Review: Anna's Go-Go Academy
5 stars, Yelp.com.au, 25/10/2011

In the unlikely event that I became a mental health professional, I would advise all my clients sign up with Anna's Go-Go Academy if they felt down in the dumps. Screw Xanax and lobotomies - I am quite serious about this!

Anna Achia is part jazzercise instructor, part comedian, part soul music historian, part madwoman and all-round one of the funniest people you will ever meet. I went to her Trades Hall classes in the Bella Union Bar for about two years, and despite how I drab I felt when I arrived, after an hour of drinking champagne, learning steps like the Pony, the Madison and the Ann-Margret and screeching with laughter at her anecdotes about her latest perm or thoughts on the election or whatever, I felt like a million bucks.

Anna cheerfully references all the great go-go dances of the '60s (seen in most Elvis movies), as well as a few '80s classics such as Hazy Shade of Winter by the Bangles, any dance moves by her beloved Michael Jackson and anything else that takes her fancy.

The classes are refreshingly free of the mirrored wall effect of every dance class I've been to in my life (where it's all about what you look like) - Anna's classes are about how you feel. They're tailored to perform simple steps and can be done by people from 8 to 88. I mean there are sometimes grandmas in there, all dolled up and re-living the glory days of the '60s! There's people's little kids having a laugh! There's my mates and I clustered around a plastic bucket of champagne! It's a riot!

And at $12 a pop (or $10 if you bring a friend), it's one of the cheapest, funnest nights in Melbourne.