Bishi: Albion Voice, KOKO - music review

British-Asian diva Bishi took a rapt crowd on a journey through ancient and modern Britain in a brave and beautiful cross-media show
Brave and beautiful: Bishi
Jane Cornwell30 April 2014

For those who say performance art has lost the plot— that it’s become silly, embarrassing, too easily satirised — I give you Bishi. Last night the British-Asian diva took a rapt crowd on a journey through ancient and modern Britain in a cross-media show variously involving song, rock sitar, kaleidoscopic imagery, several costume changes and the ghostly head of Tony Benn. It was brave, beautiful and all the more powerful for being so out there.

“I am Indian in skin but English at heart,” sang Bishi, standing on a plinth in a sari and spike heels as roses bloomed and lions and unicorns reared on a giant screen behind her. And so the former electro club DJ moved from lilting songs of despair delivered from inside a white shroud to songs featuring butterflies and Middle English lyrics to a techno wig-out made all the more Dada by strobing graphics and Bishi’s skintight black-and-white catsuit.

Now 30, Bishi met the show’s director, new media artist Matthew Harden, when she was 14, out clubbing. Their creative partnership has been both fruitful and limiting: while Harden’s visual aesthetic sprinkled magic dust over last night’s show, his downbeat introduction removed the requisite sense of suspense.

Then there was Bishi’s use of backing tracks — though by the time she got around to launching her catchy new single Ship of Fools, seemingly on the prow of a boat filled with fabulous misfits including the late, great performance artist Leigh Bowery, no one minded.

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