Patrick Wolf Paradise Rock Club October 4th 2007

I started to listening to Patrick as the music board I frequent has several ardent fans. When he supported Amy Winehouse at Avalon I was mildly annoyed to be unable to see him so when the tickets became available for his solo show I did not have a moment of doubt about getting the tickets.
I started to listen to his albums in earnest and watch the Gill Mills podcasts too which in turn lead me to listen to them as a whole as he had intended which was actually a good idea. Patrick does have a bit of a reputation as a Pop Diva especially after firing his drummer on stage in a tantrum which involved him physically chastising the man and chasing him off stage then there was the rant where he claimed to be leaving the music business for ever.
Bishi opened, I hear she got luke warm receptions in the UK but here she was warmly received and put on an interesting little set where she reflected the warm reception with a warm and sunny set of songs. she played a sitar, wore a traditional outfit (Bengalese?) and had her ipod to provide backing.
Then we got Patrick, stick thin and with more glitter than a 8 year old let loose in CVS he was obviously channeling Ziggy stardust in his makeup choices. My flickr shows the makeup as garish but it looked just theatrical when in front of you.
He seems so fragile but real and honest. Not the most handsome but he is stylish and accentauates what he has, musically his songs encompass slow and emotive points to the exuberance and joy that resonated around the Paradise as he played Accident and Emergency and The Magic Position. His classical training shows as he easily moves between his viola to keyboard. His talent is obvious to all who listen.
It was a smallish audience but deeply appreciative and Patrick was happy on stage, this showed as when he went to sing Tristan his mike just failed leaving the front row hearing his utterances as the rest of the audience lost his voice. He smiled laughed and grabbed the keyboard mike and carried on. On another night you feel that may have become a tantrum but instead it was an inside joke which we all giggled about but moved on to enjoy the wonder that Tristan is.
I am not enough of a fan to recognize the song where Patrick name checked Boston but it just added to the warmth of the evening.
I came to this gig interested, I left feeling a deep affection to this talented human angular musician.
BTW the set list became fiction as the night progressed but it gives almost all songs played though stars was played about three songs before the encore and A&E became the song before encore with the magic position as the closer.