Who: Claudia Brucken

Where: Scala London

When: Wed 2nd March 2011

When I first saw the press release for this gig I initially passed on wanting to do a review. Luckily I read down and noticed the expected guests that included spots from Heaven 17 and Andy Bell of Erasure. This made me sit up and take notice. Why would synth pop icons from the 80s be turning out to play with this women? It was then I did my research and found out about Claudia Brucken.


The Scala venue is nestled close to Kings Cross station which makes it easy to get to on public transport but not great for driving. My journey in by car went surprisingly smooth and I got a parking space a few paces from the venue so I was in a great mood when I arrived. The venue capacity is about 1000 but it felt like there was more in there as a fair proportion of space was taken up with three video cameras positions including one on a long arm that reach out over the audience and make those lovely sweeping shots. Add two mobile units in and around the pit and stage and a couple up on a gallery stage right and you start to see why so many guests were on the bill. Tonight was DVD territory and a celebration of Bruken's career.

Support was from another collaborator of Claudia in the shape of lone pianist Andrew Poppy. Poppy was label stablemate of Bruken when she was at ZTT records. Poppy is a minimalist composer and his short set left many stunned and mostly in silence as I'm not sure they knew what to make of him. Poppy's music is not really suited to this sort of gig but the crowd mostly paid due respect. Maybe this was contributed to by Poppy's looks which were a combination of red Indian elder and Gandolf like wizard. One photographer I met in the pit was so surprised by Poppy's set that he considered writing his first review just to express his shock at what he heard. If you like your music experimental and occasionally deliberately out of tune then you would be in luck.


In contrast to Poppy, Claudia Brucken was a breath of fresh air when she took to the stage. Her vocal was clear and the music purposeful. Claudia's name wasn't familiar to me however I had certainly heard of the group she was in on ZTT. Propaganda were signed to ZTT and Claudia's link to the label was even stronger as she was in a relationship with NME journalist and ZTT founder Paul Morley. Part of tonight's collaborations to celebrate Brucken's career were the appearance of Propaganda's Suzanne Freytag and Ralf Dorper. Now Propaganda's music may have been good but the two ladies attempt to dance along looked stiff and awkward.


One person who didn't look awkward at all was Glenn Gregory of Heaven 17. He joined Claudia to sing a song she performed originally with Thomas Leer. Claudia announced Leer could not be there due to having a throat operation. Nobody seemed to mind Glenn's substitution. Following that Glenn and Claudia performed an early demo version of Heaven 17's "Temptation". This was good to hear, however I missed the soaring vocal performance that sets Temptation out as one of the great 80s songs. The final number for Glenn was "When your heart runs out of time". This was a great song that had originally been released as a single with Glenn following Claudia's split from Propaganda.


The frenetic pace of the evening was temporarily slowed as Glenn and the rest of the band left and Andrew Poppy returned to the stage to join Claudia for a fantastic version of Kate Bush's "Running up that hill". Poppy's piano really helped drive this song along and he probably redeemed himself in that moment and allowed the crowd to go away with a different impression of him than his earlier support slot had left.


At one point Claudia left the stage leaving Susanne Freytag to lead on vocal accompanied by a beautiful flugelhorn solo. Most people wouldn't have been looking to the semi lit back corner of the stage throughout the set but lurking there was OMD's Paul Humphrey on keyboards. Paul and Claudia are not only working together as "One Two" but are also living together.


The last of the special guests was Andy Bell of Erasure. Andy looked terrific in his sparkly black jacket and did two numbers. He needed glasses and some notes to remember the lyrics which in no way distracted from the performance. By this time I could see Glenn Gregory in the audience clearly enjoying watching as much as he had when performing.


This was my type of gig as it's a one off with duet's you aren't likely to ever see again. By the time Claudia returned to the stage to perform Propaganda's biggest hit "Duel" as an encore you knew you'd been here for something special. A lovely unique retrospective on Claudia's career.


For a selection of pictures from the show .