PEACHES DJ EXTRAVAGANZA at the Opera House, Wednesday (September 21). Rating: NNN
A follow-up to her 2009 LP I Feel Cream doesn’t seem to be in sight, but Peaches is anything but stagnant.
In recent years the Berlin-based Torontonian has produced numerous music videos, toured her version of Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Jesus Christ Superstar and staged her own Rocky Horror-style musical, Peaches Does Herself. According to Rolling Stone, she’s hoping this DJ tour will draw attention of financiers for a North American production she wants to stage in the near future.
Billed as a “DJ Extravaganza,” Wednesday night’s show was light on production frills but full of the usual Peaches mayhem. Although she spent much of her time behind – or on top of – the decks, this gig felt like a trip back to her early days at the El Mocambo. The outfits, the songs and the size of the room are different, but the format was tried and true: the campy costumes, the chaotic choreography, the half-full but energetic crowd that lapped up every puerile sight gag and exploding champagne bottle.
Dressed in a flesh-coloured, control-top body suit topped with a Barbie-bedecked boob blossom, Peaches opened the hour-long set with a solemn, ceremonial take on Pink Floyd’s The Great Gig In The Sky, her psyched-out diva melisma rippling and echoing around the Opera House. From there, she kept the buzz saw beats, hulking rock riffs and epic builds coming, leaving the turntables to perform a few of her own bangers like Talk To Me and Boys Wanna Be Her flanked by two dancers.
The climax of the night arrived shortly after bottomless burlesque performer (and NOW Magazine sex columnist) Sasha Van Bon Bon pulled a feathered boa out of her vag and picked a fight with the other dancer. Not one to be upstaged, Peaches promptly diffused the tussle. “I have a sensitive side,” she barked. “Get the fuck off the stage.” She then brought back the ‘90s melisma for a heartfelt rendition of Tina Turner’s ‘80s hit Private Dancer and capped the night with her own classic, Fuck The Pain Away.
Playlist-wise, she erred toward the grinding dance-rock side of her repertoire rather than the hip-hop and dark, bass-y beats she played with on I Feel Cream. The highlights of the night were the cover songs that bookended the set: Peaches might be renowned for raunchy rapping, but she’s an underrated singer. While we wait for future extravaganzas – an album or a musical – this one was a sufficiently pervy diversion into her past.
music@nowtoronto.com
