It’s a slightly unnerving experience to be handed a blindfold on the way into a theatre. Especially on the way into a theatre where the production has been described as ‘a beatboxing theatre show unlike any other.’ I can’t say I’ve been to many other beatboxing theatre shows, so if blindfolds are a common feature I wouldn’t know. The list of beatboxers I could name doesn’t extend to one finger, let alone one hand. But when Grace Savage starts performing, you can’t help but sit up and pay attention.
Blind is a sensory whirlwind of information compacted into a 60 minute show. It’s a very brief history of beatboxing, taking in the Indian tabla and Ella Fitzgerald; it’s a coming of age story about a girl who found her voice by copying the voices of others; it’s an examination of relationships between mothers and daughters; it’s a beatboxing lesson (a sad face gets you more bass, apparently); it’s a pretty shocking examination of the misogyny in hip hop; it’s a showcase of Savage as a champion beatboxer; it’s a challenge to listen, really listen, to the world around you.
Sounds like too much to fit into 60 minutes? Frankly, it is. Some parts work brilliantly – when Savage layers samples of her own voice and sounds from the audience on a looper and creates a track in front of us the room feels magical. When she talks about not knowing who she was in her early teenage years, so deciding to copy other people until she did know, it really rings true. And the most powerful moment comes when she creates a track with the looper, including samples from recent hip hop hits (all performed herself), whilst the increasingly unpleasant and offensive comments that people have written under her YouTube videos are projected behind her. When the layers of the track are gradually removed and you hear the actual lyrics, to a song that gets radio play, the violence against women within the songs themselves that just seems to go by unnoticed is truly shocking.
Some parts work less brilliantly – the biographical aspects could do with tightening up, and episodes where Savage does a bit of dramatic actor business, one time with our blindfolds off and another with them on, feel very out of place and make the play lose a little momentum.
Despite the criticisms, this show really opened my eyes (despite the blindfold) to an area that I simply knew nothing about, and Grace Savage is a great ambassador. The final musical number that we hear, incorporating everything that we have heard throughout the play, feels electric, plus any piece of grown up theatre that gets an audience where the vast majority are under 25 years old is something to get really excited about. ★★★☆☆ Deborah Sims 15/10/14
