Sophie Ellis-Bextor has an alarming idea. “We’ve got an album coming out, and it would be amazing for first week sales if I died… and then came back to life,” she chirpily tells the bemused crowd assembled within KOKO’s theatrical walls. It might be a slightly extreme way to promote Ellis-Bextor’s forthcoming album Perimenopop - released this Friday and the reason for tonight’s gathering - but you can forgive the singer for having murder on her mind.
Since the mind-boggling resurgence of the now-46-year-old’s 2001 hit Murder on the Dancefloor (a re-upped Number Two spot on the UK singles chart last January, followed by a year-end placing as the biggest song by a British female solo artist globally), Ellis-Bextor’s star has re-risen for a whole new generation. She’s clearly game to jump on the rollercoaster, too. A glitzy disco throwback to her early days, Perimenopop - played front to back tonight for the first time - is designed to scratch the same glossy itch as her turbo-hit. She assures us that initial plans were in the works long before Barry Keoghan’s naked Saltburn boogie was but a glint in director Emerald Fennell’s eye, but the confluence most certainly doesn’t hurt.
Emerging dressed in sparkly epaulets and matching military minidress - part baton-twirling cheerleader, part major general gone to Pride - there’s something still endlessly charming about the Hounslow-born star. Armed with precise RP intonation, bone structure that the Kardashians would kill for, and never missing a note, you can still imagine Ellis-Bextor being good craic down the pub. She twirls, one arm up, like a ballerina in a jewellery box; kicks like a Week Two Strictly contestant and chats relentlessly, spinning affable yarns about previous snogs on the KOKO dancefloor and being threatened with fines for her TFL-related social media posts (“I don’t think the tube strike today is a coincidence!”).
If the Perimenopop-centric first half of the night was always going to be a harder sell, then the unashamedly feel-good buoyancy of these tracks make them a quicker win than most. There’s nothing here you have to work to unpick; Perimenopop is 12 tracks of pure sugary fun, buoyed by songwriting contributions from a host of pop’s top tier. “One of the glorious things that happened with everything last year is it meant that I could put together a dream list of collaborators like Nile Rogers,” she says before deploying the disco shimmy of Diamond in the Dark. After the standout flutter of Glamorous, she indulges in a bout of ribbon twirling. It’s all happily unbothered about notions of ‘cool’ or trying to infiltrate the 2025 zeitgeist.
Instead, what Ellis-Bextor does best is an uncomplicated sort of inclusive fun. She returns for part two in a pink bodysuit and iridescent fringed cape like Barbie in a jellyfish costume and sets about smashing through the hits with the wholesome energy of a holiday park entertainer. Old favourite Get Over You is still perfectly poised, while a megamix of her Spiller collaboration Groovejet (If This Ain’t Love), spliced with Abba’s Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! and Modjo’s Lady (Hear Me Tonight) encapsulates her mix of ‘00s nostalgia and timeless camp. The biggest cheers - and a sea of phones - are of course reserved for Murder, but the dancefloor is happy to have Ellis-Bextor back.
