★★★
Artbeat Cabaret. Diverse-City. 24 Feb 2022
Diverse-City is a wonderful all-gender-types-welcome cabaret venue with homemade meals, rainbow library and a teacup collection. Sarah and Sue are wonderful hosts absolutely dedicated to making this former union hall heritage building the best place to meet in the city. Many of their shows have dinner options, all through the year.
Songsmiths and guitar players Paul Roberts, Alan Hartley and Keith Preston are as rusted on to Adelaide as the Royal Show and have got the band together again to entertain in their easy-going style as in previous Fringes. Their songs both laud and lament our 3rd most livable city in the world. And this time, they are pretty disappointed by the way the city is changing – Trouble in Paradise – with a nostalgic focus on the way things were.
The three amigos are accompanied by percussionist Satomi Ohnishi, bass and accordion player Peter Franche, and keyboard player and sole female vocalist who we could hear a lot more of, Jamie Webster. Except for Jamie, they are all wearing vests, which takes you back. The folksy, ballady and rockabilly styles are played ordinarily well. Most songs have catchy choruses that are repeated so many times I was nearly singing along to songs I never heard before, which is a good feeling.
It's helpful to be of a similar age to the trio to appreciate the forensic dissection in their lengthy introductions and lyrics about things like John Bannon’s failed Bank SA and the closure of Holden which “felt the heat of the Rising Sun.” The parochial importance Adelaideans put on private schools (isn’t every city like that?) gets a good satirical serve. Paul Roberts sung us his whacky song of goldfish going out for a night, probably to do the Hindley Street Waltz he sung earlier.
The song that resonated most for me was Keith Preston’s observations of the destruction of Adelaide since John Rau gave the developers a free rein which is now official in the new planning code. “Last time I drove here, it was a heritage street. Now it’s a tower of glass and concrete” and “It’s become like the others, a city of towers.” Hear! Hear! Preston’s song of what you would see in a tour of Adelaide’s nationally listed parklands – hospital, hotel, sports stadium racetrack, private school sports facilities - was deliciously tongue-in-cheek. Indeed, we are at the crossroads as Alan Hartley observed in his closing song of turning our arts and heritage city into bland blocks of bad taste. Another Preston gem was “Colonel Light, he got it right” – a whimsy on our foundational urban design.
Adelaide began under the control of the South Australian Company and the songwriters offer that their progeny, some ironically named “Guardians,” are the movers and shakers behind the scenes, compelling us to ever-expanding growth at the expense of our livability. If so, they certainly have both sides of politics in their pocket because growth at all costs is government policy no matter who is in power.
While the concern and passion are palpable, the whole shebang lacks energy. The new songs sound like the old songs. The rambling, long and frequent introductions that are tag-teamed and read off cheat sheets are informative but prevent any sort of momentum occurring. It’s definitely thought-provoking but not terribly exciting.
David Grybowski
When: 24 Feb to 6 March
Where: Diverse-City
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
