An Evening Without Kate Bush @ Le Cascadeur At The Garden of Unearthly Delights, Adelaide

Being a life long Kate Bush fan when I heard about this show a few years ago I sent the talented Sarah-Louise Young a message saying it would be perfect for the Adelaide Fringe. I was more than disappointed when I could not attend when it played last year at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival as my friends said it was excellent. So I was ecstatic when it was announced for the Adelaide Fringe this year.

From the beginning of the show, Sarah-Louise Young has the audience howling with delight singing the backing vocals to Hounds of Love and ending with another well-known song bookending the show when audience participation was taken to another level with her near wordless performance of Kate’s debut (Wuthering Heights).

In between, Wow encapsulates and is a primer for the show to follow with a literal roll call of Kate Bush tribute acts and impersonators which introduced us to Kate’s signature stage moves culminating in a tale of a wig which almost has a starring roll by itself.

On that note, costume changes are executed successfully and choreography is spot on with Kate’s mentor Lindsay Kemp even getting a cameo. We learnt the correct pronunciation of Babooshka during a performance of that song in Russian. Sarah-Louise did a version of Running Up That Hill made famous by the Stranger Things Netflix show which was magical. Unlike Kate’s comeback shows in 2014 which excluded any songs from her first four albums this show encompasses Kate’s career from the first album to 1993’s The Red Shoes.

This is a great show for Kate Bush fans but that does not mean the uninitiated won’t get a lot from this brilliant show. I will definitely be seeing this show before the end of the Fringe so that I can her Sarah-Louise’s absolutely beautiful voice and highly inventive stage craft.

Fringe Review By Richard De Pizzol

For tickets and show info for An Evening Without Kate Bush head to FringeTix…