best show

Apr 13 2008 by Nathan Bevan, Wales On Sunday

Buena Vista Social Club @ St David’s Hall, Cardiff, Thursday

HAVE you ever wondered what strange force makes pensioners rise at the crack of dawn to queue outside their local Asda before it’s even open?

It can be an eerie sight, lines and lines of septuagenarians – like a twin-set and pearls version of a George A Romero zombie film – their purses clutched tight to their chests.

What are they waiting for? What makes them do it? Can the desire to be the proud possessor of the ‘number one’ ticket at the meat counter really be that strong?

You’d think that after a life of back-breaking toil anyone in their right mind would jump at the chance of a lie-in.

I reckon it’s all to do with years and years of stored-up energy suddenly having nowhere else to go which, as a result, catapults them out of their beds and through the door with nary enough time to don either a tabard or a hairnet.

Well, take precisely that unbridled get-up-and go and multiple it by infinity and, ladies and gents, you have the Buena Vista Social Club.

These worldly-wise wonders of world music are an internationally-renowned 12-piece big band who, between them, have a collective age to rival that of Doctor Who.

Don’t miss these true and original veterans of Cuban music when they appear in Cardiff because, despite seeming determined to prove all accepted medical science wrong, they won’t be around forever.

Box Office: 029 2087 8444

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best day out

Greenwood Forest Park @ Y Felinheli, Gwynedd

EASTER’S over, the kids are back in school. It’s okay, you can breathe again. Relax.

Don’t get too comfy though because there’s still the coming weekend to worry about.

To avoid your little darlings trashing the house in an e-number- fuelled rampage, take them to North Wales’ leading adventure park.

Having first opened its doors as an environmental education centre in 1993, Greenwood Forest Park has gone from strength to multi-award winning strength.

From the ecologically sound thrills of The Green Dragon, the world’s first people-powered rollercoaster – well, vomiting is a sort of recycling, isn’t it? – to the Tree Top Towers’ exciting array of timber structures, netted walkways and slides designed to help kids develop their physical skills, it’s as much about learning as it is about having fun.

Tel: 01248 670076

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booking now

Whitesnake @ CIA, Cardiff, July 14

THEY give Spinal Tap a run for their money on the clod-hoppingly sexist front with songs like Slide It In.

Their hair is big enough to ensure Nicky Clarke keeps his top-of-the-range motors and villas on the Algarve for the rest of his natural.

It’s official – Whitesnake are a British heavy metal institution.

Led by the touselled, perma-tanned David Coverdale – looking every bit the Venice Beach Adonis, until you realised he was from Yorkshire – they were at the forefront of the late ’70s/early ’80s UK denim and leather long-haired music scene.

As far as I’m concerned, anyone who can sing lyrics as unashamedly daft as “Memories of broken dreams/As distant as the sun/Are drifting like an echo in the wind” without the faintest hint of irony – and not provoke an entire stadium’s worth of derisory laughter – should be held aloft and cherished.

Box Office: 02920 224488

best of the rest

Jethro Tull 40th Anniversary Tour @ St David’s Hall, Cardiff, Tomorrow MOCK all you like, it’s not easy playing the flute while standing on one leg, you know. Legendary pastoral proggies The Tull, led by Ian Anderson, plough their fiddle-de-dee furrow in the capital, drawing on their expansive classic songbook in the process. Box Office: 02920 878444

Live wire AC/DC @ Beaufort Theatre, Ebbw Vale, Thursday A GROWN man dressed as a shorts-wearing school boy gyrating on stage in front of a baying audience? Were he not in an AC/DC tribute band I dare say the local constabulary would have to be informed. Call: 01495 308996

Sabbath Bloody Sabbath @ Milkwoodjam, Swansea, Saturday ARE you a Sabbath fan? Listening to what Ozzy Osbourne slops out these days make you want to cry salt tears? Then this tribute act centring on the Brum boys’ good old days should be just the ticket for you. Tel: 01792 477577

Buddy Holly’s Official 50th Anniversary Tour @ Theatr Harlech, Harlech, Today US? Miss a performance of this tribute to everyone’s favourite rock and roll pioneer? That’ll be the day! Tickets: 01766 780667