Trixie Mattel- Skinny Legend Tour

Tonight I had the privilege of seeing my favorite RuPaul's Drag Race alum and All Stars 3 winner Trixie Mattel return to Melbourne at The Plenary with her new one woman show Skinny Legend. This was the last night of her Australian tour, and opening the evening was Melbourne's very own Karen From Finance, who performed a great routine themed around the working women and office environment. She not only lip synced to Dolly Parton's "9 To 5," but also former Prime Minister Julia Gillard's famous misogyny speech against Tony Abbott.

Before Trixie came out on stage there was a cute little cartoon of her getting ready, then a compilation of clips from interviews, RuPaul's Drag Race, the YouTube series UNHhhh and Viceland's The Trixie and Katya Show. Trixie began the show with a lip sync mash up to "Roxie (The Name On Everybody's Lips)" from the musical Chicago, but with a robot voice inserted to say Trixie instead, as well as some monologues by Tammie Brown and Jasmine Masters. Trixie was wearing a full blond wig and purple jumpsuit with long bell sleeves for the first half of the show. She had some great stand-up bits and stories that covered a wide range of topics, including going through Australian immigration, ageing, parenting, bears and interactions with fans. Despite not liking hugs she invited an audience member up on stage to hug her, which resulted in a red warning alarm going off while she was being touched.

Trixie's Australian accent has improved from previous visits, which could be thanks to her watching Wigs By Vanity Instagram videos. As expected, she played some songs on guitar, with "I've Already Got Your Money" dedicated to people who might be offended by the show, a new song "Rich People" about the troubles of the rich like having to double parking their boats or staining their fur coats with the blood of the poor, and "Little Sister" off last year's EP One Stone. Trixie also sang a hilarious parody of Kim Carnes' "Bette Davis Eyes" called "Steve Buscemi Eyes," which featured a photo montage on the screen of various Drag Race alum faces photoshopped with his eyes.

After a brief intermission the second half of the show began with old black and white fitness and modelling clips hilariously narrated by Devon Green. Trixie then came out in a 1970s Cher/Native American inspired pink outfit with a long pink headdress that showed off lots of body. She had some hilarious puns about her outfit, such as,"I had reservations about wearing this" (note Trixie is Ojibwe). She told more personal stories with her stand up in the second part of the show, including about growing up in rural Wisconsin and being a country gay, moving to Los Angeles and the differences in who's considered hot, and some interesting encounters with the dentist and proctologist.

Musically Trixie showed off her chops by playing a pink clarinet to "Colors Of The Wind" from the Disney movie Pocahontas, her beautiful pink autoharp on the plaintive song "Is Michael Cera Hot" (complete with photo montage playing behind her), and then back onto guitar for the unreleased song "Yellow Cloud," which is due out in May 2019. To finish the night we got a snippet of Oasis' "Wonderwall" by audience request before she played the song that represented her past 12 months, RuPaul's "Kitty Girl" from the All Stars 3 finale. Trixie sang the first two verses before getting a guy from the audience to sing BeBe Zahara Benet and her parts of the song. Overall Skinny Legend was such a fantastic show and demonstrated how multitalented Trixie is as a performer. I am looking forward to some new music on the horizon and hopefully more Australian shows in the near future.

Here's the video for a live acoustic version of "Little Sister"

Comedy Queens 2018

Last night I was fortunate enough to get to see the sold out Comedy Queens 2018 Australian tour at 170 Russell. The show was hosted by Australia's Maxi Shield and featured American drag queen legends and newer queens from different seasons of Ru Paul's Drag Race doing a mix of comedy, songs and lip syncs. The three legendary drag performers on the bill Lady Bunny, Sherry Vine and Jackie Beat each took turns performing stand-up and their own parody songs. My favorite was Sherry and Jackie's duet of "I Got You Bitch" (sung to Sonny and Cher's "I Got You Babe").

The two Season 10 girls Monet X Change and Monique Heart each gave really high energy lip sync performances. Monet also had a funny stand-up set, and gave a shout out to a girl in the crowd who created her own sponge dress. Ginger Minj from Season 7 and All Stars 2 did a stand-up set, which unfortunately fell a bit flat with the crowd, as well as a great telephone-themed lip sync mash-up based around Adele's "Hello." Even with the technical difficulty of her track dropping out in the last 30 seconds, the crowd clapped along so she could sing and finish the performance.

The other Season 7 queen and All Stars 3 winner on the bill was my favorite skinny legend Trixie Mattel. Trixie, who was celebrating her 29th birthday, had a tight set of comedy and music. She sang a mix of her own material and mash-up covers of Avril Lavigne's "Sk8er Boi" and Fleetwood Mac's "Landslide," alongside Oasis' "Wonderwall" and a hint of Eminem's "Lose Yourself" for all the white people in the crowd. Trixie was so funny and you can tell all her time on the road has made her such a fantastic and engaging performer.

This was also my first time getting to see another favorite of mine, Season 5 winner Jinkx Monsoon. She sang a fantastic cabaret version of Meghan Trainor's "All About That Bass" and then did a whole set about being a high functioning alcoholic and slut, and the influence of different Disney films on sexual preferences. Overall it was an entertaining but long three hour show, which I'm sure will tighten up as they do the other two shows of the tour in Sydney and Brisbane this weekend.

Trixie Mattel- Accessories Sold Separately

Over the past few months I have been binge watching numerous previous seasons of RuPaul's Drag Race that I missed when they originally aired (it's available for streaming on Stan here in Australia). One of my absolute favorite contestants, the winner of All Stars 3 and co-host of the YouTube series UNHhhh and Viceland's The Trixie & Katya Show, Trixie Mattel performed tonight for her third Melbourne show at Chasers Nightclub in South Yarra.

The show was broken up into two sets to allow for costume changes. It began with the famous Melbourne queen Karen From Finance lip syncing to Meredith Brooks' "I'm A Bitch." Karen was our MC for the evening and was quite entertaining as she revved up the crowd and introduced each performer. At the start of each set we got a lip sync performance from local queens Lexi GaGa (set 1) and Sabrina Babyslut (set 2), who had the largest number of outfit reveals that I have ever seen in one performance. It was pretty epic.

Supporting Trixie on this tour was RuPaul's Drag Race season one and All Stars 1 contestant Tammie Brown. Tammie is an absolute original and performed her own songs across both sets, including "Walking Children In Nature" and "Porta Potti Prostitute." She also spoke to us in multiple languages and got the whole crowd to move like chickens.

Trixie Mattel is an extremely talented musician and comedian, and she has combined these elements, along with her trademark look, into an amazing and hilarious show. In the first set she did a total take down of some of her fellow RuPaul's Drag Race: All Stars contestants and played the finale version of "Kitty Girl," inviting people up from the crowd to sing the verses by Shangela and BeBe Zahara Benet. She also did one of my favorite songs of hers, "Mama Don't Make Me Put On The Dress Again" off the album Two Birds, and a cover of Avril Lavigne's "Sk8er Boi."

In the second set she opened with the most epic mashup lip sync performance themed around the working woman that included movie clip dialogue and portions of Dolly Parton's "9 To 5," Donna Summer's "She Works Hard For The Money" and Britney Spears' "Work Bitch." The whole crowd lifted and lost it when Trixie started dancing down the stage platform. She did some more comedy bits, including her attempt at an Aussie accent, and finished by singing "Break Your Heart" off her latest album One Stone.

All the girls that performed then came out for one final bow and a photo with the audience (Trixie somehow managed a quick costume change into a pink dress and short wig) and that was it for the night. It was such a fun evening although I wish Trixie had performed more of her own music, including the wonderful and touching "Moving Parts." I'm looking forward to getting to see Trixie again (as well as other Drag Race alumni) as part of the Comedy Queens tour in August.

Here's the video for "Mama Don't Make Me Put On The Dress Again"