such as the topical "The Pope Wants Vicars" (Which won my heart by rhyming 'Saint Thomas Aquinas' with 'scared of vaginas', and the song which definitely got the biggest cheers of the evening -
"Proud of the BBC" which is a response to all the selfish tightfisted bastards  individuals who begrudge paying the licence fee and want to destroy privatise the BBC.  It ROCKS. And I especially liked the 'FUCKFUCKFCKFUCKStart again' in the second line, although I suspect that may not actually be part of the official lyrics...

Mitch also did his 'write a new song during the interval' party piece - based on suggestions from the audience about topical news stories, which you've got to admit is impressive.

All in all, it was a great evening, and I came home with my very own 'Proud of the BBC' T-Shirt.

Of course, the one small fly in my ointment was that being a Thursday night, I still had to get up & go to work in the morning, but what the hell..

1 comment:

FairiesNest said...

Now that sounds like a completely marvelous way to de-stress!