Great jukebox musical hits the right note

We Will Rock You, Palace, Manchester

Let’s get this out of the way first, right out of the gate: “We Will Rock You” is possibly one of the worst musicals in the history of musicals.

Its script is simply inane, with the sort of rock-pomposity displayed by Jack Black’s ridiculous character in the movie “School of Rock”, in a story about a future Dystopia in which music is banned and young dissenters seek rock truth from their sage, the Dreamer, a nerdy teen who picks up fragments of ancient rock music like an off-tune radio.

But given that Queen’s lyrics and music are not intended to be sit-and-listen gems but in-your-face beats with words only to fill the gaps between posturing and guitar riffs, you have to hand it to Ben Elton for coming up with any sort of story at all.

Having got that out of the way, I’ll happily admit that the plot’s themes of all-powerful software corporations turning kids into soulless marketing opportunities and Big Brotherish thought-policing and brainwashing, have not the slightest influence on enjoyment of the show.

“WWRY” is one of the great jukebox musicals, for which little expense was spared and everything is up there on stage.

The sound system is superb and the lighting of major rock concert standard; a giant LED screen floods the audience with bright, spectacular imagery, and the stage appears also to be filled with the nation’s entire supply of support gantries — even the tremendous hidden band, with its two drum kits, is housed in a raised, stage-wide platform of the stuff.

But if the staging is tremendous, it is matched by the energy and singing quality of the main cast.

As the dreamer, Galileo, Noel Sullivan has a voice of effortless power and range; likewise Amanda Coutts as his girlfriend, Scaramouche.

Ian Reddington — almost unrecognisable from his TV soap days, under a beard and hippie gear — is fun as elderly sage Pop, while Earl Carpenter of “Les Miserables” fame plays another manic cop, Khashoggi, employed to hunt down dissenters.

It’s all complete tosh, but when the drums beat out that title-song rhythm, the audience joins in and the big chorus kicks in with the inch-perfect harmonies for which Mercury and the boys were famed.

It’s obvious that we’re really only there for the music and that, fortunately, is of the very highest standard.

To January 15, and selling out fast.