EDINBURGH 2011: BWW Reviews: FRISKY & MANNISH, POP CENTRE PLUS, Udderbelly's Pasture, Aug 19 2011

Despite enjoying a boosted profile thanks in part to a supposed copycat performer on last year's Britain's Got Talent, Frisky & Mannish are hard to describe succinctly. "Pop songs with a twist" was the best I could manage outside the venue when a curious attendee asked, but this duo absolutely needs to be seen to be understood, and there really aren't many better ways to spend an hour at this or any other Fringe.

There is a pre-requisite though: you should probably have a(n un)healthy interest in pop music, or at the very least have heard a lot of it; if not, some of the hysterically inventive set pieces of the evening may well pass you by. That seems to happen in ‘Pop Centre Plus', when an extended sequence focusing on Cheryl Cole's mimed X Factor performance of her (#1 but largely forgotten) single Promise This is met with far less laughter than it deserves. Although the incredibly talented pair is chiefly concerned with and interested in the most plastic pop, this muted reaction suggests that they might almost, somehow, be a little niche.

Other numbers go over fantastically well, among them a grime re-working of Carpenters' Top of the World and a riotously enjoyable Bee Gees-ified version of Rihanna's Rude Boy. Across the hour, there is audience participation, pop groups are formed, named and photographed, and everyone is sent out happy by some nursery rhymes done in the style of Girls Aloud. While anyone can and most likely will enjoy the show, those who have built up a lifetime's worth of heretofore useless pop knowledge might well find themselves exploding with joy.

 

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