The wonderful Kransky Sisters, that bizarrely musical sorority from Esk in rural Queensland, somehow manage to be even more unsettling in the flesh than they appear on television. The sheltered and repressed spinsters, at once naive and frustrated, can pin their audience with a look or jolt them with a screech. Mourn, Eve and their barely-tolerated half-sister Dawn ply us with tales of their life in Esk and calamitous world travels alike.  Stories weave  with unique covers of songs they’ve learnt from the ‘wireless’; disco standards, new wave hits, one hit wonders and a splash of AC/DC all rendered on tuba, tambourine, guitar, organ, saw and toilet brush.

To start, we’re treated to a slide show of the beauty spots of Esk and the sisters’ roadtrip in their luggage-laden Morris Major. The photographic attention paid to the culinary fare at country truckstops is engaging and Eve draws much empathy, seeing the vegetarian options she ‘enjoyed’ on the journey.

When the sisters take the stage proper, we’re plunged straight into the Kransky family drama, rich with rivalries and infidelity, loss and taxidermy. In a show that seems to speed past far too soon, there are musical highlights such as Grace Jones’ ‘Pull Up To The Bumper’ (seeming far more sexually repressed than I remember), and AC/DC’s ‘Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap as an ad jingle for cleaning products (with tuba solo!). The Bee Gees’ ‘Tragedy’ has never sounded so beautiful and makes us wonder why it didn’t feature a saw from day one.

The queens of Queensland Gothic managed to pull a male audience member into crossdressing and sell commemorative tea towels in the foyer after the show. The audience is charmed, if not slightly disturbed, and unlikely to have ever laughed so much over a broken toilet brush.