Time to click those heels three times and transport yourself straight to Kansas. Or Pittsburgh or Edinburgh for Miss Alexandra Huntingdon with her Gentleman’s Intermission, is the kind of cabaret loving gal whose blood clearly has a pH value distinctly less than 7. Her songs, wry and worldly, might well speak from the heart of matters modern and not Millie but this is not so much feminism squeezed into a cocktail dress as a reinvention of the glories of the days of the music hall.
Ably assisted by The Gentleman’s Intermission, Miss Huntingdon rolls out the styles of yesteryear and decorates the room in colours all the way from vaudeville to old style r ’n’ b and, best of all, this album is a live recording so you get all the proof you need that she rolls like that every night. Whoop and holler therefore just like those who were actually there as, in the glorious “Sugar Mama Blues” she takes the modern man – or at least those north of the Mason Dixon line anyway – apart in a manner that would make Lavern Baker proud. Barely pausing, she then sharpens her knife and uses “Here, Have A Sandwich” to take beard scratching indie boys to the burger van for a reality check.
The lady is a performer without a doubt and will no doubt find herself garnering popularity in any big city festival with an artistic flavour. In the meantime though, I am off to see the Wizard of Oz for I need not a heart but her phone number. She's my kind of gal.
The album is available as a download from Bandcamp.