One must surely wonder whether Ute Lemper feels angry
towards Germany, considering the amount of times she
criticised her native country. I'm sure, however, that
any German audience members will have immediately
forgiven her when she started singing. And what a
truly wonderful voice this woman has, her strong
contralto resounding off the walls of the Royal
Festival Hall.
Her strong performance was slightly spoilt, though, by
the amateurish set-up of the concert. The band,
however individually talented they might have been,
sometimes either got out of time, or got completely
lost, and the lighting crew appeared not to have a
clue as to what they were doing, lighting up
unimportant bits of the stage, and searching the stage
with the spotlight until they found her.
That said, however, Ute saved the day, singing songs
from her latest album, Punishing Kiss (including songs
by The Divine Comedy, Elvis Costello, Scott Walker, Tom Waits and others), as
well as some of her older French and German
repertoire. Most of the songs were done in new
arrangements, and so sounded slightly different than
they do on the recording, but renditions of Nick Cave's Little Water Song and I Am A Vamp were stand-out performances.
Three members of the The Divine Comedy were in attendance, yet not on the stage, composer Joby Talbot looking on with wife and artist Claire Burbridge.
This was a mostly great gig, and Ute must be
particularly congratulated for doing her best to keep
the band playing together.
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