Meow Meow: Feline Intimate

International cabaret star Meow Meow is very much the cat who got the cream this year, with her career as self-styled ‘kamikaze’ chanteuse slinking from strength to strength. This latest show sees her slumming it in the Wonderground’s Spiegeltent – ‘camping’ as she witheringly refers to it – but her loss is our gain as she presents a brilliantly accomplished, if overstretched, evening of chaotic entertainment.

The pose of long-suffering diva is scarcely an original one, and the swipes at conventional cabaret and objectification are distinctly velvet pawed, but the performance is so classy it’s hard to care. Songs by Fiona Apple and The Dresden Dolls snuggle up with Dadaist Helena Remeyer’s orgasmic ‘Sonata Erotica’, and the surprise set highlight of Radiohead’s ‘Fake Plastic Trees’.

Meow Meow shifts through tones, languages and moods with thrilling elasticity, including rocking the hell out of a polyglot cover of Brian Hyland’s timeless ‘Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini’. At more than 90 minutes there’s room for a few snips, but the only real disappointment is that Meow Meow’s trademark audience interaction is of the slightly stale ‘drag ’em up and take the piss’ variety, giving what should be an evening of cutting-edge cabaret an unwelcome whiff of the holiday camp.