2014-06-29 Last Pasties Standing: Motown Showdown

Not long after we moved the Syrens of the South Tease Tuesday shows to Red Light Cafe a second super awesome burlesque show popped up there as well called Last Pasties Standing that is produced by the ever amazing Sadie Hawkins.  Sadie's vision is a ridiculous game show of improv and intrigue!  Each show has a theme which dictates the music that will be used for the acts.

Here's the description from the website:

"Last Pasties Standing is a burlesque game show in which two (8, actually) will enter, one will…. well, nobody will end up wearing much.

This show is all about on-the-spot, creative improvisation and audience response. Eight burlesque-a-teers will take the stage and create spontaneous performances in head-to-head strip-offs to songs selected right as they get on stage. Who does it better? That’s for the audience to judge. Winners will go on to the next round, playoff style. There are additional burlesque-themed games inviting audience and performer participation, as well.

Join us for a night of spur-of-the-moment striptease and silly, sexy fun!"

So how this works is that each performer brings 3 costumes (one for each round) and you find out who you're up against and what song you'll be performing to by the luck of the draw.  The audience decides the winner of each pairing and they go on to the next round.  In the case of a tie they become a duet, another tie they become a trio, etc... until at the end of the three rounds there is a winner declared.  The winner gets bragging rights and assorted crappy prizes!

After months of this amazing event happening I finally got to go see the June 29th Motown Showdown.  The show was silly and fun, full of ridiculousness and a a great time.  Watching the performers pull the routines out of thin air along with trying to make their chosen costumes work with their given song was really an amazing show of skill.  The performances sometimes got really weird, you can tell a lot about the performer by what their default improv styles are, but they were always fun to watch even if they were kind of a train wreck because of not being familiar with the song or trying to duet a trio with people you had never even met, let a lone worked with, before.  The winner was Benjamin Elizabeth and she was very excited about her crappy prizes!

The shows are one Sunday a month and a seriously fun time.  I highly recommend going and enjoying yourself immensely.  The next one is on July 20th at Red Light Cafe.  Doors are at 8pm, show at 9pm and it's usually done around 11/11:30ish so you can still get a decent night's sleep before you go to work the next morning.

2013-01-13 Kitty Love's Sultry Sunday Lucky 13 Show

This past Sunday I was lucky enough to get to be the Mistress of Ceremonies for an All-Star Show here in Atlanta, GA!  Kitty Love began her Sultry Sundays at Red Light Cafe two months ago and for her third show she pulled out all the stops.  With the Reigning King of Burlesque, Russell Bruner, along with Mistress Kali from NOLA coming to town, she booked a show to match the amazing talent level coming in!  The show included the belly dancing talents of Madame X and Haideh, the sultry songbird Lah Lah Luscious, The Magic of Chad Sanborn, Stormy Knight, Sunny Midnight, Talloolah Love, Ursula Undress and of course Kitty Love.

The show was amazing!  Everyone brought their A game and the show really was everything that is wonderful about Atlanta Burlesque.  Since it was Russell's first time in Atlanta everyone was excited about being in the show and even the performers that weren't in the show were excited to come be in the audience!  The crowd was almost as star studded at the stage with Kisa von Teasa and Rosey Lady of Salome Cabaret in town from Knoxville, TN, Sadie Hawkins was easily as entertaining in the audience with her intermission exhibitions as some of the acts on stage, Bourgeois Betty, Lola le Soleil and the Mouth of the South Miss Mason were all in attendance.  This was the glitterati of Atlanta Burlesque, who knew all it took was a little royalty to bring everyone together!

Red Light Cafe, it has some good and bad points.  Good: nonsmoking for all you nonsmokers and also means it won't make your costumes smell if you're a performer, beautiful red curtain backdrop, decent lighting and site lines, easy going very nice staff, free parking, lots of seats!  Bad: location of the stage is really far from the dressing room so you have to walk through the audience but it does give them a thrill while you do it, the stage kind of small and carpeted so just make sure you have the right shoes on for that kind of stage, drinks and food are a little pricey, but they are all super tasty!

I think the show has a lot of potential, Kitty is still very new to producing and has a few things she needs to work out, but I think it could go well.  Though the turn out wasn't bad I think it could have been better with some marketing or at least a press release going out.  The city of Atlanta had an amazing show and I don't think enough people knew about it and ended up missing out on something special.  I wish her the best and hope to get to come back as Mistress of Ceremonies again sometime as it was the most fun I've gotten to have in a while!

Stungun Photography was there to take lots of amazing photos, including the one of Russell shown here.  You can see more of the photos in their gallery HERE.  They're the amazing photographers that shot at Dracula and AXA in addition to countless other shows.  I am a huge fan of their work and am always excited to see them snapping away in the audience!