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New Moon is nothing if not an international advertisement for the hungry virtues of virginity and young people can’t get enough of it
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Theatre
A smart, prickly and rewarding view of sexual and emotional confusion
Cock
Restaurants
Kitchen W8 is a bargain for this area, if such sophistication is what you crave
Kitchen W8
Too long and drawn out but very entertaining with excellent special effects
This is a peculiar play and does not work for me. Some of it is very funny but there are real flaws
Alex has a strong powerful voice and was faultless, she is far better now than she was on the X-Factor
London,
Critic rating
Reader rating
Description: Layered sonic-pop symphonies from the flamboyant Wayne Coyne and his band with support from the pastoral pop melodists.
Phone: 0844844 4748
Website: www.hammersmithapollo.net
Email: info@hammersmithapollo.net
Trains: Tube: Hammersmith 
Extra info: Pub
Frontman Wayne Coyne kept the fans rooted in reality despite the psychedelic effects
You could spend a whole review attempting to list everything grasping for attention during the first song of last night's Flaming Lips concert: the balloons of various size and hue bouncing about; the Santa Clauses and dancing girls either side of the stage; frontman Wayne Coyne walking inside a man-sized hamster-ball, rolling over the crowd before exiting the contraption to sing in a fractured, endearing croak and fire his glitter-gun into his adoring, almost cult-like audience.
The Lips were introduced by a jolly man in a pantomime mayor's costume, before launching into their secularist hymn Race For The Prize (a tale of scientists working themselves to death to find a cure for cancer), starting this carnival of chaos.
Barring some songlist and personnel changes and a bigger budget, it was pretty much the same show they've been playing since 1999's breakthrough The Soft Bulletin album, lifting the crowd to damp-eyed peaks of ecstasy for two hours. What startles is how spontaneous it all still felt, how unpredictable - indeed, all that was predictable was how profoundly moving it was.
For all their hippy-dippy, day-glo lunacy, a darkness stalks Flaming Lips' songbook, underscoring their Sesame Street psychedelia.
Death is a constant spectre, stealing loved ones away too soon with disease or unjust wars, but the Flaming Lips remain optimistic (it was a quality Coyne eulogised in his rambling inter-song banter).
Their message was that what matters is to taste the marrow of life in the time that remains. Do You Realise was dedicated to a fan who passed away a month before, requested by his friends in the audience; he'd had the song played at his funeral. The song's theme took on an extra poignancy with the entire audience singing the chorus.
The visual assault intensified for The W.A.N.D.: a massive video-screen showing a girl dancing naked; air thick with dry ice and glitter; blinding, blinking, brilliant white lights that turned the whole room into a strobe. It was a near-psychedelic experience.
At the centre was Coyne. Celebrating "the beginning of the end of George Bush" and leading all through a karaoke take of Bohemian Rhapsody, he resembled no one more than Jimmy Stewart in It's A Wonderful Life, optimistic in the face of life's blind cruelty.
And while it'll take more than balloons and rock 'n' roll to make a better world, the Flaming Lips' brilliance lay in making us feel it was possible, for a couple of hours at least.
Tonight, Queen Caroline St W6. Returns only
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
