KYLIE Minogue, or Kylie as she now flies in this fashionably singular world, knows how to make an entrance.
First show a teasing, tantalising Video Kylie that straddles Kitten Kylie and religious iconography (once the preserve of Madonna), then another wait, then the band, dancers and backing singers, and finally Kylie, emerging through a trap-door, lying on her back aboard giant lush lips plump as Christmas.
Kylie is not a great singer; Kylie is not a great dancer; Robbie Williams once told her she needed more hits to go with the glitz and duly gave her Kids; but Kylie knows 100 per cent how to be a fabulous showgirl, a titillating tiller girl entertainer, who works the arena tools to the collective max, while appealing to everyone individually from the eight-year old in the next seat, to the man who had seen her 60 times and was rewarded with a selfie with Cuddly Kylie.
Harsh Madonna and doppelganger Lady Gaga are exhibitionist aliens that pop down to this planet; Generous Kylie has the knack of making you feel you know her, have known her for years, that she is not out of reach. Of course, it is an illusion, but Kylie understands her fans better than any other lasting star, hence a medley of her early hits that is irreverent yet celebratory.
What's more, with all the fairy dust sparkle and costume changes, she makes being blonde and pretty and perky as fun, somewhere fun between burlesque and a young Barbara Windsor.
She plays all the hits you could want, buffs up the less potent numbers from Kiss Me Once with the firecracker visuals, adds intrigue by covering former INXS lover Michael Hutchence's Need You Tonight and unites the world in love in All The Lovers. That's pop. That's Kylie.
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