O The Drifters and Christian Playhouse Theatre, Greenside Place. 7.30pm. £5. £4. Remember ‘Kissing in the Back Row ofthe Movies“? ‘Saturday Night at the Movies"? Their barnstorming version of ‘Under the Boardwalk"? Yep. have a great night. y'all. Can less unreservedly recommend Christian. I‘m afraid.
O Razorback Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free.
0 Skint Video Edinburgh College of Art. Lauriston Place. For those who missed their successful run on the
Fringe. the enormously entertaining -
and somewhat controversial Skint Video are doing two nights in Edinburgh (tomorrow at Heriot Watt Union). Included in the entrance fee is a chance to get your applause on a live EP being recorded this tour.
SATURDAY
26
Glasgow
0 U840 at the Scottish Exhibition Centre. Supported by Simply Red. As this is the very first rock concert at the SEC lots of bands up and down the country (not to mention promoters) will be waiting to see how smoothly it goes. This. ofcourse is none ofour worry. whilst thrilling to the soul of Red‘s unusual vocal tones and UB40‘s whining reggae.
0 Marc Almond at Glasgow University's Queen Margaret Union. The Boy Who Came Back is er. . . back again with another sleaze bag routine. [don‘t care if he sings out oftune!
o The Coolnotes at Paisley Town Ha“.
Edinburgh
0 After Eight Mince Preservation Hall. Victoria Street. 9pm. Free.
0 Makossa Jailhouse. Calton Road. 9.30pm. Free. Reggae.
0 Skint Video Heriot-Watt University. Grindlay Street. (See Friday 25).
SUNDAY
27
Glasgow 0 Truce at Strutz. Heavy Metal
Edinburgh
0 BED Speedwagon Playhouse Theatre. Greenside Place. 7.30pm. £6.50. I‘d actually prefer to see how this lot would get on in The Jailhouse. but their emptiness needs a large space to fill up. Their brand of stadium-rock epitomises everything that‘s uninteresting. unchallenging and above all unsexy about ‘rawk ‘n‘ roll‘. Watching Gene Vincent decompose would probably be more unplifting.
o Primal Scream and Whiplash and Weather Prophets Hoochie (‘ooehie Club. West Tollcross. Creation Records package.
Leather trousers helpful but not obligatory.
MONDAY Edinburgh
0 George Benson Playhouse Theatre. (SOLD OUT).
0 Blues ‘n’ Trouble Jailhouse. Calton , Road. 10.30pm. Free. (See Fri 19). 0 Tonight at Noon Preservation Hall.
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MUSIC LIST
Victoria Street. 9pm. Free.
TUESDAY
Glasgow
0 Pendragon, Pallas and Abel Ganz at The Mayfair hosted by rock DJ Tom Russel. Rock smorgasbord for the committed.
Edinburgh
0 The Heaters Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free.
WEDNESDAY Edinburgh
0 Level 42 Playhouse Theatre. (Jreenside Place. 7.30pm. £5.50. £5.
29
30
Inoffensive white jazz-funk. usually quite pleasant. ifbanal.
0 The Mirrors Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free.
THURSDAY Glasgow
0 Level 42 strut their jazz-funky stuff at Barrowlands.
0 Animal Nightlife lounge lizardly about in Ultratheque.
O The Pastels at The Club De France Coatbridge. Only for the hard of heanng.
Edinburgh
0 Block Brothers Preservation Hall. Victoria Street. 9.30pm. Free.
31
j
0 Billy Connolly Playhouse Theatre . Greenside Place. 7.30pm. £6.50. £5.50. Shouldn‘t really be in this section. but you‘d be furious ifI didn't mention him. Go and see a master at work.
0 Dead on Arrival Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free. Northe dodgy American hard-core punk band of the same name.
0 Hank Wangford Band (Toasters. Tollcross. (To be confirmed). Not to be missed. This gynaecologist-turned-country-singer is a legend in his own saloon and is at this moment threatening to topple The Jesus and Mary Chain from the ultimate pinnacle of I lipness.
EIGHTH WONDER
What is this pop music fantasy thing anyway? A collection of impossibilities _easy money, high living. unbelievable luck, dreamed-of fame. unending arrogance and absolute entertainment. Bundle that idea up with a Pop(ette) Idol -too beautiful, too blonde, too thin, too young and fartoo self-assured and you have Patsy Kensit, show biz ingenue, actress and lead singerwith the appropriately named (bearing in mind the fantasy we’re discussing) Eighth Wonder.
Patsy is seventeen and stunning looking. The fuss over Eighth Wonder is most definitely centred on her flashing bi ack eyelashes and Sixties Superstar looks, ratherthan the band’s first single ‘Stay With Me’. What can it be like to be seventeen and famous for yourface?
‘Well, obviously,’ says Patsy with convincing sincerity, ‘it’s a nice feeling because everyone likes to be noticed and talked about and everything. But
we’re wanting audiences to
take us seriously as a live group as well, becuase we do play live and that people don’t just see it as a pop thing. It isn’t really, we’ve been together for two years. The group started out as a funk band and as our
songwriting matured we started to write more commercial songs. i
hope people don’t just see it on the surface, but look a bit more deeply .
‘Stay With Me' is a neat piece of pop trivia. Depth doesn’t really come into it — butthen, the sixties do.
We're not revivallsts or anything, I thin it it just came out of this very catchy, dancey, uptempo popsong really. We do play some jazz and rock so we can play everything! I think we can cater for everyone’s tastes.’
What Eighth Wonder are suffering from is a severe case of ‘lead singer-itis. But, then, there are one or two good reasons why Patsy is of such intense media interest. If hervoice, a slight high pitched trill, reminds me vaguely of Claire Grogan then that face
reminds me of. . . well take your pick because we’ve been seeing it since she was four and playing Mia Farrow’s daughter in The Great Gatsby, or as Patsy Peapod in the Captain Birdseye adverts, or in a TV series called the Foundations, or in a movie with Elizabeth Taylor called ‘The Bluebird’. Was it a strain to be a ‘child star"?
‘Well I’ve not really been in the public eye. I didn’t go to a stage school. I went to a convent school. My parents never let me do interviews for the newspapers or anything, so I’ve never really been in the papers until now, which is why I think there’s such a buzz about it because people think “Gosh she’d done all this and no-one’s ever spoken to her before.” Mum and Dad were very sensible about that— you know I couldn’t have got on the bus to school if I’d been in TheSun every day. I got the part in The Great Gatsby by accident because my mum’s friend asked us to go along just to make up numbers, and I got the part and it started from there.’
What seems the most effective guarantee of Eighth Wonder’s eventual success is the appearance ofthe group in Julien Temple’s ‘Absolute Beginners’, a mega-blockbuster musical based on the Colin Mclnnes book which stars such unknowns as David Bowie and Sade and has tracks from Paul Weller, Elvis Costello and animal Nightlife. Two songs are supplied by Eighth Wonder, but the plum part of the film—the female lead character Crepe Suzette — goes to Patsy Kinset.
‘Julian came along to see the group — he didn’t know I was in it— and he saw the band, didn’t even realise that l was an actress and asked if I'd ever considered acting and I said l’d done things before and they offered me the part.’
There are no breaks luckier than that. By the time the film is released in April next year, Eighth Wonder hope to have their debut album out. if that sounds like just too much of a coincidence, well, Patsy is quick to spot a note of cynicism in my voice.
‘The band wasn’t put together just to satisfy the film. The group has been together for two years. The film was
just something that came along and was right to do because of the music in it. Had it been a straight acting role I wouldn’t have done it.’ (Andrea Miller)
22 The List 18—31 October |