Magnetic Fields

Kings Theatre

How do you sum up a life in song? Stephin Merritt, the baritone bard who heads The Magnetic Fields, has succeeded in doing so with customary dry wit on his latest literal autobiographical opus, 50 Song Memoir, which he and six magnificent multitasking bandmates presented in glorious musical technicolour over two concerts.

While the stage set was cluttered with paraphernalia like a child’s bedroom, and each musician was marooned in their own island of exotic instrumentation, the songwriting was pithy and execution seamless.

Using laugh-out-loud rhyming couples, accompanied by an orchestra of oddities, from vintage synths to singing saw, and complemented by lovingly animated vignettes, Merritt indulged in some existential wondering about the wanderings of his childhood, taking in perplexed pets, his first terrifying gig, dancing on the graves of his mother’s boyfriends and his first band, while colouring in cultural context such as the Stonewall Riots and the advent of disco and new wave.

While the first programme featured a keen new revelation for every year of his first quarter-century, the second concert, like the second half of his life to date, was a more downbeat, melancholic affair though there was still room for whimsy, drollery and a song about fetishes. FIONA SHEPHERD