OneTouch Theatre, Eden Court, Inverness, 12th February 2011

THE LOVEBOAT has been cruising the Scottish seas for some fifteen years with a regular, sold-out date at Queen’s Hall during the Edinburgh Festival but, though it’s sailed to Highland parts before, as far as the crew could remember this was its first landing in Eden Court. To mark the occasion the OneTouch Theatre had taken on a festive air, strewn with red roses (Valentine’s weekend), decked with bunting, and with the ground floor seats replaced by tables and chairs around a dance floor.

Loveboat Big Band at Glenuig Hall

Heather Macleod, smoky-voiced chanteuse from Lewis, sashayed onstage, flanked by a skeleton crew under the command of Admiral Andy Thorburn on piano. They were soon joined by the sailor-suited brass section who rootled and tootled through the theatre like a New Orleans cortege. The Loveboat’s figurehead is usually a trio of vocalists, but laryngitis had kept Kaela Rowan and Lindsay Black on shore in Edinburgh; luckily, Macleod’s voice was big enough to fill most of the space they left, with a little help from swiftly dusted-off falsettos. In an impressive display of insouciance, guitarist David Donnelly managed this without removing his (unlit) cigarette holder.

There followed a lightning-fast cruise around the world, navigating calm and choppy seas alike, punctuated by Admiral Thorburn’s surrealist references to the Admiralty Handbook’s chapters on Knots, Whipping and Lashings. The Loveboat’s note-perfect recreations of old standards like ‘Sea Cruise’ and ‘My Funny Valentine’ rubbed shoulders with artfully aged arrangements of more recent, mostly nautical-themed tunes including Little Feat’s ‘Sailing Shoes’. The Eurythmics’ ‘Sweet Dreams” and Michael Jackson’s ‘Don’t Stop till You Get Enough’ featuring guest vocalist Captain Barnacle (Barney Strachan) brought hitherto reluctant dancers onto the floor. Dance styles varied from immaculate ballroom to alcohol-fuelled randomness, but the important thing was that people danced, eventually.

It took a while for some of the audience to get the idea that dancing was not just tolerated but the major point of the evening – some thought it was a concert – and it would have helped if the house lights had been turned down far enough to encourage shy dancers onto the floor before the encores. The Loveboat is a wonderful conceit, part theatre, part music, part mayhem, always pure enjoyment and, like sea air, good for your health.

© Jennie Macfie, 2011

Links

• Loveboat Big Band
• Jennie Macfie