Wednesday 31 August 2011

Lest we forget



Diana, Princess of Wales (born 1 July 1961 – died 31 August 1997)

Once upon a time...



Charlie Hides (aka Kandi Kane Baxter, aka Laquisha Jonz, aka everyone really!) is a drag genius. We have loved his stage act for years, and he appears to have taken to YouTube like a duck to water, with an extensive selection of parodies of beloved divas and other celebrities du jour.

His Madonna's GaGa nightmare series was launched on on the interwebs a little while back, and I love it! I thought I'd provide a bit of a catch-up...





Visit Charlie Hides TV for more delights!


2021 UPDATE: parts 1 and 3 have gone from the interwebs, but part 4 Hallowe'en Special is out there...

More good news from Auntie Beeb



The magnificent QI with uber-brainy "National Treasure" Stephen Fry is back on our screens on 9th September 2011!


Quite Interesting, indeed...

http://www.qi.com/

Tuesday 30 August 2011

Sail Away...


Stritchy, August 2011. Photo: Advanced Style blog

Just because I love her, here's a wonderful snippet from a Noel Coward documentary featuring Elaine Stritch to cheer us up on this miserable grey first day back in work:


Simply fabulous...

Monday 29 August 2011

Get out of here, we just don't have the time!



Another shock, horror moment - as we discover that the lovely Kim Appleby (who with her late sister was one half of Stock, Aitken & Waterman's finest Mel and Kim) celebrates her 50th birthday today!

Dear me, we are all getting old...


Respectable
Respectable
Respectable
Respectable

Tay, tay, tay, tay, t-t-t-t-t-tay, tay
Take or leave us only please believe us
We ain't never gonna be respectable

It's our occupation, we're a dancing nation
We keep the pressure on every night
Explanations are complications
We don't need to know the where or why

Tay, tay, tay, tay, t-t-t-t-t-tay, tay

Taking chances, bold advances
Don't care if you think we're out of line
Conservation is interrogation
Get out of here, we just don't have the time!

Tay, tay, tay, tay, t-t-t-t-t-tay, tay

Take or leave us, only please believe us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)
Like us, hate us but you'll never change us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)

(Respectable, respectable, respectable)

Hesitation is just frustration
Give us the music and we're alright
On each occasion, for your information
We can look after ourselves alright

Tay, tay, tay, tay, t-t-t-t-t-tay, tay

Take or leave us, only please believe us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)
Like us, hate us but you'll never change us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)

Respectable
Respectable
Respectable

Fascination is our sensation
We like to put ourselves on the line
Recreation is our destination
So don't wait up for us tonight!

Tay, tay, tay, tay, t-t-t-t-t-tay, tay

Take or leave us, only please believe us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)
Like us, hate us but you'll never change us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)

Take or leave us, only please believe us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)
Like us, hate us but you'll never change us
We ain't never gonna be respectable (Respectable)


Still an absolute classic!

Kim Appleby website

"We like this one, Pats!"



Great news!
Hit comedy Absolutely Fabulous is to return to BBC One later this year with three specials to celebrate the show's 20th anniversary, the BBC has said.

Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley will return as Edina and Patsy along with other original cast members.

Julia Sawalha will resume the role of put-upon daughter Saffy, June Whitfield as Edina's mother and Jane Horrocks as personal assistant Bubble.

The award-winning series ran from 1992 to 2003 with a special in 2004.

It depicted the raucous, fashion addicted lives of PR guru Edina, with her constant weight battles, and her best friend, the glamorous sex-mad magazine editor Patsy.

Saunders, who is also the show's creator, said: "Like a good bottle of champagne we hope that we have got better with time without losing any of our sparkle.

"Last week when we started filming in dear old west London, it was as if nothing had changed. It was raining.

"Nevertheless, we are so happy to be working for an audience that has grown just a tiny bit older like us, but is still willing to let us fall over on TV in the name of PR."
Any excuse for some classic clips...


Read more on the BBC

Buzz, Buzz



It may be a Bank Holiday, but some things will never change...

On this Tacky Music Monday, have I got something really kitschy for you! How about (a very old) Mamie Van Doren getting down'n'dirty about her phone?


Tasteful, as I am sure you will agree.

Mamie Van Doren website

Sunday 28 August 2011

New balls, please!



I am no major fan of tennis (or any sport for that matter), but now I have seen the latest Emporio Armani ad campaign featuring the lovely Rafael Nadal, I am prepared to change my mind...





Here's the video - deep joy!


http://www.armani.com/

Get Hep!



By some bizarre coincidence, today we celebrate not one but two birthdays - and the connection between them is quite joyful.

For the late Mr Donald O'Connor (before his greater fame courtesy of Singin' in the Rain) and the late Miss Peggy Ryan - born on this date in 1925 and 1924 respectively - together formed a formidable dance partnership in the 1940s, in the kind of "hep cat" teen movies that occupied the slot between Judy Garland/Mickey Rooney and the Frankie Lymon/Jayne Mansfield/Russ Tamblyn vehicles of the 1950s.

With titles like Get Hep to Love, What's Cookin'?, It Comes Up Love and Mister Big, this type of film was deliberately geared towards youngsters, and none of them was particularly "plot-heavy", working as they did as a fillip to the more mature and glossy (but similar) Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers/Eleanor Powell/Rita Hayworth dance extravaganzas.

But fun nonetheless!




Happy Sunday!

Peggy Ryan

Donald O'Connor

Saturday 27 August 2011

Isn't It Something?



We went to see the much-vaunted new Sondheim musical Road Show at the fabulous Menier Chocolate Factory on Thursday. Mere words cannot sum up what a magnificent and breathtaking evening's entertainment it was!

The product of more than a decade's unsuccessful tinkering (the show was originally conceived in 1999, and first produced as Bounce way back in 2003), the indefatigable combination of Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman have finally let the acclaimed British director John Doyle (he of the award-winning productions of Sweeney Todd, Company and Mack and Mabel) loose on it. Unusual amongst musicals, he decided to let it run seamlessly (without an interval, a prospect we were originally a bit uncomfortable with) for ninety minutes, and, in the spirit of its new title Road Show, every scene runs into the next with very little time even for applause...

The story is based on the true lives of the pioneering entrepreneur brothers Addison and Wilson Mizner,who grabbed hold of the concept of "The American Dream" and shook it for all it was worth in a succession of crazy (and often shady) money-making deals that drew the attention of the rich, the famous and the media of the early 20th century.

From the early scene of Papa on his death bed singing to his sons about the prospects the new century could hold for them (It's In Your Hands Now), through the wild adventures of the Yukon Gold Rush (Gold!), gambling, fixed boxing matches and horse races (The Game), and travels across the world (Addison's Trip), the pair (and their dying but extravagant mother) finally reunite in the middle of the property boom in Florida where all the billionaires are vying for the bigger and better houses that architect Addison can offer them (You!).



En route Addison falls in love with Hollis, the wealthy son of an industrial magnate, and there is a glimmer of hope that this "wild child" may find a more settled existence, but soon the brothers begin to "revert to type" with the next big scam (Boca Raton) and everyone begins to realise that the real thing that drives the brothers is not their ability to help build America, but their insatiable and selfish desire for wealth. The show closes as it opens, with Addison on his own death bed being visited by the spirit of the dead Wilson.

With all these death-bed scenes you'd think Road Show would be really dark and gloomy, but it is far from it! The breakneck speed of the whole thing perfectly captures the energy of the brothers in the style of the Vaudeville/silent movie acts of the time. The cast of David Bedella (as Wilson), Michael Jibson (as Addison), the gorgeous John Robyns (as Hollis), Gillian Bevan (as Mama) and Glyn Kerslake (as Papa) - and the whole supporting ensemble - were outstanding.

The humour and the pathos are beautifully balanced, and the choreography and staging (in the round) is simply genius. We were in the third row - just in front of actor Scott Bakula and across from Michael Cashman, incidentally - and it was almost like being inside the show at times. Throughout the performance the audience is showered with handfuls of hundred-dollar bills, and we had laps full by the end!



Some of the showpiece numbers are absolutely stunning - most notably Mama singing about the (by now on the run) Wilson Isn't He Something?, and Addison and Hollis's love duet The Best Thing That Ever Happened.
[Both songs were originally written as "straight" love songs between a man and a woman in the original incarnation, which gives them much more of a typically Sondheim-esque twist in this production.]

So, just one word - BRILLIANT! We couldn't stop enthusing about it...




You really must see this show!

It runs until 17 September 2011 at the Menier Chocolate Factory. Book your tickets here. I rather hope it will follow the lead of the Menier's previous productions and get its transfer to the West End!

Friday 26 August 2011

D, delirious



This Friday is a good Friday. It's payday (pour moi!), its a Bank Holiday weekend, and I just got confirmed in the job I applied for in the restructure of our department at work!

To celebrate, I think feathers and a green jump-suit must be the outfit du jour, as the fabulously silly Ottawan provide the soundtrack - Thank Disco It's Friday!


Have a good long weekend!

Thursday 25 August 2011

All wound up and ready to play...



Time once more for me to share with you, dear reader, some of the newer tracks that have been meandering through the echoing corridors here at Dolores Delargo Towers...

Let us open with a very warm welcome for the return of Mr Will Young, who has decided to go all "upbeat" and electro with his new album Echoes, apparently. It has taken weeks for this to grow on me, but I have really taken to his new single Jealousy. (And the cute acrobat in the video helps, too...):


To follow, something a bit funky. It's Shake Aletti (aka Steve Nicholls from Sheffield) with his infuriatingly catchy new single Inside Out:


This one rocks! The "voice" of Iio (they of the wondrous mega-classic Rapture from 2001) Nadia Ali - almost certainly the only Libyan artiste who has ever had hits in the US and UK - returns, with Starkillers and Alex Kenji in tow, with a new single Pressure:

Nadia Ali - Pressure (Alesso Radio Mix)

As any fule kno, we here at Dolores Delargo Towers are always overjoyed to discover some new trash-tastic wannabee-diva, preferably from somewhere exotic. Fitting the bill perfectly is the remarkable Milana, the newest protégée of Russia's equivalent of Simon Cowell, Maxim Fadeev, with the wonderful Love On My High Heels:




Let us finish with someone that I reckon might well "float the boat" of one or two of our esteemed friends (John-John and little Tony, are you there, dears?). It's the very naughty Matt Zarley with a hunk-tastic video for his coyly-titled WTF! [Thanks once more to Marc at Deep Dish for the introduction.]


Enjoy!

Romantic Twigs?



From her website:
British icon Twiggy will release her first album in 12 years on 21st November. Next to modelling, music is Twiggy’s other most successful career and a major passion, having scored hits in the early 70s and won awards for her stage performances.

Romantically Yours is a hand-picked collection of all-new interpretations of pop and easy listening standards spanning several generations, each one of them a personal favourite of Twiggy’s, including amongst others Gershwin and Rodgers & Hart, Neil Young, Bryan Adams, Ray Davies and Richard Marx.

For Romantically Yours Twiggy has chosen to leaf through the pages of the great American songbook and record versions of such timeless compositions as Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered, Blue Moon, My Funny Valentine, Someone To Watch Over Me and They Can’t Take That Away From Me. From there she realised how much the album should reflect her love of more recent songs, including Janis Ian’s achingly poignant ode to the agonies of teenage insecurity, At 17; Chip Taylor’s pop perennial, Angel Of The Morning, and Bryan Adams’ 1985 ballad Heaven (having become friends with the Canadian rock star via his other line of work, when he photographed her for a book in aid of a breast cancer charity).

The album also includes a guest vocal appearance by Twiggy’s daughter Carly Lawson on Neil Young’s Only Love Can Break Your Heart, a guitar solo by Bryan Adams, and a version of Richard Marx’s Right Here Waiting featuring duet vocals with the American songwriter himself.

“Music’s so much a part of my life and my career,” Twiggy says. “There was a time when I thought that was what I would do, but these people who say they plan their career, how? I don’t think you can. Things present themselves to you, whether it be acting, singing, modelling, whatever you do. But I love my life, because I do so many different things.”
Interesting...


Romantically Yours on Amazon

Wednesday 24 August 2011

Future feeling, new sensation



In honour of the 50th birthday today of Colin Angus, singer with 90s rave faves The Shamen, here is one of my favourites of theirs...


Move any mountain, move any mountain

I will not fail nor falter, I shall succeed
My perception is altered, I do believe
Faith is so strong now nothing shall bar my way
Firm conviction is no fiction
This is my day

I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain

I walk so tall, ascending I stand so high
Earth below me revolving above the sky
I feel no fear to be here is oh so fine
Shining brightly, like sunlight inside my mind

Well you know that any mountain is capable of moving
The Shamen and the new generation who are proving
You can be what you want to be
Let your soul and your body and your mind be free
Well never mind, we all are that
And going all the way is where I'm at
With delivery smooth like water from a fountain
That's why I can move any mountain
Move any mountain

I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
Move any mountain
Move any mountain

Future feeling, new sensation
Body is rocking and the mind is reeling
And rolling race changing motion
Flowing like a river into the ocean
Better get yourself ready for the new vibration
My vision, one nation, one tribe
One day'll come the might to move any mountain

Move any mountain
Move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain

I walk so tall, ascending I stand so high
Earth below me revolving above the sky
I feel no fear to be here is oh so fine
Shining brightly, like sunlight inside my mind

I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain
I can move move move any mountain


The Shamen

Tuesday 23 August 2011

Jeannie and her fabulous balls



Happy 77th birthday today to Miss Barbara Jean Morehead, better known as Barbara Eden, star of 1960s classic series I Dream Of Jeannie.


Although it is her appearance as said genie for which we remember her most, among Miss Eden's other notable achievements she starred alongside Walter Pidgeon and Joan Fontaine in Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, with Tony Randall in the cult movie 7 Faces of Dr. Lao, in numerous US made-for-TV thrillers and mini-series, on stage as the star of Kander and Ebb's Woman Of The Year, and reunited with her Jeannie co-star Larry Hagman in Dallas in 1990 (and again on stage in the play Love Letters in 2006). She continues to make stage and singing appearances to this day.

Here she sings about big balls...




Not yet retired, and proudly bearing what appears to be a new head (thanks to fairly obvious amounts of plastic surgery), Miss Eden published her memoir Jeannie Out of the Bottle in April 2011.

Barbara Eden official website

Thought for the day...


"There’s nothing that great about sex - never was. What usually comes from it? Sweat, fatigue, and dirty linens, then later unwanted pregnancies, and, of course, today there’s the health angle.

As for gay sex in particular: Nothing’s really that great about it. It’s very uncomfortable and many times vastly more complex than lovemaking in heterosexual counterparts.

When a boy and girl decide they are going to have sex, they roughly know what to expect. But before two men have sex, they practically have to hold a board meeting in order to figure out the agenda of what they’re going to do."
Quentin Crisp
Really?


Not according to Frankie...

Monday 22 August 2011

The cold-blooded murder of the English tongue


Charabanc trip


Croydon Aerodrome

So charabanc* and aerodrome are considered to be obsolete words, are they? Not here at Dolores Delargo Towers, they're not!

Read more in The Telegraph

We make every effort to promote such delicious words as palimpsest, flapdoodle and calumny, and refuse to call a turfing iron a spade...

And don't even get me started on the ruination of the spoken language!


[*charabanc is apparently a French phrase meaning "carriage with benches"]

Beyond the cleavage



As rumours abound that Raquel Welch's fabulously camp TV special Raquel! from the early 70s is to be reissued in a re-mastered version, it would seem churlish on this Tacky Music Monday not to feature a clip of the wonderful lady herself doing... well... what she did best, really!


Anyone who can publish an autobiography called Beyond the Cleavage just has to be fab!

Have a good week...

Sunday 21 August 2011

Every day should be a "Doris Day"!



I am currently listening to (an amazingly star-struck) Michael Ball interviewing (a very sprightly) Doris Day on his Radio 2 programme. [The programme will be on iPlayer for a week if you want to hear it]

Any excuse for a "Doris-fest"! The reason for the interview is of course her much-trumped new album...

From StereoBoard:
Eighty-seven-year-old legendary Hollywood singer Doris Day has become the oldest star in history to be playlisted on BBC Radio 2 with her new single Heaven Tonight, taken from her new album My Heart.

My Heart is Doris Day’s first studio album of new material in 17 years; a dozen songs of a timeless quality, with nine brand-new recordings produced by Day’s late son, Terry Melcher, plus a trio of Day classics.

Miss Day has been fully involved with the musical selections for this special release. Her son Terry Melcher – who was known as a songwriter and producer for folk-rock pioneers The Byrds and other artists – co-wrote four of the new songs with Beach Boys member Bruce Johnston.

Doris Day's forthcoming new album, My Heart, is released on Monday 5th September 2011.
Unfortunately every attempt to get an online copy of her new single to play for you has failed, but here is the album tracklist:

1. Hurry, It's Lovely Up Here
2. Daydream (originally by Lovin' Spoonful)
3. The Way I Dreamed It
4. Heaven Tonight
5. My One & Only Love
6. My Heart
7. You Are So Beautiful (originally by Joe Cocker)
8. Life Is Just A Bowl Of Cherries
9. Disney Girls (originally by Beach Boys)
10. My Buddy
11. Happy Endings
12. Ohio

While we wait, here's another Doris Day classic:


The new album is only available in the UK and Europe. Pre-order your copy today! [Preview clips are available.]

http://www.dorisday.com/

Saturday 20 August 2011

The other Stritch



You win some, you lose some...

We dearly wanted to go and see Liza's long-time collaborator Billy Stritch live at The Pheasantry tonight, but, as luck would have it the tickets sold out. Never mind, here's a sample of the two great talents together on a variety show in Argentina in the 90s instead - a classic!


Billy Stritch website

Friday 19 August 2011

Lick it real good



From Time Out :
From today (19 August) to 30 September, The Icecreamists hosts a new ‘pop-up’ in their original premises on Maiden Lane (they have another in the centre of Covent Garden piazza). No strangers to publicity stunts – they were responsible for the infamous ‘Baby Gaga’ ice cream made from human breast milk – this time they are screaming one louder with what they claim is will be the ‘world’s first gay ice cream bar’. What this entails, they say, is a ‘strictly over 18s ice cream haven’ (they don’t say if proof of age is required).

According to their press release, ‘Get ready boys for the treat of your lives with Mr Wippy aka Sandro Squillace baring all in the store’s window, showing you his wicked ways with ice cream. ‘Vice Cream’ masseur Jorge Khawam will be on hand offering customers complimentary massages and ice cream facials.’
I will pop along for a slurp later...

Shimmy Friday!

At the end of what has turned out to be a very slow, very dull and very miserable week (it is always awful going back to work after some time off, even if I haven't been away), it's time to celebrate the arrival of the weekend!

And so get ready to don your shimmeriest shimmy frock, tie as many bangs into your hair as you can lift, and shake it on down with our favourite 70s camp girlie singers, The Ritchie Family - Thank Disco It's Friday!!


Have a great one!

Thursday 18 August 2011

Kid no more



Oh lordy! The dashingly handsome Robert Redford is 75 years old today.

We drooled over him (and the gorgeous Paul Newman of course) in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and again in The Sting, and even the schmaltz of The Way We Were couldn't change that! He starred in many notable films - not least the acclaimed All The President's Men and the award-winning Out of Africa. However, Oscars success eluded him until he turned director (as he remains to date) and the success of Ordinary People in 1980.

Although perhaps no longer the great heart-throb, we can still enjoy the sparkle in Robert Redford's eyes...



Robert Redford Through the Years - Life photo gallery

Happy birthday, Sundance!


Robert Redford on IMDB

Makes my soul drip, drip, drip away



Nostalgia time...

Remarkably it is twenty years since this sassy number was in the Top Ten.

So, on this grey and grizzly day (in what should be the height of summer), what better way to lift our spirits than to play it?


Whatever happened to Zoë?

Wednesday 17 August 2011

Little Eydie



It was the 80th birthday yesterday of the lovely Miss Eydie Gormé!

Famous for her musical double-act with husband Steve Lawrence (also happily still alive), Miss Gormé was briefly during the 60s one of America's most successful "girlie singers" (a genre popular both sides of the Atlantic at the time), with hits such as Blame It on the Bossa Nova, Yes, My Darling Daughter and I Want To Stay Here.

Her Latin roots led to a hugely successful career in the Spanish-speaking world (where in my opinion she made some of her best music), and as half of the duo "Steve and Eydie" Miss Gormé continued to enjoy commercial and cabaret circuit success for several decades (although she remained a fleeting memory over here in the UK) before finally retiring in 2009.

Many happy returns to a lady whose music has always made me feel good...


Eydie Gormé official website

Flogging the family silver


Christmas 1923


BBC 2 opens April 1964


Jon Pertwee is Dr Who January 1970


Glenda Jackson is Elizabeth I February 1971


Joan Collins July 1989


Eastenders April 1994


Torchwood August 2011

What is happening to the BBC at the moment?

I know the government wants to cut its licence fee, but why should that mean we are faced with the prospect of the brilliant BBC4 (last vestige of intelligent broadcasting by the Beeb) being slashed to the bone in favour of the eternally pointless "yoof TV" channel BBC3 (the one that brought us such "wonders" as Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps , Mind, Body & Kick Ass Moves, Freaky Eaters and Jamelia: Whose Hair Is It Anyway?)? Ridiculous.

And today it is announced that institution of the British establishment the Radio Times is set to be flogged off to a private equity firm. We all know what that means...

I have many happy memories of getting hold of the new issue of the Radio Times (and of course its ITV opposite number TV Times), and the whole family taking it in turns to circle, asterisk or otherwise mark what programmes they wanted to watch in the coming week. Thus began the weekly tussle for supremacy between rival calls for Robin's Nest vs a Horizon documentary on Isaac Newton. Christmas-time was especially good, as you had the bumper double issues to look forward to, and only had to work out whether you had seen Chitty Chitty Bang Bang or the Bond film more times already, in order to decide which to watch.

Of course, in this day and age when TV listings can be published anywhere, and catch-up and on-demand TV are available at the click of a mouse, the whole idea of the magazine is a bit of an anachronism for many. But it has been published since 1923, and still sells bucketloads of issues - and after all, once you have flogged off the family silver, what happens when all you have left is the EPNS?

Radio Times on Wikipedia

Tuesday 16 August 2011

Porcine Princess?



From WhatsOnStage.com:
When Cameron Mackintosh brought Betty Blue Eyes to the West End - his first original musical in over a decade, a Stiles and Drewe-scored musical adaptation of A Private Function - it was clear that the titular sow was going to be no ordinary pig.

Currently starring in the musical at London's Novello Theatre and appearing nightly alongside Sarah Lancashire, Reece Shearsmith, Adrian Scarborough and Ann Emery, is a specially created animatronic pig, which reportedly cost over £100,000 to create, voiced by none other than Kylie Minogue.

The Australian pop singer, songwriter and actress was backstage at the Novello last week to meet members of the cast and the West End star who's hogging the limelight.
Read my blog about Betty Blue Eyes from March this year

Gay icons don't come much bigger


Madonna at the Vanity Fair party, Oscars 2011

Happy 53rd birthday today to Miss Madonna Louise Ciccone! Always a house favourite here at Dolores Delargo Towers, the lady remains a world-beating megastar - bigger than Mega-Babs, Celine Dion, Janet Jackson or Whitney Houston, and bigger than Cher, Britney and Beyoncé put together!

According to a rather good article by the lovely Alex Hopkins in Time Out:
Gay icons don't come much bigger than Madonna. "She is a timeless force of nature who has challenged sexism, ageism and homophobia. The older she gets, the more powerful she becomes".
Indeed! And almost thirty years on from her debut in the music industry, she is most definitely not finished yet...

As uber-blonde "actress" Abbie Cornish breaks the amazing news that megastar multi-millionaire Madonna may be more intelligent than she is, so we wait with bated breath for the launch of Our Glorious Leader's directorial feature film debut W.E. The movie, which intertwines the real-life love story of Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson with a more modern relationship, will premiere at the Venice and Toronto film festivals in September 2011.

A busy birthday girl indeed, Madonna is already in the midst of recording her 12th studio album after beginning work on it in June. Now that is something for which I cannot wait! Let us hope it is more Confessions On A Dancefloor than the too-"urban" Hard Candy...

Over at my other blog Dolores Delargo Towers - Museum of Camp, Madge in all her glamorously photographed finery is our latest exhibit - check it out.

Over here, it's time for a classic, methinks. Strike a pose, there's nothing to it!


Madonna official website

Monday 15 August 2011

Marry me?

It's my first day back in work after a very chilled week's leave for my birthday, and I am pissed off.

There's only one thing for it, on this Tacky Music Monday - I am going to have to post this marvellously camp little number by Tuesday's birthday girl Lesley Ann Warren to cheer myself up!


Hope your week is fabulous, peeps...

Sunday 14 August 2011

Something inside me



Simply because I just heard this most beautiful rendition of Unusual Way from the musical Nine being played by Elaine Paige on Radio 2, I felt I had to share:


There's nothing like a bit of the gorgeous John Barrowman to cheer up a Sunday...

In a very unusual way one time I needed you.
In a very unusual way you were my friend.
Maybe it lasted a day, maybe it lasted an hour.
But, somehow it will never end.

In a very unusual way I think I'm in love with you.
In a very unusual way I want to cry.
Something inside me goes weak,
Something inside me surrenders.
And you're the reason why,
You're the reason why

You don't know what you do to me,
You don't have a clue.
You can't tell what its like to be me looking at you.
It scares me so, that I can hardly speak.

In a very unusual way, I owe what I am to you.
Though at times it appears I won't stay, I never go.
Special to me in my life,
Since the first day that I met you.
How could I ever forget you,
Once you had touched my soul?
In a very unusual way,
You've made me whole.

Lots...



"It's such a human condition, whether you're a great track star or a great knitting person or you paint watercolours - someone knows who you are." Tony Curtis

What do a "trick pony mechanical bank", a set of Miguel Berrocal sculptures, several Jan Stussy watercolours, assorted pistols, twenty trinket boxes, a portable artist's easel, a collection of books about Marilyn Monroe, numerous Art Nouveau theatre posters and a Pontiac Firebird Trans Am convertible car have in common?

They are all lots in the forthcoming Tony Curtis auction!

Read more on the BBC

Visit the auction site

You can even pick up items from his wardrobe, original costumes from Some Like It Hot, his correspondence, awards, and (bizarrely) his driving licence!

Is it me, or is this all a little ghoulish?

Saturday 13 August 2011

Oh, those Arias...



Alistair, Paul, John-John, Jim and I trotted off to the rather lovely St John's Smith Square again last night (12th August) for a recital of arias and operatic pieces by the Polish-Canadian Soprano Maria Knapik and British-Canadian baritone Jeffrey Carl.

Sublime and sweet, the first half consisted of a succession of short chansons by Polish, German and French composers, including Baudelaire, which were skilfully delivered if a little disjointed - the pianist Michel Brousseau certainly believed in taking his time "warming up" between numbers...

The second half on the other hand was a real treat, as the duo were given a freer rein on some bigger classic operatic pieces. Leoncavallo's I Pagliacci and Verdi's La Traviata were suitably melodramatic, and the finale pieces (also from Verdi) Eri Tu from Un Ballo in Maschera and the ultimate scene from Rigoletto were wonderful.

It was, however, Miss Knapik's shimmering delivery of Vissi d'Arte from Tosca that in my opinion was the stand-out performance of the evening - she has the makings of a real diva! This was further evidenced in the first of three encores by the pair, when she performed a rip-roaring Près des remparts de Séville from Bizet's Carmen, which we adored.

Another beautiful evening in beautiful Baroque surroundings.

Here is a sample of the talents of Maria Knapik:


And here is some of Jeffrey Carl:


St John's Smith Square

Friday 12 August 2011

"Would that it were, would that it were"



And so, farewell, then Robert Robinson. This man was indeed the mainstay of televison in my youth, and never ever seemed to age (he was always old!).

A wonderful "genial uncle", a brilliant broadcaster, and sadly missed.



Robert Robinson RIP

What you do, what you do, what you do



Thirty-four years ago a certain Donna Summer crashed onto the disco scene, and took over the gay world (for a while, until she pissed on her own fireworks with some nasty comments about AIDS).

Her debut song I Feel Love is a magnificent Moroder classic, and practically guaranteed to make you want to grab a swathe of chiffon and your best silver sling-backs, slug back a Babycham, and boogie! Thank Disco It's Friday!



Have a good weekend!

Thursday 11 August 2011

Musical melange



It's time once again for a little taste of some of the newer music that I rather like at the moment. An eclectic mix, it is too...

First, let us welcome the return of none other than 80s pin-up Kim Wilde, here with a rather good cover version of 90s classic Sleeping Satellite from her new album of covers, Snapshots:


Alphabet Saints were described in The Guardian as "fastidiously futuristic in a 1972 way, looking back to a time when they looked forward to a now that wasn't overly focused on then". You can make your own minds up on that one, and just enjoy their single Jessica's Heartbreak:


Ready for something genuinely different? There is absolutely nothing quite like the experience that is Psychologist, and his absolutely bizarre song Propeller...


Let's lighten things up a bit. How about a nostalgic return to the sound of House music, with the marvellously funky Azari & III, and their new single Manic?


And last, but most definitely not least, it's the return of our favourite perv here at Dolores Delargo Towers - Mr Johnny McGovern aka Gay Pimp with his paean to everybody's secret fantasy - the Sexy Nerd. I love it!!


Enjoy!

Wednesday 10 August 2011

It's big and it's black and it's furry, and I be afraid of it



How terribly glamorous! I share a birthday with the fantastic Kate O'Mara...

She's been in everything camp, has our Kate - Dynasty, Ab Fab, Dr Who, The Avengers, Jason King, The Protectors, The Persuaders, The Return of the Saint, and of course that ill-fated "soap" Triangle - and we love her in all of them!

Here is one of my all-time favourite scenes featuring this marvellously vampy lady:


Kate O'Mara on IMDB

Tuesday 9 August 2011

Worth a million dollars of anyone's money



It's good to know that Whitney Houston is only one day older than me, and looking so good...

I never liked the woman, nor her godawful wibbly vocal strangulations - I blame her, fair and square, for the rise of the rest of the rubbish singers-who-think-they-can-sing-but-can't like Christina Aguilera, Leona Lewis, Mariah Carey and the rest.

However it gives me a great excuse to re-play this little slice of brilliant campery!


Enjoy!

The practical approach

Amidst the violent stupidity of our urban benighted yoof on the hunt for new phones and trainers at everyone else's expense (don't kid me this has anything to do with social policy, politics, or even the fact the police wiped some worthless shit off the streets last week), it is good to see some people have a genuine sense of community...


Clapham Junction, earlier today