Review: Radio Ga Ga at Tyne Theatre

Radio Gaga – Friday 1st March 

Two Queen tributes within three days- good thing I’m such a huge fan of the iconic band! It was going to be difficult to try to not compare the tribute I watched on Wednesday evening to Friday’s offering so I had to go into it with a clean slate. Tyne Theatre and Opera House as always, were the most wonderful hosts for this crazily entertaining evening. The stage was set up with a Radio Gaga backdrop and instruments ready to go. The theatre was busy and I saw so many Freddie mustaches flying around as well. I will say it was definitely a very merry audience and they must have utilized the bar well- you could tell it was a Friday night! 

They opened the set with Tie Your Mother Down which I thought was a strange opener for a Queen concert but it was filled with energy and the strobe lighting matched each beat perfectly. The backing vocals from the band were top notch during the song especially from the drummer, Micky Richards. I won’t lie he was our favourite throughout the night. 

Our Freddie had passion and energy in abundance and he had such a great rapport with the audience. His vocals were good throughout but I will say I felt like I was missing some of those iconic falsetto Freddie moments and quite a lot of the numbers had been lowered to suit his vocal range. The audience members still seemed to enjoy it and joined in with all the songs. 

The costuming was spot on and mirrored the band’s image perfectly, especially Freddie with his iconic white skinny jeans, vest, Adidas high tops and yellow jacket. He had several costume changes into some brightly coloured character vests which were fun too. I did find the guitarists Brian May style curly wig brilliant as well. 

The evening was filled with all of the iconic audience echoes much to our delight led by the frontman himself. His voice really shone throughout these echoes. The band involved the audience throughout the entire night and although they may not have been the best musically we were all thoroughly entertained and my belly actually hurt from laughing. 

At the end of Act One we heard a really unique medley of some of Queen’s lesser known tracks and I really appreciated this part of the performance. The frontman was iconic and held his own with some of Freddie’s movements however, he was a little showy and the bum slaps and one handed press ups seemed like an interesting choice. During Act Two, he pretended to use the microphone stand as a golf tee and the microphone flew off into the audience which had us all in hysterics but it could have ended in disaster! Luck was on his side however as the audience member caught the microphone and ran back to the stage laughing. 

We found throughout the second half the cohesion of the band and the vocals were much stronger and he continued to shine throughout numbers such as I Want to Break Free and Crazy Little Thing Called Love. These songs had everyone on their feet dancing away and it really brought the fun and energy back into the room. 

For the Pre Finale we got to hear Bohemian Rhapsody which is my all time favourite song. As previously mentioned Freddie’s range wasn’t particularly high so they made the smart decision to let the audience sing the middle section of the song – a smart move but maybe a bit of a cop out! 

Overall, it was a really fun and entertaining evening and for the most part the band put on a brilliant show.