If It Ain't Got Dat Swing

"It's getting harder each year to make it bigger, brighter and better,” admits Graham Coupland, the founder and driving force behind both The Gangsters' Ball and the ten-piece big band, The Velvet Set, that has been its core musical act over the six years the event has been running. “I'm really happy with the concept and happy with the show the attendees get each year, with the way it works, with all the extras, the music and the dancing, but I did want to make it bigger, brighter and better, and the answer to that this year was to bring an international headline act over, which is The Pretty Things Peepshow.”

Direct from The Big Apple itself, The Pretty Things Peepshow artists, who include Go-Go Amy, Donny Vomit, Rachel Renegade and Miss Vivacious Audacious, specialists in not only traditional 1930s-style acts but more contemporary rockabilly/rock'n'roll turns, will be also be performing at The Gangsters' Ball Sydney and Melbourne sideshows. “Go-Go Amy, the main organiser of the troupe, contacted me two years ago expressing interest in our show, and back then I just didn't really have the budget. The Gangsters' Ball show was still developing and finding its feet, but I kept it in the back of my mind that they'd be the perfect vaudeville troupe to bring over. Donny Vomit, who's the only male performer of the troupe, his I guess trademark act is the traditional 'nail through the nostrils'  – and we're talking six-inch copper nails hammered into the nostrils two at a time. So that's going to be interesting to see – we'll have to have some Kleenex tissues side of stage for him!”

Along with some of the country's best swing, rockabilly and rock'n'roll DJs, many of The Gangsters' Ball favourites will be on hand, including The Gambling Den, with poker, roulette and Black Jack table; swing dancing demonstrations; cocktail bars; a vintage styling parlour; and a 1930s-themed photo booth. There'll be pin-up girls and hat-check girls to take care of your gladrags, because everyone who attends dresses to the hilt for the night, so it'll be wall-to-wall fedoras and petticoats, guys and dolls, gangsters and molls in costume. Then there are the local artistes. “Kelly Ann Doll is going to be back onstage for the first time in a couple of years, currently reigning Miss Burlesque NSW, so I'm bringing back some of my favourites this year. It'll probably be more of a swing dance/cabaret slant, rather than straight burlesque this year. There's so much burlesque happening here in Australia at the moment, so there won't be a huge burlesque element this year. Adam Mada will be doing the entire tour with some fabulous new illusions and conjuring up his sleeves. We've got Jeremy Ansley, who is one of Australia's leading jugglers, and I think he's going to attempt the famous eight-hoop juggle, which only one other performer in Australia can do, and there are going to be knives and machetes and all sorts of things flying around as well. We've got Captain Finhead – he's one of the world's leading nose jugglers and balancers – so he'll be balancing all manner of sharp and pointy objects on his nose and on his forehead. He also performs with his partner in a group called Strings On Fire, a cabaret routine where they're serenading each other on violins while throwing burning swords at each other – it's unicycles and all manner of sharp objects being thrown or juggled – it's going to be mayhem! It's all good fun; I just hope my insurance covers it.”

Along with MC, the chanteuse Madame Leila Leontine – the other act performing in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane as part of The Gangsters' Ball – is the self-explanatory Acrobatica, which features members of This Side Up, infamous for their performances in the Smoke & Mirrors show from a couple of years ago.This year, you'll also, for the first time, finally be able to walk away from The Gangsters' Ball in Sydney and Brisbane with a copy of The Velvet Set, in full 19-piece mode, on CD, recorded live to tape in their rehearsal space. Melbourne will of course feature their own big band favourites, Michael McQuaid's Red Hot Rhythm Makers. “Again, we really just try and recreate the old 1930s speakeasy vibe,” Coupland explains. “The Velvet Set is going to hit the stage with an entirely new repertoire for Gangsters' Ball this year. We're going way back into the '20s and '30s and working hard on some very difficult old-school arrangements. There's a lot of old Glenn Miller and Cole Porter and Duke Ellington in there – we're trying to steer away a little bit from the Rat Pack – Sinatra and so on.”