Go-Go Kylie!!

Kylie Minogue proved herself one of the greatest show-women of our times (mine at least) in 1998 with her Intimate and Live tour. In a two-hour concert that felt like a small live gig, Kylie sang amazingly (for those who say she can't sing), danced freely and crazilly (for those who only know the stiff moves from the Fever Era) and dazed the crowed with her charisma and charms.

But now, leaving the journalist affection behind, just let me say: WHAT A WOMAN!!! As I watched the DVD I could not be more stunned by her stage control in a show with a simple and intimate concept. Here there were not big screen projections, mesmerizing wardrobe or hot dancers. All the attention was focused on Kylie and her band, except in Dancing Queen, when the scary/queeny combo of dancers showed up for the first time with their hot pink peacock suits.

Since I&L was the tour for the Impossible Princess album, this show contains some of my favorite songs by Kylie. She starts off with self-deprecating Too Far. The song has an ironically organized stream-of-consciousness mood, filled with delusional thoughts and ravings. This set is visually simple (Minogue's wearing a neutral black wardrobe) but musically charming. Right after "Too Far" we meet a genius rock version of disco-anthem What Do I Have To Do? and my big-time favorite Some Kind Of Bliss. The set ends with the beautiful and haunting ballad Take Me With You, with its delicious percussions and addictive chorus, besides of being one of Kylie's best compositions.

Then I Should Be So Lucky is showed with a charming sepia cinematography that it kinds of shake away the fact that the song became dang boring with the new arrangement (piano+vocals). Then comes the queer dancers and "Dancing Queen". Dude, I'm definitely pro-gay, duuh I'm one of them myself and here I am raving on Kylie Minogue's work! But those guys were scary! The moves, the faces, the feathers... kind of disturbing, especially because for the first time audience's attention is taken from Kylie. But by the middle of the performance, all of that gets a jocose meaning, and their glances and stares become funny. Then we have my beloved Dangerous Game (dancers-less) pretty and simple, but I could not forget to comment.

Next set is initialized with genius Cowboy Style. Here again we meet the dancers stuck on weird and striptease-esque galoshes. This is the moment we note the Go-Go dancing mood of the show's choreography. "Cowboy Style" is followed by Step Back In Time which should be hailed as a masterpiece after the arrangement and dance-routine it got. Mixing Saturday Night Fever's 70's moves with the go-go knack this is the single moment the dancers become more easy to the eyes than spooky gay.

Free is a previously unreleased track and another Minogue jem, proof of her geniusness. The friendly synthesizer's chords starts off as she croons "It's night time/We're driving". Then, the music and the lyrics become bigger and bigger, faster and faster, as if a zoom-in is being given into her mind, until reaches the climax, with Kylie screaming my new motto "This is the feeling I want for always/Free".

Right after it, never giving us the time to recuperate from an extravaganza to another, she drops us Drunk. Another stream-of-consciousness track, she goes about being drunk on love with someone. But the best of it is the fact that the melody and the lyrics really transmits the idea of drunkenness. That raises Minogue as one of the most underrated songwriters of Pop Music. That theory is once again proved when later on she performs Limbo. How to describe "Limbo"? Especially this live version... Okay, firstly, the dancers are back here, but they're really invisible when we have a perky and saltatory Kylie waving and shaking her hair extensions combined with an attractive dark man beating his drum in one of the most involving percussion sets ever heard!!

After it the only worth mentioning performances are The Clash's Should I Stay Or Should I Go? when once again Kylie throws her hair and body, runs through the stage like in a marathon and still sings perfectly, leaving us all breathless just by watching. And then in the very finale the reprise of that year Australian Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras' perfomance of Better The Devil You Know, with the familiar dancing couple, plus more than a dozen hot men tucked in red zipped underwears and glittering devil horns adorning their heads. That's why this bitch is the queen of campy!! She makes it funny and glamourous!

The best thing about Minogue's Intimate And Live is that it proves a Pop Diva can still throw a show without the visual feast or big dramacity and it can be as enternaining and involving as it is simple. Kylie sings (LIVE!), dances, smiles, throws her hair and absolutelly amazes the watchers with her honest and charming performances. Even though the backstage footage is showed between the concert's tracks, it rarely breaks the mood and feelings of the sets. This show was also released in audio double-album, that contains all the concert's tracks and perfectly transfers the joy of the show without images. The woman can sing bitch!

[Song: Limbo Kylie Minogue]