Thriller Live!

Three cheers for the creators of Thriller Live! For not weaving the brilliant repertoire of Michael Jackson around some threadbare plot. Seriously, the songs are good enough to stand alone, especially when they are delivered with the talent and energy of this current touring company. The energy on the stage was quite extraordinary, from the dancers and form the excellent vocalists, all of who could hold their own in the dance routines. Add to this a blisteringly raunchy band who were more than up to the task of recreating the sounds of Tamla through disco and funk to his later epic balladeering days. The set is okay but this is after all a concert so it does not need to do much, and the costumes, well some are odd, there’s a lot of punky looking stuff which I guess Jackson did appropriate, but here it looked perhaps a bit too punk. The lead vocalists are all good, Angelica Allen has a great voice but from time to time she was swamped by the sound system, not her fault. Adam J Bernard and Shaquille Hemmans are both accomplished vocalists who give their all throughout and Sean Christopher certainly has all the moves. For my money though, it is the vocal skill of Rory Taylor that steals the show, an amazing voice that sounds closest to Jackson’s in all its incarnations, funking brilliant!
Theatre Royal Brighton
27 June
Andrew Kay
4 stars