MICK MCSHANE is roused by a band whose socialism laces every line of every song with commitment and raw passion
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An excellent night of alternative comedy
'We’re a long way from Live At The Apollo and interchangeable telly panel shows here, and I mean that in the best possible way,' writes JAMES WALSH
BBC EAT YOUR HEART OUT! The winner of the competition, Sam Eley, performed as Basil Crumbwick, in a giant papier-maché head
New releases from Mountain, Soul Asylum and Michael McDermott
ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
Sketch Off Final
Leicester Square Festival, London
DESPITE the crisis in the arts, Britain has a never-ending supply of fresh weirdos. Some come straight from their university improv clubs, and some are doing their recovery in public after a year of being brutalised at infamous French clowning school Gaulier.
And some are here because their anarchic spirit allows them to belong nowhere else.
And many end up in the heats of Sketch Off, a competition dominated by character comedians, with the odd sketch act who surprise everyone by actually winning on occasion, like last year’s Burger + a Pint, who reprise their joyously stupid skits here while the judges make up their minds.
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