Katy and I had a rare night out on Wednesday night when we went to see a Bill Bailey warm-up show for his new comedy project, Dandelion Mind. It’s described as follows:
Featuring Bill’s trademark musical interludes, observations and stories of the road, Dandelion Mind will be based loosely on the theme of doubt (or will it?), as we follow Bill from his real-life saga of being trapped by the ash cloud, to his barely contained rants about celebrity, TV, creationism and Michael Winner. He demonstrates new instruments, both ancient and modern, he sings an internet love song, a lament about punk heroes, Iranian hip-hop, and plays a mean folk-bouzouki.
Thomas the Doubter gets a new look, and Darwin’s curious obsessions and the myth of intelligent design are all worked over in Bailey’s own surreal style. He revisits the music of his youth, with a brand-new French Disco re-working of Gary Numan’s hit, Cars, played in his own inimitable way, and maybe some Wurzels-based remixes of classic German techno. Just your normal Bill Bailey gig, then.
It wad a great show because the venue – the Leicester Square Theater – was rather intimate (less than 500 people, max) and it allowed for some really good (and some not so good) heckling. I really have to give mad props for the man to be able to improvise so much and so well at the drop of a hat. At one point, we were having a barnacle penis length auction. You need a very quick mind to be able to handle that :)
The show was also a bit more raucous and raw than his normal material. It was interesting to see that.
I also managed to find some bootlegs of part of the show. They’re quite funny :D
Katy’s parents babysat doofus while were were at the show and spent the night. I took yesterday off and we went to see some bathroom designs. We topped off the evening with a BBQ and a couple of pitchers of spiked Margaritas. I had my first hangover in years this morning.