Edinburgh Fringe 2025
Low Down
Ab Fab meets The Old Grey Whistle Test in this look back to the 70s, when many bands formed a decade earlier were more than creaking at the seams. Part sketch show, part parody singing, it’s an interesting hour of music and badinage from a talented trio of performance singers.
Review
Remember the 70’s? That time when a lot of the bands that had kick-started the cultural revolution of the 60’s were finding breaking up wasn’t as hard as Neil Sedaka’s hit suggested. Would the Bee Gees actually make it through the night, never mind the next decade? Would Simon and Garfunkel be echoing to the sound of silence? Would Fleetwood Mac go their own way(s)?
70s Rewind is a re-imagining of what might have happened to these and other bands in a bright and breezy hour of sketches and hit songs that the audience are positively encouraged to join in with. And do, with mixed results. The show features an effervescent trio comprising Rainee Blake, Maddi Fraser and Jordana Lilly as they rattle out the tunes and sketches, battling with a range of malfunctioning moustaches, wobbly wigs and other accoutrements that seemed to have minds of their own.
The fate of the Bee Gees is the rolling theme across the show, with nods being made in the direction of Simon and Garfunkel, Crosby, Stills and Nash, Fleetwood Mac and the Eagles, each band being parodied vocally and with a degree of invention involving an awful lot of quick costume changes, wigs, moustaches and sparkly jackets.
Segues and sketches involved some nicely scripted and delivered badinage, the trio opting for caricatures (rather than characterisation) with some splendid send ups, particularly that of the adenoidal Robin Gibb, although I think his tash might have rested a little more securely on his top lip than was the case here. And the plethora of groan worthy puns involving well kent song titles, plus a dash of innuendo and double entendre hit the audience sweet spot in terms of humour.
You could see that the audience was engaged from the first note, hardly surprising given that most of them were sporting a rolling gait and rotundity that suggested they’d been around when the songs first hit the airwaves. Their best dancing days might have been behind them but, oh boy, was this lot up for a party!
And this last night Fringe party was rolling along very smoothly too, building nicely to the big finale featuring what proved to be an excellent medley of Bee Gees 80s disco hits, when the sound system decided its Fringe was over and, with a couple of thunderous bangs and a crash, went to meet its maker.
Now, the mark of a top class act is how it copes when things turn to custard, as they clearly had here. Top marks and a Fringe award for ingenuity to this trio, then, as within seconds they’d plugged the backing track into an alternative amp, ditched the mikes they’d been using for vocals throughout the evening, and belted out the finale with voices on turbocharge. Not a note dropped, not a dance step missed. Top class!
This talented trio have got something with a show that was a bit “Ab Fab meets The Old Grey Whistle Test”. Great voices, each with depth and range, produced a lovely rounded sound with some sweet harmonies. Sketches pretty much worked as intended, their attention to detail in terms of costuming and props was laudable and their composure when things went thump when they shouldn’t have was the icing on the cake. Let’s hope they come back next year with more – a trio I recommend you look out for.
