Claire Sawers

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Haruki Marukami's novel is given multimedia stage adaptation by Stephen Earnhart

24 Aug 2011

Toru Okada is 29 and shares an apartment with his wife, Kumiko and their cat. When both the wife and cat vanish and don’t come back for several days, Toru tries to work out what’s happened to them, with the help of a spiritualist who doubles as a…

Profile: Best Coast

Californian surf-pop duo set for Edinburgh date

24 Aug 2011

That name rings a bell... Refresh my memory? Gladly. It’s a boy/girl duo of Bethany Cosentino and Bobb Bruno, with Ali Koehler on drums. What does their music sound like? A sad look back at a really incredible, life-changing, but ultimately…

The Phoenix: A Failure on a Mision

Natural performer let down by unchallenging material

23 Aug 2011

If Tania Edwards read the phone book aloud, it would probably be a sarcastic and over-animated thing of wonder. She seems born to perform, but would probably thrive on more envelope-pushing material (as opposed to failed loves, lager drinking and her…

Interview: Chad VanGaalen

Illustrator, musician and Sub Pop labelmate of J Mascis

18 Aug 2011

Illustrator and musician Chad VanGaalen’s no frills lo fi approach is winning him fans, including his own grunge idol J.Mascis, finds Claire Sawers ‘Ever since I was about five, I was really into comic books. For years I’d been going to this comic…

Sarah Millican

Has the Geordie jester lost her bite?

17 Aug 2011

After TV stints on Mock the Week, Michael McIntyre’s Comedy Roadshow and Loose Women, Geordie chatterbox Sarah Millican is a household name to many now, just three short years after her Fringe debut. The steep upswing in her career means she’s relocated…

The Phoenix: A Failure on a Mission

Daft sense of humour requires more envelope-pushing material

16 Aug 2011

If Tania Edwards read the phone book aloud, it would probably be a very sarcastic, absurd and over-animated thing of wonder. The 30-year-old seems born to perform, but would probably thrive on more envelope-pushing material (as opposed to everyday…

Matt Kirshen

Embarrassing moments humour slightly wooden

16 Aug 2011

A geeky schoolboy turned awkward adult, Kirshen mixes tales about embarrassing moments (like that time he dictated an ‘I love you’ note to the Interflora man), with observations on politics. Kirshen tries to incorporate a fixed grin into his schtick…

Henry Paker

Original, whimsical stand-up

15 Aug 2011

Imagining we’re stuck up Kilimanjaro, waiting to be rescued, with enthusiastic thespy type, Paker (he likes exclaiming things like ‘extraordinary!’) keeping morale up with his arsenal of dinner party skills. These include impressions of emoticons…

McNeil and Pamphilon

Enjoyable sketch comedy from two chaps who should know better

15 Aug 2011

Steve and Sam open with a knowingly sheepish confession: they are ‘two middle-aged, white thirtysomethings who won’t give up the dream’. Thankfully they bring something fresh to that already over-cluttered table. A seductive Wham dance, McNeil’s ability…

Armageddapocalypse

Loving pastiche of action movies from Footlights crew

14 Aug 2011

One for action movie fans, this Cambridge-based theatre group gleefully ransacks the genre, and all its drug-dealing, wire-wearing, daughter-kidnapping clichés. Written by Footlights veterans, the hammy nonsense is enhanced with parkour shadow puppets…

Daniel Sloss - The Joker

Ridiculously talented young comedy buck

12 Aug 2011

Daniel Sloss – a charming, elongated Macaulay Culkin doppelganger, and protégé of Frankie Boyle – begins by listing the reasons why people might not like his show. ‘I smile, I swear, I’m happy and I can jump. The ones who won’t like me, they’re the old…

Interview - Washed Out aka Ernest Greene

American synth-pop creator expands band line-up for UK dates

8 Aug 2011

The List catches up with Ernest Greene the night after a gig in Berlin. It was someone in the band’s birthday apparently, so a bit of partying had to be done afterwards. Now he’s in the awkward post-coffee, but pre-breakfast part of his hangover, and in…

Margaret Cho

San Franciscan in town to have lots of sex, please

8 Aug 2011

There’s an audible audience cringe when Margaret Cho explains – with all the detail of an autopsy report – what she thinks might have put off the man about to have sex with her. ‘I’d like to apologise to all the people who didn’t know what to expect…

Roisin Conaty

‘Dickhead’ on a mission to achieve zen

8 Aug 2011

This 32-year-old from Camden Market is on a mission ‘to get zenned out, and be more functioning’. With four and a half years of singledom playing on her mind, plus an appalling sense of direction (not good when trying to storm off after an argument, she…

Fiona O'Loughlin: Spirited (Tales from an Angel in a Bottle)

Bloody funny, just don’t show her the Bloody Marys

8 Aug 2011

An Irish-Australian who loves to get drunk? Now there’s a novel idea. Don’t be fooled though, Fiona O’Loughlin strides comfortably through what should be a cliché minefield, and finds comedy gold in the true story of her struggle with alcoholism. Her…

Interview: Oneohtrix Point Never

Psychedelic synths and drones from experimental electronica-lord, Daniel Lopatin

2 Aug 2011

Name Daniel Lopatin Job title Musician, label owner Where are you just now? Brooklyn, NY. What are you doing/ going to do today? Finish the track arrangement for the upcoming OPN record. Do you enjoy touring? I do, I didn't always. It…

Margaret Cho interview - Cho Dependent

US comedian brings revered taboo-busting material to Edinburgh Fringe

6 Jul 2011

Whether or not Edinburgh crowds will recognise Margaret Cho probably depends on their TV viewing habits. British followers of Sex and the City may remember Cho as the terrifying, black-uniformed fashion producer who orders Carrie to model on the…

Lip Service

Matter of fact and moving study of human emotions

25 Aug 2010

Bravery, authenticity, vulnerability. It seems these are three things that Becki Gerrard wants to prove during her autobiographical solo show. Her theatrical device – being totally naked throughout, and making it very clear just quite how comfortable…

Two Bloody Queens

A noble, but shambolic attempt

25 Aug 2010

It takes a brave man to sum up the lives of two dead monarchs – especially in drag, in a noisy pub basement, in an hour. Robert Inston’s portrayal of Elizabeth Tudor and Mary Queen of Scots is a noble, but shambolic attempt to show the real women behind…

Teenage Riot

23 Aug 2010

What’s going through the mind of a teenager? Lovebites? Career prospects? Facebook? Dieting? All of the above, apparently. ‘My shrink doesn’t understand me!’ whines one teenager, in a comedy section where we get an emo blast of adolescent moans. ‘I am…

Carl Barron

Restrained idiocy from Aussie manchild

20 Aug 2010

Carl Barron is not big (rude people point it out to him all the time, apparently). He’s not clever (or so he’d have us believe with his slow-schoolboy schtick). Luckily for him, then, that’s he’s very funny. The jolly, just-a-touch dopey Australian…

Vidal Sassoon

The style icon talks to Claire Sawers about his life and book

17 Aug 2010

At the height of his celebrity, in the peak of his playboy yachts-and-champagne years, Vidal Sassoon was aboard a boat in Capri, where he was spending the summer. Bobbing in the bay, surrounded by friends, Sassoon looked over at an English boy who was a…

Louise Welsh's Naming the Bones

The author's newest novel meanders between boozers and burial grounds

17 Aug 2010

Louise Welsh’s latest novel was inspired during a trip to Germany, but set in her beloved Scotland, though it’s not the reverie of an expat looking through tartan-tinted glasses. Naming the Bones meanders between Edinburgh boozers and Highland burial…

The Nelson Twins

More groans than laughs

17 Aug 2010

God love them, but these ‘garden gnome’ resembling identical twins from New South Wales really struggle to spin the gimmick out long enough for an entire show. It’s only 45 minutes long, and it has its own warm-up act – the expressionless stoner, Luke…

The Wau Wau Sisters

Chaotic, messy, Benny Hill-style slap and tickle comedy

16 Aug 2010

This is chaotic, messy, Benny Hill-style slap and tickle comedy, from those dirty tramps, The Wau Wau Sisters. Acrobatic striptease, red wine showers and Catholic schoolgirl burlesque skits keep the tone strictly low-brow, with song and dance numbers…