Cabaret...

Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome, im Kabaret, au cabaret, to cabaret!

Last Thursday Stu and I went to see Cabaret at the Savoy Theatre in London's glitzy West End.

Starring Will Young as the Emcee and Michelle Ryan as Sally Bowles it was the essentially the same Rufus Norris directed production we saw back in 2006 at the Lyric Theatre starring Anna Maxwell Martin as Sally and James Dreyfus as the Emcee.

Kander and Ebb's remarkable musical turns the pre-war Berlin of 1931 into a dark and sexually charged haven of decadence, its extraordinary and morally ambiguous inhabitants determined to keep up appearances as the real world - the world outside the comfortable sanctuary of the cabaret - prepares for the nightmarish chaos of war.

Sadly there was a slight mismatch between the acting skills and the singing skills of its stars. Will Young could do the latter but not the former. With Michelle Ryan it was vice versa.

The musical numbers were excellent however and the dancing troupe are up to high Bob Fosse standard and conveyed the throbbing sexuality of the Kit Kat Club to a tee.

And as with the 2006 production there was a fair bit of nudity. It wasn't gratuitous in any way though. It was all in the best possible taste. And in fact used quite poignantly at the end.

Marc Almond tells Pop Idol losers to f**k off...
Marc Almond thinks the public should not have to put up with the Pop Idol losers releasing records. He believes Will Young should be the only pop star to emerge from the series. The Soft Cell star says the other finalists can get lost.

He said: "It's very easy to be famous nowadays, but it's also a lot easier to disposed of. "Why do we have to put up with the Pop Idol losers and runners-up releasing records? It's all very Saturday night karaoke. There's room for Will Young because he won the competition, but the rest can f**k off.

Soft Cell have a new album scheduled for release in September. Almond thinks the duo's new material will appeal to established fans and the upcoming generation of music lovers.

"I'm nearly 45, so I'm going through a kind of midlife crisis. That will be reflected in the album. But I think we've managed to keep our mystique. At the first set of Soft Cell reunion gigs there were older people mixed in with a lot of teenagers who've just discovered us."

Almond says he hasn't heard Marilyn Manson's cover version of Tainted Love, which is currently in the UK Top Ten. "I like Marilyn Manson and people have asked me about it, but I haven't heard it yet," he said.

"I'm much more interested in completely different versions of songs like David Gray's cover of Say Hello, Wave Goodbye. Of course, we wrote that song so we get royalties from that one - maybe there's a mercenary element to my attitude somewhere."

A Greatest Hits album has just been released, which includes two new Soft Cell compositions.