Peaches should come with a health warning. If her sexually explicit prankster rap doesn't make you queasy, her fallen cheerleader guise will. Resplendent in ripped fishnets, pink bomber jacket and rose-tinted spectacles, she swigs from a bottle of white wine, her legs-apart stance and death stare both mocking and tempting. You don't know whether to love her, laugh at her, or tear her apart.
Peaches is all about provocation: she makes Erotica-era Madonna look like a virgin. Her debut album, The Teaches of Peaches, sets a child-like, unrestrained and almost clinical look at sex to ice-cold beats. It is fantastic, a cult success that inspires fans to run wild. Which is why the scratchy, sampled guitars of Sucker are accompanied live by a man jumping naked into the moshpit and several girls shaking their breasts at each other on stage.
All the music is pre-recorded, leaving Peaches to strut around causing mayhem. This is less a gig than an invitation to riot, a barely controlled fusion of poetry, performance art and sexual politics. The crunchy, witty AA XXX finds Peaches moving her hands over her white hotpants before licking her fingers and swinging her jacket around her head aggressively.
Peaches makes no excuses for her honesty - or her dodgy outfits. When she runs off for one of her many costume changes (her love of ill-matching underwear is the only constant), we are treated to the charms of her label-mate Taylor Savvy and two Russ Meyer-style vixens screeching retro punk-pop. But Peaches is the star, acting the bitch but still a kid at heart. "Shut up and put your arm in the air," she commands, adding sadly: "I didn't know I'd have to talk to you like that, but I guess so."
Rock Show has her mimicking rock's testosterone levels with an angry roar, and Lovertits is a slice of dark disco. Caked in fake blood, her unattached hairpiece stuck into the back of her knickers to complement the fake pubic hair sprouting from the front, Peaches lets the crowd take over singing the anthemic encore Fuck the Pain Away, her desire to stir things up a success.
