Marcus Brigstocke, Chorley Little Theatre, 11 April 2013

Marcus Brigstocke's Brig Society tour came to Chorley and played to a full house.  Politics was the overriding theme for the evening. Brigstocke set his stall out in the opening minutes with a few jokes about Margaret Thatcher that, despite the nearness of her death, were acerbic without bordering on the tasteless. 

The central concept of Brigstocke's two and a quarter hour show was a critique of David Cameron's vision of a Big Society, with members of the Chorley Little Theatre audience appointed as ministers for Education, Health and Transport and free to make up policies of their own. The truck driver given the transport brief duly abolished people who hog the middle lane, proposing that machine guns be fitted to the front of lorries in order to remove offending vehicles in the centre of the motorway.

Brigstocke demonstrated he could easily have been a politician. Not only did he go to a posh school and have a very good line in appearing to talk down to people but he also made a splendid fist of explaining how the banking crisis occurred. His use of audience participation to illustrate how the banks lent other people's money to those that couldn't afford to repay was as clear as anything the BBC's Robert Peston might come up with, and in the process he emptied the audience's pockets of more than £50. His analogy of the Greeks staying in the Euro being like gatecrashing a German run nightclub and being unable to keep up with the music also illustrated his ability to extract a gag out of unpromising material.

George Osborne (net worth £4m) and David Cameron (£30m) were targets of his ire for pursuing the Government's economics policy, but so too was Jimmy Carr for the tax avoidance measures he employed and made headlines with last year.

Some of what Brigstocke does is hardly comedy at all. His rant against The Sun ('why does anybody still buy it? They hacked into a dead girl's phone') could be that of a left wing politician, and his amusing comments about UKIP leader Nigel Farage speared the pretensions of the UKIP leader to be treated as a serious politician more effectively than anything being said by the mainstream party leaders. Proving Brigstocke is also no fan of Labour Ed Miliband was dismissed with a withering one liner about his appearance.

But it wasn't all about politics. Brigstocke questioned the necessity of most train announcements and washing your hands after visiting the lavatory, whilst also cautioning men against drying their genitals in a Dyson airblade.

Despite its length and the weighty subject matter, the show was evenly paced and by the end the audience had been entertain and educated, with everyone having a better understanding of economic policy and with those who 'invested' money in Brigstocke to help him illustrate the banking crisis once more clutching the banknotes he borrowed mid show. Unlike the audience member in Leeds who Brigstocke apparently took £10 off and omitted to refund, finding the money in his shirt pocket afterwards, the Chorley audience did not go home unrewarded.

Justin Moorhouse, Chorley Little Theatre, 16 March 2013

Justin Moorhouse is fat.  But not fat in a bad way.  He’s more of your affable Hairy Biker kind of fat, the sort of genial fat bloke who’d elbow his way past you in his eagerness to get to the cream cake counter at Greggs and crack a gag in the process such that you wouldn't mind him beating you to the last eclair.

And Moorhouse is comfortable with his size.  It's not glandular or due to big bones.  It is, as he tells a packed house at Chorley Little Theatre, because at home the biscuits are next to the kettle.

Food is a subject close to Justin's heart and at different points in his act the biscuits, a sausage roll and a Ginster's steak slice all feature.  But it isn't just about food, and in a two hour set he also talked about his relationship with his teenage son, his eight year old daughter's obsession with Catholicism and whether, when the rest of the country was facing civil unrest, riots in Euxton and Whittle-le-Woods were ever a realistic proposition.  His conclusion?  They weren’t.

He has a go at teachers in a ‘I’m not having a go but –‘ kind of way which even the teachers in the audience could not help but laugh along at, before - and using an image that will be instantly familiar to everyone who's ever been on a Sunday outing with their family - recounting a childhood visit to Botany Bay that came to an abrupt halt when his father refused to pay the admission.  His own visit to an owl sanctuary as a parent witnessing bored dads trying to get a 3G signal in order to watch the football on Sky on their smartphones also resonated. 

Moorhouse wasn’t afraid to be edgy – his jokes about Paralympian swimmers and the Asian guy running his corner shop had the audience wondering whether they dare laugh or not while he showed that beneath the affable exterior lies an experienced comic when he dealt firmly with a drunken heckler who, having slept through the first hour of his act, started to shout incoherently.

A good comedian draws you into their world, settles you into your seat with an introductory gag or two and then takes you on a journey looking at things you might not have thought you were going to spend your evening contemplating.  So it was with Justin Moorhouse.  Gay sex, teenage masturbation and paedophilia were probably not topics that the audience were expecting to be listening to as they sat eating their pre theatre madras in the curry houses of Chorley, nor where they thought Moorhouse would be taking them when he stepped onto the stage and blinked at them from behind his spectacles.  But that’s where he took them.  And they loved him for it.

Tull, Octagon Theatre, Bolton, 2 March 2013

Tull, a play by Manchester United scout Phil Vasili about the life of Walter Tull, runs at the Bolton Octagon Theatre until 16 March 2013.

Walter was the first black player from Britain to play professional football (Arthur Wharton, who played in goal for Preston North End and who was the first black professional footballer, was born in the Gold Coast, now Ghana) and served with distinction in the First World War.

The play tells the story of Walter's life from the death of his mother through his football career at Tottenham Hotspur, where he was hounded out by racism from fans and opposing players, to his death in the spring of 1918 in Flanders.  Tull finished his football career at Northampton Town, chose to enlist and, had he survived the war, was ready to sign for Glasgow Rangers on the cessation of hostilities.

The play is performed by a cast of eight people who between them perform over 100 different parts. There is no scenery and no costumes. Despite this, the play works thanks to dramatic lighting effects, an able cast and a tight script.  Nathan Ives-Moiba, who plays Tull from the age of 6 until he dies on the battlefield is the one constant, with the rest of the players taking on the roles of Walter's family, key political and military figures in his life and football people that he encountered.

Tull encountered racism throughout his life, none more so than when he was at Spurs, and his relationships with Northampton's legendary manager Herbert Chapman and Suffragette Annie Williams are at the heart of the play.  This is a gripping tale and a must see for football fans as well as anyone just wanting to see great drama.

The final chapter of the story, as directed by David Thacker, has yet to be concluded.  For being black, Tull was denied the posthumous honour of the Military Cross that a white army officer would have been granted for similar acts of bravery in combat.  Until that wrong is righted (and there is an online petition to government calling for it to happen) this play serves as a fitting tribute.

Richard Thompson, Liverpool Philharmonic, 1st March 2013

Richard Thompson's reputation is built on that of a folk guitarist who, since his days as a founder member of Fairport Convention, has forged a solo career that now spans six decades. But Thompson likes to mix it up a bit and his latest UK tour features him at the heart of a solid three piece band with his new album Electric at the core of the show.

Accompanied by bass player Taras Prodaniuk and a powerful drummer in the shape of Michael Jerome, Thompson presented a set at the Liverpool Philharmonic that was at the rockier end of the folk rock spectrum, verging on heavy rock at times.

Opening with a trio of songs from the new album, most of which is played during the course of the following two hours, Thompson led the band through a thunderous set played mostly on a fetching pink Fender Stratocaster.

Dressed in his customary black clothes and black beret, a two hour performance saw Thompson displaying the virtuoso guitar skills that have led some to place him up there with Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton. And when the band encore with a cover of Cream's White Room, the comparisons are easy to make.  Thompson was cribbing from a lyric sheet for the song, but whilst he smilingly struggled to remember the words, his fingers never missed a note.  Clapton, take note.

As well as expert musicianship, part of the attraction of Thompson's live act is his witty repartee and he cheerily reminds his audience that no evening's entertainment is complete without both a murder ballad and a sea shanty, the latter finishing in 9/8 time.  When an audience member calls out for a song that the band hasn't rehearsed, he jokes that 'I’m the only one up here that knows that. Not that it's stopped us so far.’  And when fan favourite Beeswing is requested from the front stalls he responds ‘I’ve got the wrong guitar for that - unless you want the punk version,’ and then proceeds to play a couple of bars in just that style.  Beeswing later features in the encore, beautifully played on the acoustic.  Since it wasn’t on the original set list, Thompson presumably decided to accede to the shout from Row D.

Alongside staples such as Wall of Death and Did She Jump Or Was She Pushed, new songs Saving The Good Stuff For You and Salford Sunday stand up well.  Thompson remains one of Britain's foremost singer songwriters and whilst this current tour does not reflect the full range of his songwriting talent and the extent of his impressive back catalogue it does showcase his immense skill as a guitarist.  Rock on, Richard.

Terry Alderton, Chorley Little Theatre, 4 February 2013

When you go to see a stand up comedian it's reasonable to expect that the act will stand up and tell jokes.  But with Terry Alderton what you get is a running, jumping and falling over comedian with at least two voices in his head and a range of sound effects that would put the BBC's radiophonics workshop to shame.  It was entertaining and non stop, and the term 'stand up comedian' really doesn't begin to describe Alderton's act.

Much of the humour on display at Terry Alderton's gig at Chorley Little Theatre was visual.  The venue was barely a third full but an enthusiastic audience saw this Essex stand up deliver a tour de force.  Billed as 'work in progress' some of the gags fizzled out, yet it was still interesting to see and hear how the character of Liam at the Apple Store in the Trafford Centre is developing.  Similarly, Alderton's discovery of a vibrator in his wife's bedroom drawer was a theme that he appears still to be working on, as he returned to it several times during the evening.

One of Alderton's stage tricks is to turn his back on the audience and pretend his inner voices are talking to him with the audience able to eavesdrop. This device works both as a means of delivering a joke but also as a way of parking one that hasn't quite caught light.

At times the sketches - they are too unformed and flow into each other too much to be called gags - seemed to go nowhere in particular, but it is not due to a lack of material on Alderton's part.  If anything, watching his performance was at times like flicking through the channels with a TV remote and only staying with each programme for a few seconds.

The performance is full on.  Alderton is a ball of energy and a brilliant mimic too, whether it's pretending to be two feuding neighbours in Northern Ireland or a call centre operator in Mumbai.

Alderton was supported by affable Geordie Seymour Mace, whose act included his take on a visit to Botany Bay and an enthusiastic performance fulfilling a 'lifelong ambition' to be a backing singer with Gladys Knight & The Pips.

All in all, a good night's entertainment and the Chorley audience left feeling they had their money's worth. At £8 for a ticket this was excellent value for a comedian who has already been on the small screen in various guises and is determined to make it as a stand up and an equally funny support act.

Chris Ramsey, Chorley Little Theatre, 27 November 2012

Chris Ramsey likes Chorley. He was back at the Little Theatre within 18 months of his last visit and has already booked a further gig at the venue in April of next year. With his Feeling Lucky tour he was bringing a brand new stand up show to town and on more than one occasion in front of a full house told the audience how pleased he was to be there.

Hailing from South Shields and most recently starring in the BBC comedy Hebburn set in the North East, Ramsey often laughs at his own jokes because, as he admits, he doesn't always know what he's going to say until a second before the words come out of his mouth.

In a 95 minute set, he focused on how lucky the audience were to be there in the Little Theatre, and how genetics and historical chance had brought them all to that point. In his own case, having his Dad drop him on his head as a two year old and then Ramsey almost drown himself in a swimming pool whilst on holiday in Spain were particular adventures that he was lucky to survive.

Although there were a series of themes that developed from his central argument about luck, the main theme itself could have been better developed and in truth the set flagged at one or two points.  However Ramsey’s engaging style of delivery kept the attention of his predominantly youthful audience and kept the laughter flowing.

The climax of his act wove his account of a sky dive and the recurring theme of his Dad's taste for practical jokes together. If you are a nervous flyer, Ramsey's description of preparing to leap from a small aircraft ('it was like a van with wings') will not make you any more likely to want to board an aeroplane.

Ramsey made headlines earlier in the year for being accused of breaking into his parents’ house, and his photograph on the mantelpiece and his driving licence carrying his parents’ address did not immediately convince the constabulary of his innocence.  He had something to say both about Russell Brand's predilection for female company and Roy 'Chubby’ Brown's reputation for telling racist jokes, neither of which he seems to appreciate.  He also had to admit to being kicked off Sky TV’s Saturday morning programme Soccer AM for making inappropriate comments.

But Ramsey is hardly controversial.  His material is no more filthy than that of many modern stand ups, although he possibly bases more of his material around using public lavatories than most.  Ramsey admits to not using public toilets if he can avoid them, but has various stories about encounters with lavatory attendants with whom he seems to have the unhappy knack of encountering, usually immediately after they have cleaned their establishmentand are leaning on their mop admiring their work and when he is desperate to use their facilities.

Ramsey engages with his audience, laughing at their jokes and making barbed comments as appropriate that take the crowd along with him.  He didn't  fill the Chorley Little Theatre in 2011.  In 2012 it was deservedly packed out for his return.  Grab tickets for his April appearance while you still can.

Jenny Eclair, Chorley Little Theatre, 5 November 2012

Jenny Eclair's Eclarious tour brought her back to Chorley Little Theatre for the second time in under two years.  She could sell out bigger venues but would appear to like the intimacy that Chorley's home of comedy provides.

After a nervous start, in which her delivery was noticably rushed, she settled into her stride.  She gave us a taste of her novel, which was nothing more than middle age porn with its references to sumptuous furniture, before prowling the stage and launching into an exploration of the issues facing women of a certain age.

Eclair is from Lytham St Annes, and whilst her familiarity with the North West is welcome, as the audience was immediately able to picture her portrayal of her no nonsense mother, the story about what she got up to in the bus shelter in Lytham is less so. How she got such big biceps is a gag that was told on her last visit and was one of several jokes that she told last time she played Chorley and which should have been rested.

She was funnier with her newer material, with much of her act focused on the perils of being over 50, whether that is lack of bladder control or having to hold onto one's breasts when running to stop them flopping about.  She is unimpressed with Madonna's propensity to flash her nipples when other women of a similar age are more inclined to slump on the sofa drooling biscuit crumbs from their mouth.

Jenny doesn't really do sex, and doesn't know why her partner Geoff is still with her given her overall decrepitude.  Her preoccupation is with how her body, and those of all women of her age, is changing, whether it's her hair falling out or the shape of her knees.  These are revealed to a disbelieving audience to be rather, er, manly.

Eclair does not have any pretensions. At home she prefers to spend the day in her night dress if she can, and doesn't like unannounced casual visitors because it means she has to put her clothes on when she could simply stay in her knickers. Small children are particularly unwelcome because of their tendency to make a mess.

Eclair attracts a predominantly female audience - 90% of the Chorley Little Theatre crowd were women - and they loved her take on post menopausal life.  But the men too were laughing out loud.

Another sell out gig at Chorley Little Theatre and a happy comedy audience.

The Rolling Stones, O2 Arena, London, 25 September 2012

By rights the Rolling Stones should be part of a Sixties nostalgia package, pitching up at Preston Guildhall once a year and running through their number one hits in a 20 minute slot before making way for Gerry and the Pacemakers or Herman's Hermits. Instead they are charging £375 for tickets at the O2 in Greenwich, which singer Mick Jagger wryly noted isn't that far from Dartford, where they started out fifty years ago.
Their ticket prices generated headlines when they were announced, and the Stones have always been about headlines, whether it's drug busts or inappropriate use of a Mars bar. And the reason why they're not relegated to touring as a Sixties act in municipal venues across suburban England but can still sell out arenas around the globe is because they have a treasure trove of rock classics and a mastery of the craft of putting on a rock show that few bands can match.They also, despite their ages, love what they do. Guitarists Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood were in fine fettle and drummer Charlie Watts, resplendent in white tee shirt, was captured on the big screen that was projected behind the stage grinning from ear to ear.

The band's delight at being back on stage shone through in their performance. From the opening bars of their second ever single I Wanna Be Your Man, written for them by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, through to a thunderous Jumping Jack Flash, the band were on fire. Hits from Get Off My Cloud and It's All Over Now through to Start Me Up and a note perfect Brown Sugar came in wave after wave, reminding the audience that as well as being rock's perennial bad boys the Rolling Stones have recorded a juke box full of great songs.
But they also have a slew of album tracks from the late sixties and early seventies on which their musical legend is built and Wild Horses, Gimme Shelter and Sympathy for the Devil all get an outing as does a pulsating Midnight Rambler with Mick Taylor, who is officially the only past or present member of the Stones to look more like a building labourer than a rock star, making a guest appearance on lead guitar and stalking Jagger across the stage.

Honky Tonk Women, Miss You and a Bill Wyman backed It's Only Rock'n'Roll added to the occasion, the group knowing exactly which buttons to push to get the audience up dancing and singing along.

The highlight of the show was undoubtedly the encore, with the anthemic You Can't Always Get What You Want played to the accompaniment of a full choir sending a collective shiver down the spine of the audience. Were the ticket prices outrageous? Yes. Did the band give value for money? Yes. Can you put a price on seeing the greatest rock'n'roll band in the world for what could be the (very) last time? Absolutely not.

At the end, Mick Jagger stayed on stage bowing to the audience long after the rest of the band had left, so perhaps this really is the last time and perhaps the Stones will finally just make headlines for what they'll always be remembered for - their music.

The Wedding Present, The Ritz, Manchester, 9 November 2012

The Wedding Present were once termed an indie band.  But whilst they might be 'semi legendary', as self effacing main man David Gedge introduced them, the 'indie' label hardly seems appropriate for an act whose three guitarists are at one point all facing their amps and trying to extract maximum feedback from their instruments.  And I was reminded, as Gedge closed their 90 minute set by wringing one last riff out of his guitar with two broken strings flapping in the breeze, of no less a comparator than Neil Young.  The hair may be shorter but the aural barrage is pure grunge.  Maybe the Godfather of Indie and the Godfather of Grunge should talk.

The gig was showcasing the band's Seamonsters album, which is twenty years old.  Personally, I don't think playing an album in its entirety and in the order the tracks originally appeared works as a device.  Heather would make it into my all time fave Wedding Present tunes.  Some of the other things on the album frankly wouldn't, and even if I was a big fan of Seamonsters I'd prefer the tracks to be sprinkled around the set.  Surely part of the fun is not knowing which songs that a band with a back catalogue stretching back more than 25 years is going to spring on an audience?

That criticism apart, it was a great gig and the large audience (large describes the kind of middle aged man who was a skinny indie kid 25 years ago) had a good time.  Before reaching the main course of Seamonsters, the band served up a series of starters , with Girl From The DDR off their last album Valentina and various other delights including Mars Sparkles Down On Me, the delectable Sports Car and the ever dependable My Favourite Dress.

The show was over too quick and, as always with Mr Gedge, there was no encore.  One day perhaps he will surprise the audience at the end of a concert by popping up back before the microphone instead of at the merchandise stall.  I went home clutching my newly purchased Live 1991 CD, which features tracks from Seamonsters played out of sequence to how they appear on the original studio album, and listened to Heather all over again.  Loud!

Rob Rouse, Chorley Little Theatre, 10 November 2012

Being related to a comedian can't be easy.  Les Dawson's mother-in-law was the butt of many of his jokes, and stand ups who use observational material will inevitably be drawn to the people around them as subjects.

It seems doubtful that Mrs Rob Rouse realised that her bladder and bowel movements were going to feature quite so prominently in his act when she first started dating the comedian, who was visiting Chorley Little Theatre on his 'Life Sentences' tour.  Not that Mrs Rouse is the only member of the household whose toilet habits get a mention since the bowel movements of Rouse, his children and one of their friends all get discussed.

Chorley Little Theatre was barely half full for this exploration of the Rouse family's bodily functions, but those audience members who came wrapped in their coats to brave the slightly chilly temperature were soon warmed by the laughter Rouse generated.

After an introductory joke about Saturday evenings being a comedian's Monday morning and how it was important not to dive straight into work in case you make a mistake such as 'Chorley police tasering a blind man with a white stick', Rouse turned to his main themes for the evening.

One was his four year old son, who features heavily in Rouse's act, whether it's the tale of him appearing at his father's bedside at 5.30am to begin the endless stream of questions that a growing young mind needs answering or bursting into the lavatory with his potty to share an intimate moment with Dad and let the postman see the two of them having a bowel movement.

Rouse's at the time unborn daughter also features, with the effect of her her penchant for poking his heavily pregnant wife's bladder acted out on stage.  Her birth at home is also described in graphic detail, and one hopes that Mrs Rouse was given the opportunity to vet the material before her husband performed it to a wider audience.

Life as a parent is acutely observed, with his son's testing of his father's patience by prodding a lump of cheese with his finger bringing flashbacks for anyone who has raised a toddler.

A member of the audience was invited to drink a cup of tea that may have been made with Rouse's wife's breast milk ('but to tell you the truth I really can't remember') and sportingly took up the challenge, while the audience's reaction to the idea was 'milked' for all that it was worth.

Rouse is witty, filthy and thoroughly engaging as a comedian but definitely not for the under 16s, and you probably wouldn't want to be sat next to your gran at a Rob Rouse show either.  He wasn't fazed by the sparse audience and created an intimate atmosphere with his warm manner and enthusiastic way in which he threw himself around.  (For a 'stand up', he spent quite a proportion of his act on the floor.

The Chorley gig was filmed for a DVD and audience members present on the night have been promised a free copy.  When they drop through the letterbox it'll be a chance to show their comedy loving friends who decided to give the show a miss that this genuinely funny man deserves a bigger audience.  And a chance for Mrs Rouse to consider whether she wants her husband in the delivery room if she chooses to have another baby.

Rolling Stones - Crossfire Hurricane

Crossfire Hurricane
Director:  Brett Morgen
Cert 15

Crossfire Hurricane, the new documentary about the Rolling Stones, premiered at 300 cinemas worldwide including The Odeon, Preston.

It is difficult to find something new to say about a band which has probably featured in more books, magazine articles and TV programmes than any other.  But director Brett Morgen has managed it in this fasicinating trawl through the vaults of TV stations across the world.

Culled from TV and cinema footage, much of which is previously unseen or unshown since it was first broadcast, the film is both a treasure trove for hardened Stones followers and an education in the band’s history for the uninitiated.

The heavy bias towards the 1960s reveals the chaos of the early days of the Stones, when the band strummed Popeye The Sailor Man because the girls at their concerts screamed so loudly that the audience could not hear a note that was being played.  So too are the darker days of the group, including their descent into serious drug abuse in the late 1960s, with the death of guitarist and founder member Brian Jones touchingly remembered.

The horror of the Altamont concert, when an audience member was stabbed to death by the Hells Angels hired by the band to provide security at the gig, and guitarist Keith Richards' arrest for heroin possession by the Canadian police in 1976, are also examined in detail, giving a warts'n'all picture of the self styled greatest rock'n'roll band in the world.

The current day opinions of the band are voiced over the soundtrack, interspersed with the more youthful images of Mick Jagger, Keith Richards et al, and only at the very end - with an outtake from Martin Scorcese’s Shine A Light which featured the band in concert in 2008 - do we get to see the wrinkled old rockers in anything like their present state.

What carries the film along is the music, from Route 66 by way of I Can't Get No Satisfaction and Honky Tonk Women through to Miss You, with contemporary footage of the band performing numbers on TV shows that in some cases has not seen the light of day in more than 40 years.

Crossfire Hurricane will be available on DVD before Christmas.  Stones fans unable to make it to view the film on the big screen should start writing that letter to Santa now.

Greg Davies, Chorley Little Theatre, 6th October 2012

Greg Davies is a big man, as he was happy to admit to a packed Chorley Little Theatre when his The Back Of My Mum's Head show rolled into town.  Describing his body shape as resembling that carved by a four year old from a big piece of ham, he confided to the audience that the waistband in his underpants had snapped before he came on stage and that, whilst we might not witness the event, his underpants might fall down inside his jeans at some point in the evening.  Being so large had a number of other drawbacks, including the fact that he'd destroyed two toilets at home in one day.

Having shared his wardrobe malfunction secret, and engagingly got the audience on his side, this former teacher (perhaps best known for playing the teacher Mr Gilbert in The Inbetweeners) revealed his agenda for the evening, helpfully set out on a flip chart.  Davies did not go so far as to tell the crowd when they should laugh but such information would anyway have been superfluous, as they were laughing from start to finish.

The show was a well paced mix of story telling and audience interaction, with Davies' observational comedy taking random incidents in his life and weaving a narrative from them, such as the east London taxi driver who called Davies 'Big Bird' on picking up his fare and, having riled his passenger from the off, then got into an argument with him about what the ingredients of a pie are.  'It's pie, isn't it?'

Davies' top five involuntary noises, with the Pick of the Pops theme tune helpfully hummed by the audience, included a reference to a friend caught spying on his sunbathing neighbour by his monster of a wife.  Davies disguised 'Darren's' real identity to spare his embarrassment only to accidentally blurt out his real name, which is now known only to Davies and 250 theatregoers and staff.  Apart from the laugh it got, the mistake was ironic since Davies' theme was how adults need to censor what they're thinking in a way that children don't.

Davies' parents feature in much of his material, with his mother's concern about Davies being bitten by a fish whilst he was up a mountain so baffling to him that he produced a script so that the audience could help him act out the telephone conversation he had with her and his father.  His mother's 'it's not normal' refrain was reflected back by Davies to highlight how everyone says or thinks things that perhaps they shouldn't.  His friend Nicky's confession at a university Truth and Dare party that he'd fondled his sleeping grandmother's breasts was one example, whilst the hospital consultant asking Davies if there was going to be another series of The Inbetweeners whilst performing a cystoscopy on him was another.

Davies tells a story with a suitably conspiratorial air.  His family's camper van being followed through the American countryside at night with his parents terrified they are about to be killed only for Davies' then 12 year old sister to save the day by hanging out of the back door waving a plastic machine gun to scare their pursuers away has everyone on the edge of their seats, intrigued and amused.

The show concluded with the audience joining Davies on his guitar singing a song about a bonsai tree called 'I wish I was a bonsai tree'.  Music and comedy does not always work, but as a means of concluding a very funny set Davies succeeded in creating the sense of a camp fire singalong and making the audience feel they had been part of something special.

Davies' support was Ed Petrie, better known to younger readers as a presenter on BBC children's television shows.  Petrie suggested he had been asked rather at the last minute to accompany Davies on the tour, a statement which was supported by a short and slightly stumbling set that concluded in him forgetting his last joke.  The Chorley audience gave him a sympathetic hearing but the belly laughs were reserved for Davies.

Dexy's, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, Friday 21st September 2012

A Dexy’s concert attracts an interesting mixture of mainly older audience goers, reflecting the fact that the band that was once Dexy’s Midnight Runners were big in the 1980s.  Dexy’s have been through innumerable line up changes (Wikipedia lists 30 current or past band members) but at its heart is Kevin Rowland, backed by whichever set of musicians he has enlisted to provide the silky texture to underscore one of Britain's finest vocalists.

Rowland is a tortured musical genius who over the years has enjoyed a difficult relationship with critics, fellow band members and his wardrobe.  In response, he attracts a small but devout following that includes middle aged soul boys wearing flat caps, turned up jeans and leather soled shoes.

The show starts with new album One Day I’m Going To Soar.  Played in its entirety, it does not make things easy for the non believer.  Audiences wanting the greatest hits do not always appreciate having to sit through unfamiliar concept albums, as bands going back to The Who playing Tommy in the 1960s have found, and One Day is not a comfortable first listen.  With its spoken word sections and confessional tone, the album is far from uplifting material.  As Rowland says in new song It’s Okay John Joe ‘I don’t show much of myself in life, but in my music I tend to put it all in.’

Things are not helped by the vocal being slightly muffled in parts and a reverential atmosphere descends.  There is little attempt to build a rapport with the audience and conversation is restricted to a few thank yous, reflecting Rowland’s shyness.  But there are strong songs on the new album, and if there was any justice in the world the single She Got A Wiggle would be blaring out of radios everywhere.

The lack of audience interaction continues once the new album is dispensed with, with one of the band appearing dressed as a 1950s police sergeant for inter song banter with Rowland.  It’s a pre rehearsed device that could have been insensitive in the light of the shooting of the two Manchester police officers but as a means of setting up This Is What She’s Like and Tell Me When My Light Turns Green it works, with the latter number proving to be the highlight of the show.

Rowland finally plays one of his trio of instantly recognisable hits with world wide chart topper Eileen.  Sadly fellow number one single Geno, the eminently singalongable Jackie Wilson Said and other songs that got radio play in the band’s heyday do not get an airing.

Despite this, by the end most of the audience is on its feet, waving hands in the air and dancing in their seats.  The faithful have been rewarded.  With less emphasis on the new album and a better selection of songs from a strong back catalogue, the non believers might have been dancing from earlier on in the show too.