Miro Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 (edited) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/live-music-reviews/5961593/Mika-at-the-Roundhouse-in-Camden-review.html including a pic (old one) Mika controlled the crowd like a showbusiness veteran at the iTunes Festival at the Roundhouse in Camden. Rating: * * * * * By Neil McCormick Published: 7:04PM BST 02 Aug 2009 Completely covered in tin foil, the stage resembles an amateur dramatics production of the moon landing. The backdrop is lit up like a rainbow. Cannons fire glitter overhead. Pretty choir girls wear slinky skirts and shiny fairy princess hats and (while they don’t actually appear to do much singing) never stop grinning from one end of the show to the other. The featured backing singers wear silver feather dresses and do little hip-shaking routines. And the star of the show gambols about on top of his piano in glitter boots and white dungarees (with no shirt underneath), dancing with the geeky abandon of Pinocchio shucking off his strings. Watching Mika live is like stumbling into an alternate dimension where the Seventies never ended, Top of the Pops still rules the charts and the stars comport themselves as if life was one big children’s television show. There is a flurry of big personalities in pop music but none come bigger or bolder than Mika. He should, by rights, be incredibly irritating. His stage persona is of a camp, perpetually grinning, buffed-up nerd caught between rampant narcissism and giddy incredulity at his luck as he goes about fulfilling all his childhood pop fantasies. White dungarees were a fashion crime even when they were considered fashionable, and Mika wears them without irony, rather with a kind of gleeful conviction that he has the talent and chutzpah to carry it off. Which he does. The forthcoming follow-up to his five million-selling 2007 debut should be a testing time for Mika, especially given how fickle music audiences have become, yet for his comeback shows he is already behaving like a superstar in waiting. Five new songs slotted so effectively into his set that the crowd were soon singing along as if they were old favourites. Mika’s voice is high and clear and he doesn’t over-use it, happy to let his backing vocalists and the audience carry the tunes for him. For all his relative youth (he is still only 25) he has the crowd-control instincts of a showbusiness veteran, switching instinctively between gushing humility and drama-queen teasing. But it is the sheer pleasure he communicates in performing, his exuberance and flamboyance, that makes it all so infectious. It’s one thing to see his natural audience of women and gay men jumping up and down and singing along with abandon, but by the end even reluctant, arms-folded husbands and boyfriends seem to shed their ambitions and surrender to the force of his choruses. Mika writes monster pop tunes that have such rich emotional complexities gushing under their singalong surface it is almost as if he is daring listeners to call his bluff. These are songs of psycho-sexual drama tarted up with cascading melodies and irresistible hooklines, delivered with the camp showmanship of the Scissor Sisters channelling young Elton and Bowie. At the centre of it all, Mika himself is a one-man glitterball, reflecting and refracting in his own shining light, impossible to pin down. ------------------------------------ Thanks to Mikasounds here is a scan of the article Edited August 4, 2009 by Miro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
guylainem123 Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 thank you for posting miro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
babspanky Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/live-music-reviews/5961593/Mika-at-the-Roundhouse-in-Camden-review.html including a pic (old one) Mika controlled the crowd like a showbusiness veteran at the iTunes Festival at the Roundhouse in Camden. Rating: * * * * * By Neil McCormick Published: 7:04PM BST 02 Aug 2009 Completely covered in tin foil, the stage resembles an amateur dramatics production of the moon landing. The backdrop is lit up like a rainbow. Cannons fire glitter overhead. Pretty choir girls wear slinky skirts and shiny fairy princess hats and (while they don’t actually appear to do much singing) never stop grinning from one end of the show to the other. The featured backing singers wear silver feather dresses and do little hip-shaking routines. And the star of the show gambols about on top of his piano in glitter boots and white dungarees (with no shirt underneath), dancing with the geeky abandon of Pinocchio shucking off his strings. Watching Mika live is like stumbling into an alternate dimension where the Seventies never ended, Top of the Pops still rules the charts and the stars comport themselves as if life was one big children’s television show. There is a flurry of big personalities in pop music but none come bigger or bolder than Mika. He should, by rights, be incredibly irritating. His stage persona is of a camp, perpetually grinning, buffed-up nerd caught between rampant narcissism and giddy incredulity at his luck as he goes about fulfilling all his childhood pop fantasies. White dungarees were a fashion crime even when they were considered fashionable, and Mika wears them without irony, rather with a kind of gleeful conviction that he has the talent and chutzpah to carry it off. Which he does. The forthcoming follow-up to his five million-selling 2007 debut should be a testing time for Mika, especially given how fickle music audiences have become, yet for his comeback shows he is already behaving like a superstar in waiting. Five new songs slotted so effectively into his set that the crowd were soon singing along as if they were old favourites. Mika’s voice is high and clear and he doesn’t over-use it, happy to let his backing vocalists and the audience carry the tunes for him. For all his relative youth (he is still only 25) he has the crowd-control instincts of a showbusiness veteran, switching instinctively between gushing humility and drama-queen teasing. But it is the sheer pleasure he communicates in performing, his exuberance and flamboyance, that makes it all so infectious. It’s one thing to see his natural audience of women and gay men jumping up and down and singing along with abandon, but by the end even reluctant, arms-folded husbands and boyfriends seem to shed their ambitions and surrender to the force of his choruses. Mika writes monster pop tunes that have such rich emotional complexities gushing under their singalong surface it is almost as if he is daring listeners to call his bluff. These are songs of psycho-sexual drama tarted up with cascading melodies and irresistible hooklines, delivered with the camp showmanship of the Scissor Sisters channelling young Elton and Bowie. At the centre of it all, Mika himself is a one-man glitterball, reflecting and refracting in his own shining light, impossible to pin down. Wow! That is word for word what I said! Now I don't need to write a gig report. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christine Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Brilliant review! Thanks for posting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CazGirl Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 what a stunningly BEAUTIFUL review, thanks so much for posting! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tiibet Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Wow, thanks for posting this!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robertina Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 great! i hope there are more! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kodes100 Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Thank you Miro for posting this beautiful review. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. It is not only really flattering - I think it is true. As a die hard Mika fan it is sure gratifying to see the so-called professional critics get him! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robertina Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 no more reviews in the papers today? i cannot find anything else in the papers web sites...maybe in the paper ones? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dark Angel Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Thx for posting Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikalollipop_karla Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 wooow thx u Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
celien Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Thank you for posting!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silver Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 At the centre of it all, Mika himself is a one-man glitterball, reflecting and refracting in his own shining light, impossible to pin down. A one-man glitterball What a great review. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sienna Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Great review, thanks for posting! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SashaX Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 great Thanks for posting Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vickylovesmika Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Nice to read .... this is what i said a way back 70's all over again!!! GREAT gig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lala_lollies44 Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 T4P! That described mika spot-on! Ahh, I love reviews. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vélez Patti Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 thanks for posting It's really nice to see different people around the world attesting : Mika is here to stay. He is not a one hit wonder Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ewokwicket Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Thanks for posting, a fab review. One man glitter ball.....I like that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vixenbbw Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 hehe!! The music press are having to start taking real notice of what he does now or else they'll be left behind. He's now identified as a force to be reckoned with and not just the one hit wonder (Grace Kelly) that they all sniffed and predicted him to be. Great review..on the nail and, I suspect, just what Mika would like to be reading about his shows. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mariposa Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Wow! Reading this review really makes me feel happy! It's what we all experience at every single Mika gig. And that's what the Mika gig "addiction" is all about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
natmika Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 Finally! A british reviewer that gets him! And about the back to the seventies line, yesterday I was watching on tv in one of the music channels a special about the seventies. Seriously, that was a great time for pop music and the musicians all new how to put on a show (and makeup:naughty:) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gatagordinha Posted August 2, 2009 Share Posted August 2, 2009 I LOVE this review! It is honest and very perceptive, and gets right to the heart of what Mika is all about, without being patronising, and concludes (as I understand it) that Mika's basically a star. Which we all know , but it's just lovely to read it in a review every now and again. Thanks for posting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RAK1 Posted August 3, 2009 Share Posted August 3, 2009 hehe!! The music press are having to start taking real notice of what he does now or else they'll be left behind. He's now identified as a force to be reckoned with and not just the one hit wonder (Grace Kelly) that they all sniffed and predicted him to be. Great review..on the nail and, I suspect, just what Mika would like to be reading about his shows. Yes, the words I'd be quite happy to ram down Katie Prices throat! Quite happily! Love this review, glad at last the media are realising he's NOT going anywhere, and he's got a lot of talent hidden away in him! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lena Posted August 3, 2009 Share Posted August 3, 2009 Thank you Miro, I read and felt how me holds apart pride . For Mika:wub2: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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