Back-to-back Bacharach
His musical genius has made stars such as Perry Como, Tom Jones and Dionne Warwick shine brighter, shifted millions of records, given several generations the soundtrack to their turbulent emotional lives, and set him among the pantheon of world-class song- writers. On opening night, proving you’re never too old to take a bow, Burt Bacharach provided a Magic Moment all of his own for the London debut of a New York-originating jukebox show that claims to “reimagine” him but mainly worships, however irreverently, at his altar. Joining the cast for What’s It All
About? during the curtain-call, the beaming composer brought the audience at the Menier Chocolate Factory to its feet and then blew them away by sitting down at a keyboard to join in a round of Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head. Seeming quite frail at 87, the fact that he could hardly be heard was itself enough to make anyone’s teardrops fall.
If they could muster that coup every night of the week, this show would be the talk of the town. As it is, it feels like the sort of exercise in puppyish fandom that you need to be a diehard Bacharachian to savour.
The auditorium has been transformed into a bohemian Aladdin’s cave for this homage. Cushions and throws on the seats, cosy sofas around the stage; old rugs here and there, and, amid trails of fairy-lights, lamps everywhere you look.
The invitation is clear: sit back and relax as a bunch of talented, smiley hipsters take Bacharach’s backcatalogue out of the comfort-zone of over-familiarity and into wilder terrain. Though they’ve stood the test of time, some of the songs he penned with lyricist Hal David suffer guilt by association with elevator muzak. This sustained remix bids adieu to the sleepy sound of the flugelhorn and the Fifties and Sixties period trappings, and applies some electric rock treatment instead.
It’s not a bad idea. And only a curmudgeon would pour cold water over a project that, conceived and fronted by the young and musically capable Kyle Riabko, 27, has met with approval from Bacharach himself.
The problem, however, is that the evening – which offers no bio-drama, no back-story, no declared connection between the seven singer-musicians and the songs – doesn’t strike enough emotional chords. So relentless is the pace, so many numbers bleed one into the other, that rather than excavating the material, too much of it is drained of pathos.
It’s all very well having an up-tempo rock-out to Do You Know the Way to
San Jose? but without the melancholy, where’s the meaning? The curse of bathos even strikes. As Stephanie McKeon warbles that ode to heartbreak Walk on By, director Steven Hoggett has her spin on a revolve, contemplating empty chairs.
Amid the zestful commotion, which entails much whisking on and off of mics and other gubbins, some unplugged moments achieve a raw, spine-tingling potency: Anastacia McCleskey’s soulful rendition of Don’t
Make Me Over is sublime. If only this back-to-back Bacharach fest was given more chance to dig deeper, it might raise the roof. As it is, it resembles a deluxe species of theatrical wallpaper, ornamented for one night only by the unforgettable appearance of a man whose music will live on long after us all.