The weather outside was frightful, but nothing was going to prevent Alexis Foxe’s fans from trudging through the snow. Her first song, “Yoo-Hoo,” has the line “So, what you gonna do, Miss Alexis Foxe?” Replied Foxe, “You know how good I am at showin’ off,” and the audience loved it.

Dressed in a skin-tight blue dress, the dark-eyed beauty strutted around the stage, accompanied by recorded electronic music. A few lyrics, all written by Foxe, might be considered “X-rated” by some, while others will feel that they’re simply clever. Gary Schreiner wrote and arranged the music with Foxe, except for “Big Baby,” written by Foxe and Richard Niles.

Foxe called herself a “sugar addict and professional failure” and detailed her determination to overcome a problem with sweets, song by song. Her singing was sexy and breathy, singing several songs in voices of various ethnic characters—British, Russian, Italian, French, Jamaican, Spanish, and Brooklynese. It was as if Foxe had taken the audience on a journey to the great cafés of Paris, London, Rome and Canarsie.
Besides rap, the music suggested stride, ’50s, rock, disco, samba, Macarena and Peggy Lee. The terrific program included “Down the Drain” (“I may have a lot, but I want more”), “Gloomy” (“I feel too tired to try, too sad to live, too weak to die”) and “Grand Macadamias,” perhaps autobiographical.

Jerry Osterberg
Cabaret Scenes
January 26, 2011
www.cabaretscenes.org