Sunday, November 25, 2012





As the days gets colder now that November is about to end I am warming up a tad to the concept of burlesque. I wrote about how I disliked it here,  here and here.  Last Saturday was my third time at the Neverland Burlesque with the Blood Alley Quartet at the Russian Hall on 4th Avenue.

Mz Adrien

The first time I tackled the photography with a 3G iPhone. The second time I plunked my softbox flash and my medium format camera back stage. I snapped the girls before they did their act (very dressed) and then after the act (with a lot less clothing!) What could I possibly do this third time? I used a new light called a beauty dish (appropriate?) but took a Nikon FM-2 and Nikon F-3. I loaded one with T-Max 400 (pushed to 1600) and the other with Fuji 1600 colour negative film. What you see here is the Fuji. It is pretty well impossible to colour correct the film since I did not use the flash but the quartz (3200 degrees Kelvin) modeling light. To get a proper colour one must use tungsten-balanced film or adjust a digital camera to tungsten white balance. After scanning the negatives I used Corel Paint Shop Pro X2 on the Time Machine setting of Photo Effects. I chose the Early Colour Process setting which replicates the Autochromes of the beginning of the 20the century.

This time around there were two new girls (I don’t think they mind being called girls). One was Voodoo Pixie and the other Violet Femme. A third girl was a “dirty” country& Western singer, Shirley Gnome of which I will write about later.

Voodoo Pixie

Voodoo Pixie is not too short and not too tall. She is slim and has legs to kill for and breasts that are just right. Everybody around her (including the other girls kept telling her how cute she was). This finally made me wince as I found her sexy as hell. Both her acts featured classic burlesque dancing and poses and she wore beautiful costumes. But the added bonus was her expert and graceful dancing. I was sure she must have studied balled but Violet Femme told me this was not the case.

Violet Femme is a full-figured burlesque dancer who has a physical resemblance to that classic Tempest Storm. One of Violet Femme’s acts pretty well brought down the full house. They had been riled up into excitement by our master/mistress of ceremonies MZ Adrien. Violet Femme’s act featured many golden gift boxes of all sized that had countless tasseled pasties. She applied these to different parts of her body and they twirled her body this way and that way. The pasties rotated in every direction like clocks gone wild. By the end I was dizzy and the house clamored for more.

Now Shirley Gnome, wearing scuffed cowboy boots and a cowboy hat and a bad blonde wig (or was it?) charmed me by telling me she sang dirty country& Western. With her “aw shucks” expression I was further charmed. She looked terrible. She had not slept for days. She told us and the house that it was hours of constant sex and drugs. Could this be true? She looked so wholesome and cute (yes cute!).

Gus Vassos - Impresario

Her first act blew me over ((and consider that her act did not include taking her clothes off. She is not a burlesque dancer). She can sing, play a guitar (she borrowed Gus Vasos’s guitar) and has a way with words. For her second act there had to be some persuading by Vassos. She was ready to lie down and sleep. She sad goodbye to me and I felt I had to protectively hug her (even though with boots and hat she was taller than I was). I told her to make sure she went home, slept and had a good breakfast the next morning. It seems that Shirley Gnome specializes in an almost all day breakfast in bed, all alone and without any need of room service. What could that breakfast possibly be? Like a good Western girl she is indeed self-sufficient when has to be.

Sasha Minx's performance was only the second in her carreer as a burlesque dancer. This time around (like in her first performance) she took off her clothes while singing live with the Blood Alley Quartet. But there was one big improvement. She was wearing a slinky outfit and not jeans. But there is one lack of improvement I am glad she did not upgrade. No pasties for her, just sexy black tape!
At the end of the evening I had laughed and enjoyed wholesome repartee with lovely girls backstage. But I must stress here that the best part of the show was to listen to a solid sounding quartet play original songs with verve, passion and virtuosity. Is there anything more that I could possibly ask for?

I will be back to report from backstage, the next Neverland Burlesque show at the Russian Hall on December 15. It should be a jolly good show. I have heard rumours of potential codpieces.

Sasha Minx

Goldie Monroe



Violet Femme



Shirley Gnome

 
 
   

Mz Adrien's things

Shirley Gnome sings her "breakfast" song



The Blood Alley Quartet From left, Randy Bowman (drums), top left Dave Olajide (bass), centre, Gus Vassos (vocals, guitar) right, Anthony Walker (vocals, guitar)