Amongst what seemed to be a giant school trip sat me wondering what all the fuss was about. Surrounded by little girls in what can only be described as carefully planned ‘outfits’, there sat a lonely elderly gentleman in a black leather jacket, dead-centre with the best view. ‘Perhaps he is here to see his granddaughter perform’, I thought, thinking the best of him. Positioned on the stage was a solitary stool and guitar, eagerly awaiting to be played, but by whom? Surely there won’t actually be any “real” musicians at this show, t’would not be normal in this modern age of pop performers!
Soon after this confusion had reached it’s peak in my mind, on walks a brigade of hip and hop body-rockers, headed by Miss Pixie Lott herself, wearing what might be termed a disco-ball swimming-costume. Her endless bare legs were sure to make the elderly gentleman’s ticket price seem like good value as she marched fourth to take position, although he may have been a little disappointed that the usual theatre binoculars were not available to rent. At her side were two rather street wise young ladies dressed head to toe in black, baggy, comfort clothes, not wanting to distract from Pixie of course, but for me were a highlight of the entire event, their style and dance moves were almost too cool for school, and if I’m honest a little part of me wished they were my friends. Pixie’s set was very dynamic, filled with her most well known tracks including her latest single ‘Mama Do’ which was very well received by the crowd, and even I found myself joining in with her clapping hands actions.
Remember that solitary guitar and stool at the edge of the stage? Well all was revealed when a young man walked on to accompany Pixie with a few acoustic numbers, which brought a nice mellow mid way break to her set. After the young man had earned his dinner with his finger picking wizardry, it was back to the boom-boom. All in all I was rather pleased with Pixie, I was just impressed that she sang live to be honest, and she wasn’t the only one…
After the interval, it was clear that the excitement had began to overpower the majority of the crowd as they rushed to their feet when the music began and the curtain came up. Much to my surprise, I saw not the Saturdays but a bunch of rather strapping men bearing instruments strut on stage. A live band; what a treat! The Saturdays slowly emerged from their epic theatrical set, which included an elevated platform from which stairs descended in front of a city-scene back-drop and a rather large TV screen, upon which featured “arty” visual delights, very much like those offered by Windows Media Player. Off to the side of the stage, was one of the band members sat upon a stool with a rather unfortunate broken ankle. She wouldn’t be shakin’ her booty.
Throughout their performance they did have a few costume changes, which were all variations on a theme in their own individual Saturdays colours. The highlight of their set was a medley of classic and current pop tunes which included ‘Shutup and Drive’, ‘I Kissed a Girl’ and ‘So What’. It was very well executed and I give them all due credit for singing live, and surprisingly in tune. Not only did they show off their vocal talents, but two of the members also picked up guitars and played along to their own songs that they claimed to have written while on the road. They were no Jonas brothers, (who, lets face it, are pretty rockin’) but nevertheless competent enough to add their own creative touch to the rendition. Towards the end of their set was shown video footage of the girls’ hilarious antics, recorded by them while on tour. It really gave us an insight to the girls’ personalities and provided an opportunity to feel closer to them. After this they banged out their most well known tracks, including “Issues” and the Comic Relief one, I forget the name.
This brought the set to an end and the girls walked (and hobbled) off stage, and then rather annoyingly messages such as “do you want more?” followed by “scream” which was then rounded off with “louder!” appeared on the big TV screen. I thought it was quite fun to begin with, but after the continuous repetitions, I really did want to scream, out of desperation. The girls came on and did two more numbers as an encore, which left the audience applauding on their feet, not exactly a standing ovation as we were all stood up from the beginning, but it’s always good to start as you mean to go on I suppose.
