Following her outstanding success at the 2012 Adelaide Cabaret Festival, French-Australian chanteuse Nadéah returned for one show as part of the So Frenchy So Chic-themed evening of music at Adelaide Festival Centre’s summer music season, Sessions. (French band Revolver performed earlier in the evening as part of the same season.) Nadéah is known for her quirky autobiographical lyrics, her blurring of punk, cabaret and pop and her sultrily energetic performances, and she did not disappoint.
Dressed in a diaphanous jade coat, which she soon abandoned, Nadéah’s relaxed and sensual charm captivated the audience from the moment she walked on stage. A momentary struggle to tune her guitar became an opportunity for her to display her casual comic flair and banter with the crowd, resulting in her suggestion that she should perhaps return as a comedy routine during the upcoming Adelaide Fringe.
Her first song ‘Met a Man’, featuring the lyrics ‘I met a man with a crack pipe and a gun in his hand’, set the standard for the night. Throughout the quirky song ‘Pinot Noir and Poetry for Breakfast’ Nadéah sauntered through the cabaret-style seated audience and by song’s end she had cajoled the audience into singing of their desire to have Pinot Noir and poetry for breakfast as well.
Nadéah introduced the song ‘Humdrum’ as being her response to countries like South Africa and England, which she claimed stifle fun through overregulation. She performed this pulsating song with vocal vigour and danced with such wild abandon that it seemed her type of fun could never be muted.
Proving that she was not just a wild child, Nadéah’s versatility was displayed during contemplative melodic songs like ‘Stumbling’ and ‘The Song I Just Wrote’.
‘Odile’, a rousing song about a girl’s search for love, taken from Nadéah’s debut album, Venus Gets Even, was well known and warmly welcomed by the audience who tapped along joyfully to the song’s carnival rhythm.
Nadéah’s stunning performance climaxed with a memorable, impromptu rendition of Janis Joplin’s classic ‘Mercedes Benz’ in response to a zealous audience request.
Rating: 4 stars out of 5
Nadéah
Sessions 2013
Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre
17 January
