6/3/2023 0 Comments Ricky king musicLocal bands The Lightning Seeds and Atomic Kitten played. Co-hosts Joel Dommett and AJ Odudu did their best to knit the concert together with its inevitable autocue segues and plugs for the National Lottery. The Neoclassical St George’s Hall became a vast screen for projections – from the names of famous Liverpudlians to a recreation of the Titanic – while acrobats spun overhead and dozens of coloured drones lit up the sky. An estimated 161 million people will watch the Eurovision final on Saturday night, and as a curtain-raiser this event was pretty spectacular. While Johnson remains a commanding presence and Paul Rutherford – Frankie’s Bez – danced like it was 1984, the 30,000-strong were expecting more. Instead the band opted for the lesser-known Welcome to the Pleasuredome, a bouncy number two hit from 1985 – inspired by Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem Kubla Khan – and the title track of their debut album. While it was understandable that they didn’t play Two Tribes (the UK is hosting Eurovision on behalf of Ukraine, so lyrics about two tribes going to war would have been inappropriate), they also eschewed Relax (the saucy song for which they were banned) and The Power of Love. Holly Johnson and pals played just a single song – and it wasn’t one of their three number one hits. And yet, performing for the first time in 36 years at Liverpool’s majestic St George’s Hall to kick off the city’s Eurovision celebrations, one of the most popular bands of the Eighties proved a bit of a disappointment. It’s a sign of how much times have changed that Frankie Goes to Hollywood, once banned by the BBC for their sexual lyrics, were last night headlining a concert to be broadcast on BBC1.
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