In the 1970s, the Tubes battled it out with Alice Cooper for the title of rock'n'roll's most notorious theatrical pranksters. Where Alice had a boa constrictor and a guillotine, the Tubes had Fee Waybill hamming it up in bondage routines or teetering around as glam rocker Quay Lewd. The Tubes even got themselves banned by apoplectic local councillors in Portsmouth.
Nearly 30 years later, you can find more scandal in an episode of Little Britain, but the crowd greet the band like long-lost relatives. This time they've packaged themselves as The Tubes' Wild West Show, dressed as cowpokes, cardsharps and bartenders under a medicine show backdrop.
They twang their way cheerfully through hopalong fare such as Under the Double Eagle while Waybill - in one of many disguises, this time the Mad Cow Auctioneer - mimes hacking up a steer with a chainsaw. After a brief punkoid blast of the Beatles' I Saw Her Standing There (refurbished with the riff from the Damned's New Rose), Waybill emerges again as a mariachi singer in a glittering sombrero, singing Aguena Sale la Rosa in flamboyant pantomime Spanish.
Unexpectedly, the band can muster a convincing degree of musical expertise. Original drummer Prairie Prince hammers out unswerving tempos, guitarist Roger Steen patrols the distant galaxies of acid-blues and space-funk, and bassman Rick Anderson knows when to winch them in from the great beyond. They also have a perplexing penchant for lapsing into 70s AOR, however, with tunes such as Don't Wanna Wait or the new Talking to the Moon giving off weird Foreigner-like emanations.
To shrieks and catcalls, Waybill eventually staggers out as Lewd, dressed in a pink feather boa, blonde wig, Indian headdress and skintight silver trousers - all balanced on outrageous foot-high banana-shaped boots - to sing Stand Up and Shout and White Punks on Dope. He "dies" during the latter, only to be resuscitated by a "nun" and a "nurse", who reappear in tarty bondage gear for Mondo Bondage. All completely baffling if you missed 'em first time round.
· At King Tut's Wah Wah Hut, Glasgow, tonight. Box office: 0141-221 5279. Then touring.
