Frisky and Mannish, a musical-comedy duo who specialise in parodies of various pop songs, were, despite how uninventive that specialisation may sound, hugely and contagiously fun. Though their main joke is undeniably unoriginal, the sheer amount of pop songs we are exposed to day-to-day means that new commentaries/piss-takes are never superfluous, especially when they are as potent and well-conceived as this duo’s. Highlights from their performance at Players include a version of Kate Bush’s insane “Wuthering Heights”, delivered in a monotone, bratty Kate Nash style, which then segued into a version of her song “Foundations” (which conflated Kate Nash holding onto the “cracks in our foundations” with Kate Bush outside Heathcliff’s window, leaving us with some new figure “holding onto the cracks in your window”) before returning to “Wuthering Heights” for its hysterical final section. Another highlight was “Eternal Flame”, sung by Frisky with hyperbolic intensity. I also hugely enjoyed the duo’s bizarre, extended digression in which they imitate a confounding genre they call “Early 20th Century British Sea-Side Humour” which made great use of the duo’s vocal interplay- this kind of meta-humour is always enjoyable.
The duo promised audience participation early in the show; I was dreading this section, though it only consisted of a short parody of the sorting hat from Harry Potter, which would have been successful (it was executed with great zeal) if I had appreciated the references to pop stars which replaced the school houses from the novel; the joke was to make fun of various b-grade pop stars, and it smacked rather distastefully of one of those soul-denying talking heads programs you see on Channel Four counting down the top one hundred whatevers, or some crass tabloid culture editorial- the same rather trite, smugly ironic asides were rehearsed. Unfortunately, this approach was something of a motif throughout the entire performance, though their infectious and wholesome sense of fun (constrained though it felt) dispelled any lingering after taste.
There was little spontaneity throughout the show, which made their conceit of covering and merging pop songs seem all the more rigid a framework. Also, though the overarching conceit was that Frisky and Mannish were teachers/headmasters in a “school of pop”, with the audience comprising the students, much of the humour was derived from allusions to concepts discussed more at third level education; genre studies came up, as did Roland Barthes’ “The Death of the Author”. Not that these references weren’t funny, they just seemed incongruous in their secondary school conceit (though I may be nitpicking).
The show simply wouldn’t work if Frisky and Mannish weren’t excellent musicians and performers; Frisky has a wonderful singing voice and Mannish plays the keyboard with all manner of complicated flourishes. Also, Frisky covers a broad range of voices and accents which are remarkably sophisticated. Her Lilly Allen is particularly good, as is her impression of the imperious school teacher. Mannish I found somewhat less impressive, perhaps because of his less bombastic persona (the contrast between their personae is made amusing light of in a closing song in which Frisky sings to Mannish lines like: “You were content to stand in my shadow”). Maybe it was just this particular night, but I got no sense of high spirits from Mannish, and on the whole found him, even for the timid role he plays, to be distinctly uncharismatic.
Really, it’s hard to recommend Frisky and Mannish if you’re looking strictly for laughs, as some of it just wasn’t particularly funny, however they successfully blur the line between mocking and celebrating the songs they perform, and pop music lovers/likers (which basically covers all of us, I think) will surely enjoy their set.
