Friday 4th March 2016
Sophie Ellis-Bextor jetted into Australia last Friday and no sooner jetted back out on Sunday. “You have to be bonkers to come to Australia from the UK for 48 hours. Who does that?” said Sophie with a wry smile.
Accompanied by her 4 month old son Jesse, Sophie arrived in Sydney to headline the Soda Pop Party in celebration of the Gay Mardi Gras festival which also opened on Friday. Many of the sold out crowd of 1000 people were treated to a special meet and greet opportunity with Sophie Ellis-Bextor who was very gracious and signed pictures, photos and was warm and welcoming to all that she met.
As you would expect, with an infant to look after and such a short time here, this show was essentially a DJ set with the vocals provided by Sophie and sung over the top of her pre-recorded songs. No musicians provided any live instrumentation but the short set was well received with ‘Murder on the dance floor’ the first song of the set. The hits followed, including “Music gets the best of me”, “Take me home” and “Get over you”, with many songs taken from her albums “Read my lips” and “Make a Scene” providing the backbone of the show. Sophie has a strong and powerful voice and the disco beat of her songs made for a great dance party. A buoyant and joyous mood permeated the 1000 strong audience for this was fun to hear all these great songs again.
Sophie Ellis-Bextor seemed genuinely surprised at the crowd’s enthusiasm for “Heartbreak make me a dancer” and “Can’t fight this feeling” , as these songs received little airplay here.She appeared to be relishing the opportunity to once again be on stage as it has been a while, with 4 kids under 13, Sophie has her hands full these days. We were extremely lucky to have her perform in Australia and a big thank you must go to “In the Dark” promotions for bringing her out for 2 shows in Sydney and Melbourne.
Sophie has just finished recording her 6th album a couple of weeks ago with the same musicians that recorded the previous record “Wanderlust”. Hopefully one day Sophie can return here with her full band in tow.
Adrian Alders