WITH Tim Minchin filling arenas and the Flight of the Conchords enjoying the kind of female adoration reserved for boy bands, these are good times for the art of musical comedy.
It’s a path that’s been well-trodden for the past decade by ex-Bluecoat pupil Mitch Benn, and, if this hilarious show is anything to go by, a TV slot to go with his Radio 4 show is surely there for the taking. On stage for the first time in Liverpool for seven years, Benn starts off with a brilliant opening montage that shows his talent for musical mimicry. Bob Dylan singing a Christmas cracker joke, Chas and Dave singing political satire and the Human League singing exclusively in double-entendres, were just some of the unlikely but hugely accurate impressions Benn pulled off (ooh-er).
Backed by his two-piece band, The Distractions, Benn’s own songs are no less amusing, with his dexterous word play coming to the fore on a song about the Queen Mother’s alleged love of reggae (“She would say one and one when she meant I and I”). The surprisingly mixed crowd of Benn devotees lap it up, as Benn plays to the gallery, and his proud mum sitting in the front row.
At the interval, he accepts a challenge from the audience to write a song on any topic in 15 minutes. When he returns, it is with a perfect take-off of Billy Bragg, singing a song about the England team’s poppy scandal and the forthcoming Doctor Who movie. It’s a wonderful moment.
A laugh-out-loud send-up of Chris Martin and Co, called Everything Sounds Like Coldplay Now, gives the chance for Benn to vent some spleen about the mundanity of modern life, but it’s on his closing passionate defence of the BBC that he really hits full flow. Hopefully it will earn him a series.
Jamie Bowman
