Manchester Stalkathon

OK, firstly I apologise that this blog is WAY TOO LONG, but every time I go to Manchester for Queer Up North it turns out to be the BEST time and I just had to tell you all about everything. I was only there for 36 hours but it felt like a week there was so much excitement and, though I never thought I would hear myself say this, it is possible I am ALL STALKED OUT.

As if the double bill of Justin Bond and Taylor Mac (with extra added Jonny Woo and David Hoyle) wasn't enough to contend with, I found myself falling for yet another, and I can now declare that I am officially BESOTTED. My new love is Our Lady J - a totally FIERCE trans woman who is keyboard player and musical director to Mx Bond. But I'll tell you more about that later, I'm going to take it right back up to the top and then we'll start ...

My first engagement was Is Queer Culture Obsolete? a debate where writer Mark Simpson had been invited to play devil's advocate and put forward an argument against queer culture to a five-person opposing panel. Well, what a damp squib he turned out to be. I mean, don't get me wrong, I've nothing against the guy, although he often talks bollocks he does so in a powerful way and I always find his writing interesting, but on stage he totally failed to live up to his reputation. Given his media image of being out-spoken and controversial, I was expecting him to put forward a strong case and give birth to a Mrs Merton-style heated debate, but he just kind of bumbled and phaffed about like an uncomfortable school boy.

He opened by claiming he didn't know what queer culture was so had gone to look on Wikipedia (?!) He had found no definition as there should never be one - queer is fluid and uniquely defined by each individual who chooses to embrace the label. He put his lack of comprehension forward as an "argument" to the panel, who comprised of Justin Bond, Taylor Mac, Jonathan Best (Queer Up North's artistic director) and two academics.

Though they tried their best to answer there wasn't too much they could say in the absence of an actual question, so he then started prattling on about Canal Street and the straight girl invasion. This, as Justin pointed out, really had sod all to do with queer culture, but at least it brought about some interesting comments about the history of gay culture and how it used to be all about fighting oppression. Now queer culture is less about fighting external oppression and more to do with seeking refuge from the homogenised post-Civil Partnership gay culture. Mr Simpson wasn't impressed.

Somewhere in his summing up he decided there was no such thing as queer culture and at this point he lost us completely. People started talking about their own personal experience and that was fine, I especially enjoyed one of the women on stage saying she was scared she would succumb to the idea of gay marriage and needed queer culture to talk her out of it, and although I was interested in everyone's comments it was all very negative, negative - oppression, rebellion and blah blah blah. I was happy to be handed the microphone at the end of the session to make a comment, and I asked why no one had mentioned celebration? I said that for me queer culture is about being proud and being free to express different variances of gender, so couldn't we all just cheer up a bit? I'm happy to say I got the only laugh of the session (OK, maybe Justin got some too) but I was certainly pleased to have sneaked in uninvited and got the last word!

At the end of the discussion I was reunited with Taylor and hugged Justin till he almost choked of constriction, we had nice little chats then I went off to my hotel for a lie down and to prepare for the evening highlight - May Queen, A Vernal She-Quinox.

It's hard to explain the sheer brilliance of this show - the UK debut of Justin's New York production Lustre - that allowed him to present my dream line-up. I really can't decide what my favourite bit was. There were many fabulous Justin moments before, during and after the guest sections, as he sang new songs and old favourites like Low Spark of High Heeled Boys and a few Bambi Lake numbers. For the latter he was joined by his adorable boyfriend Nath-Ann, who was clad in a loin-cloth with glitter on his body that gave him the look of a young Grecian god.

Jonny Woo was the first to take the guest spotlight to do his pussycat story of Mister Tinkle Tum Tum - the jealous cat who hates his mummy's new baby and is rescued from his misery by the entrance of Sir Jasper Wasp, who plunges his sting into the arm of the baby causing its blood to boil and erupt.

I've seen Jonny do this piece a few times and it just keeps getting better and better, the silent theatre was enrapt, hanging off every word and savouring the perfection of timing and subtle nuance. His outfit also deserves special mention for including a fur cat basket that he had fashioned into an enormous bonnet.

If my memory serves me well it was David Hoyle who was next up. Looking relaxed and happy he launched into a rant about straight people and how your parents give birth to you then fuck you up. He concluded we should all just turn on the people who produced us.

Next was Bitch, who I was aware of from Shortbus, she led us through a spirited rap called Pussy Manifesto. Justin revealed that his working titles for the show had included White Woman Down or White Pussy. Originally he had wanted to include some people of colour but abandoned the plan when all he found was a drag queen called Rachel Diversity. At some point he also included a stark autobiographical line about a revelation in San Francisco when he realised it was time to drop the bird seed tits and the fright wig, and thus it was the end for Kiki.

After some more songs and dialogue about Joan Didion, he introduced his extra special guest - the lovely Taylor - who walked on wearing the biggest set of falsies you can imagine. Not content with being double G-cup titties, they also *sang*, accompanying him in soprano on The Revolution Will Not Be Masculinised, which made me wonder - why do people always think tits have high, squeaky voices?

I think it was at this point that the divine Our Lady J, who I had been swooning over horribly throughout the performance, took her moment of glory to perform her song Pink Prada Purse - a story about her being in love with a boy (boo!) who broke her heart so she shot him. As soon as I heard her voice I was SOLD, deep and beautiful with a warmth matched only by her smile. She gave these old hormones of mine quite a shake up.

In the bar afterwards, at first I was too shy to speak to her, but then I got Nath-Ann to introduce us. In the unlikely event that any of you are still reading, you can see the evidence in my lovely stalking gallery. I'm not going to go on about the stalking, I'll let the pictures tell the story, so if you'd like to select some Vision On style music, I will bid you a fond farewell ...

Take me to the stalking gallery.