Think Cabaret meets Spinal Tap and you have the essence of Vampires Rock. The paradox of being great entertainment while still managing to be essentially naff is amply illustrated by the performance of impresario and fun-meister Steve Steinman.

Steinman looks like Alexei Sayle, dresses like Uncle Fester, but sounds like Gordon Ramsay on far too many occasions when his talent is to sound like Meat Loaf. The show is a collection of old rock anthems tentatively linked together by older jokes, but... the audience loved it.

The script was unsophisticated, smutty, and for the most part disjointed, while the humour was crude and crass; similar in style and delivery to one of the “plays” at the end of the old Crackerjack kids TV programme, complete with a Peter Glaze look-a-like, but written by the Carry On scriptwriters supervised by Bernard Manning.

The band were excellent, and the cast put everything into it, and of course there was the added box office attraction of the wonderful Toyah Wilcox, but with so many small children in the audience Steinman made the mistake of letting his vehicle drift over the line of family entertainment, a mistake you won’t find perennial successes in York like Berwick and Huge making.

The vampire theme makes it easy to say it all sucks, but it doesn’t; it panto rocks!

It’s a great show that needs to just take a long look in the mirror at itself.

Let’s hope vampires are really not allergic to mirrors.