Sarah-Louise Young brings a lot of big Theatre Kid Energy to her Kate Bush tribute act at Sydney Festival, which is exactly what you want from this sort of thing. Young doesn’t attempt to exactly mimic the revered and eclectic English musical icon, but rather invites the audience into a celebration of both Bush herself and the Bush fandom.
The trick, I think, is acknowledging that Bush is, yes, ethereal and arty, but also more than a little goofy – as sketched out when we’re taken through a quick practical demonstration of the six main tricks in Bush’s choreography bag. It’s taken as a given that the audience is heavily seeded with Kate Bush tragics, and that certainly seemed to be true – which came in handy when a 10-year-old girl and her mother were roped in to provide backing vocals for ‘Hounds of Love’, and when a couple in their sixth decade of marriage were invited in stage to dance to ‘Don’t Give Up’.
There’s a lot of audience interaction; at this show we are all “Fish People”, as Bush’s fans call themselves, regardless of how well we may know her back catalogue. And Fish People are not precious, it seems – Young’s reworking of several songs, including a Russian take on ‘Babushka’ with the pronunciation corrected, were met with rapture.
An Evening Without Kate Bush is an absolute delight. Odds are good you’ll never see the enchantress herself live (Fish People know), but this joyous celebration might be the next best thing.
‘An Evening Without Kate Bush’ played at Sydney Theatre Company’s Wharf 1 Theatre, Walsh Bay, as part of Sydney Festival from Jan 18-21, 2024. Find out more here.
