The Tiger Lillies, “the great punk/avant-garde cabaret band,” play St Ann’s Warehouse, in New York, this weekend. I had the misfortune to sit through the first half of their show in London a little earlier this year with Clive Davis. Mercifully, Clive released me at the interval. But, he did return valiantly for the second act, resulting in one of the most delicious reviews I have read this year:

Let me begin by stressing the positives. First of all, we got to hear a Jake Thackray song playing over the speakers during the interval. Second, although this show feels as if it lasts four hours, it is all over in less than two. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is just about all the enthusiasm I can muster for this pathetically misconceived evening.

We have all heard of Grand Guignol. The latest Gothic extravaganza from Martyn Jacques and his “satanic folk” colleagues — now celebrating 20 years of cheerful deviancy — could be described as Petit Guignol. It tries desperately to be dark and cynical, but in the end it is about as subversive as that TV commercial in which Johnny Rotten reinvents himself as a butter salesman.

The Tiger Lillies at New Players Theatre, WC2 (The Times)