|
adbacadabra” Revisited
When I first reviewed
“adbacadabra” in my June 2005 column, I thought this tribute band put on a
decent show and was worth checking out. Sure there was some room for improvement
but that’s true of everything.. I recently had a second opportunity to check out
the band and found that they’ve improved greatly since the first time and
thought it was worth revisiting adbacadabra here.
Unfortunately I wasn’t able to
arrive early to the show to catch the pre-show trivia screens which I was
informed that it was put together by the band and they’ve since corrected the
slight error in years of “Ring Ring” and “Waterloo” as entries for Eurovision. I
arrived at the Pala Casino’s Grand Cabaret while the band was performing “Gimme!
Gimme! Gimme!” so I’m not entirely sure how many songs I missed but it couldn’t
have been too many since I was only about 10 minutes late. Perhaps what an
unexpected and pleasant surprise when I arrived is that I had to push past a lot
of people standing at the back of the venue to find that every table was taken,
and the Grand Cabaret is a pretty large lounge type venue, so who knew that many
people wanted to hear the work of a long gone Swedish band.
I headed to the bar and spent at
least 4 songs in line just to get a beer. Apparently they had only one bartender
working and two cocktail waitresses who the bartender would drop everything for
when they turned up at the bar so for those in line only one or two people got
served between cocktail waitresses’ appearances. They really ought to have had a
couple of bartenders. But that’s a venue problem not a band problem. You’d think
with it being a casino they’d know the goal is to separate people from their
money as quickly as possible. I saw a number of people who just gave up trying
to give them money for a drink.
While every table was taken, not
every seat was taken as there were several small tables located down in front of
the stage that had chairs for about 4 people and most only had a couple at them
so after getting a beer I decided to head down front and grabbed one of the
extra chairs from a table and sat down on the side. It served to be an excellent
vantage point to see both the band and the audience reaction. The audience was
very enthusiastic during pretty much all of the show, the only real dip in
enthusiasm was when the band was performing “Hole In Your Soul” as I think the
average person is just not really aware of the song, but they gradually warmed
up to it and were bopping along by the end of it since it’s a good opportunity
for the band to “rock out”
The most noticeable improvement
for me was the ditching of the mirror in “The Winner Takes It All” that the
Agnetha character would turn to stare into at the start and end of the song. It
has now been replaced by Agnetha facing the audience at the front of the stage
which is being filled with fog from fog machines. I think this was a very
welcome change in that from a staging point of view keeps your attention on
Agnetha because she’s facing the audience instead of her backside and allows the
emotion of the song to carry through without the giggles the mirror tended to
inspire. The song did seem to get quite a bit more rousing applause than
expected, not sure if that’s because of the training the audience gets to treat
the song like a “showstopper” by seeing Mamma Mia! or if the rendition was that
moving. I’m too close to the material and seen Mamma Mia! too many times to do
anything more than to speculate as to why, but I’m just going to chock it up as
to a combination of both as it was a very good rendition that felt true to the
showstopper version in Mamma Mia!
While I still think faux Swedish
accents are kind of a detractor when it comes to ABBA tribute bands, adbacadabra
was a lot more polished on theirs this time around than before so it feels a
little bit more acceptable here as they’re employed as a method of
characterisation rather than just an extra way to get cheap laughs from the
audience as Björn Again likes to employ the accents.
Only real hindrance to the show
was something that was not the fault of the band by any stretch of the
imagination, it was the over zealous fan down in front who kept trying to get
the bands attention, even to the point of tapping “Frida” on the shoulder while
she’s down in the audience for “I Have A Dream” to try and hand her glow sticks
that were thrown from the stage during an earlier song. And continued efforts to
try and get the attention of the band were disruptive to the show but I think
everyone in the band handled it well considering. At one point I think she was
trying to offer a room key and/or soliciting sex with the men in the band. She
was quite a scary woman to say the least. .
In summary, adbacadabra was even
better than before and definitely worth making an effort to see. It’s very
evident that a lot of love and attention towards ABBA was put into the show and
that everyone involved is really working hard to put forth the best possible
recreation of ABBA to be found in North America. They put on a fun show that I
hope to get a chance to see again soon. Perhaps a suggestion to the band is once
a date is known for the premiere of Björn and Benny’s musical “Kristina” perhaps
an adbacadabra concert could also be booked in the same location to take help
make the big premiere an extra special ABBA fan event.
Ryan |
