As the fifth show of his ‘Songs The World Will Never Hear’ tour, the night showcased Tim Minchin’s songs and stories from the last two decades to a sold-out audience.
A performance with the strict etiquette you will likely find in theatre - no phones and no singing along - meant the show’s contents had stayed pretty much under wraps, leaving the audience with only clues from the staging to shape their expectations. Sneaky photos were taken of the psychedelic backdrop, with references including an evolution from monkey to Minchin, fossilised piano and koalas; in his many non-musical exploits, Minchin voiced over the koala, Pretty Boy in Back To The Outback, a character he later mentioned was rather type-cast.
Whilst some could have chosen to ignore the steward’s no phone signs, Minchin’s five-piece band demanded attention in futuristic white boilersuits and hats with digital screens displaying the word “turn”. Launching into a clever work demanding the audience to “turn off your mobile phones”, Tim Minchin made a dramatic rockstar entrance before a 59-second countdown with accompanying lift music left the audience to hastily switch off their devices.
Underneath a layer of self-indulgence, quick wit and a running commentary of whether or not the last joke had been offensive, was a focus on human connection and nostalgia. Opening and closing the show with video clips from the archives, the show dug deep into the twenty years since Tim Minchin launched onto the British comedy scene. 2005 hit, ‘Rock ‘n’ roll Nerd’, was met with giggles from the audience, a song that set the theme for the night; “He will always be / A rock 'n' roll nerd / He'll keep writing songs the world don't care about”.
Playing in one of the world’s best concert venues, Minchin shared “I love this room, I love this town” before providing the audience with an insight of what to expect across the next few hours, an “absolute sh*t show of inconsistency”. The first of five or six love songs of the night - it later grew apparent that the discrepancy was over whether a song about boobs counted as a love song, he decided it did - was ‘You Grew On Me’, dispelling the myth of love at first sight and going into great conversational depth about UK audiences not appreciating the final line of the song which relies on an understanding of Australian slang.
With a new album, ‘Time Machine’, releasing next year, featuring songs written in his 20s, the second love song of the night was ‘I Wouldn’t Like You’, a heartfelt piano ballad from the album. Throughout the show, Minchin successfully dabbled in stand-up, comedic interludes and political commentary. He very quickly addressed his ramblings as an intentional choice to keep each night unique, as well as to critique the culture of flawless perfectionism being created by AI.
The night was an exhilarating ride of serious topics, cultural criticisms and absurd songs. Well aware of the intriguing duality of his career as a composer-lyricist and voice-actor for children's media and known for controversial lyrics and previous onstage escapades, he swiftly shared, “got away with it, opened Matilda, bought a house”. A letter of unsolicited advice and an exploration of generational trauma was found in ‘Ruby’, another track from his upcoming album, before a surreal shift to the country satirical hit ‘The Good Book’, Minchin donning a cowboy hat halfway through as the screen displayed lyrics with half the words as emojis. ‘I’ll Take Lonely Tonight’, written in 2018, was the third love song of the night, before an encouraging anecdote about all VIP ticket costs being donated to Médecins Sans Frontières. This set the scene for a serious “activist” song; instead, Minchin embraced being a rockstar with a comedic performance of ‘Canvas Bag’ involving a wind machine, smoke machine and ripped open shirt.
The second half felt like a jukebox of the key moments of the last twenty years, ‘Confessions’ featured choral harmonies as Minchin, now with a glass of red wine, intermixed vocal commentary on feminism, poverty and environmentalism with his love for “boobs”. Whilst his short stand-up set garnered mixed audience reaction, his subsequent performance of ‘Revolting Children’ from Matilda received a massive audience response.
The fifth love song of the night, ‘Apart Together’, a song about the fleetingness of life, featured a beautiful trumpet solo from Nick Etwell. The slower pace continued with one of the first handful of performances of ‘Peace’, a move away from humour with a song self-described as a “tear-jerker”. The newest song on the set was followed by the oldest, ‘The Song of The Masochist’ off the upcoming album, soundtracked with full band funk and a rather frenetic jazz improvisation instrumental that showed the best of the five-piece ensemble. The sixth and final love song of the evening was from ‘Groundhog Day’ before Minchin returned to the stage for a dramatic red-lit encore of ‘Dark Side’ and a performance of Dionne Warwick’s ‘That’s What Friends Are For’. An audience sing-along to old video footage was complemented by the night’s only invitation to take your phone out, as the hall lit up with phone torches and a standing ovation.
Condensing twenty years into two hours was always going to be a task, especially for someone with such an expansive and genre-spanning career as Tim Minchin. But, with a celebration of songs and comedy, old, new and unheard, it is certain that he knows how to put on a show.
Tim Minchin’s ‘Songs The World Will Never Hear’ tour continues to the end of July, for more information and to book tickets visit https://www.timminchin.com/
Maisy Neale
Image: Damian Bennett
