Nice and Spikey Islington, 27th January 2014

Nice and Spikey Islington.

27^th January 2014

Before Gig,

I have now finally decided to do the Edinburgh Festival this year. After months or procrastinating and not writing new material and ordering another Americano and gossiping about other comedians and going home empty handed from another day’s “writing session”. I have finally and irrevocably said “yeah alright” and taken the plunge. I am going to the Edinburgh Festival. I suspect I covertly took this decision in August 2013, however up until now I have been concealing this decision from myself, in a highly successful attempt, to justify my lack of progress writing the damn thing.

But now I am going to the Edinburgh Festival. The Festival is no longer next year, now it is this year. I have to write a new show and so tonight I am at Nice and Spikey comedy club to try out new material that may or may not make it into the actual show. I have a new routine about people speaking in the cinema and one about having cow eyes and one about trying to find common ground with my mother on the telephone.

Another thing. At the venue, the Gents toilets stink. And not in a nice normal stinky toilet way but in a nasty there is something seriously amiss with the drains kind of way. I actually report the stench to the bar staff which, given the all-pervasive smell, would seem totally unnecessary. The staff confirm that yes they do have functioning noses and yes they are aware of the smell and yes it is “the drains”. The big stink doesn’t stop the venue selling pizzas and nor does it stop the punters buying them. Sometimes you have to love the perseverance of the British.

During Gig,

I had been warned that they were a very good audience but unfortunately they are far worse than that. They are amazing. They are laughing at anything and everything. They find everything funny. How can I gauge new material in this all-pervasive laugh fest? They are over generous. This is hardly ideal test conditions.  What are these people so up-beat on a Monday night anyway? If I wanted wall-to-wall gratitude I would be trying this out on a Saturday night. I’m looking for a bit of midweek lethargy here. How can I prepare for a rainy Tuesday afternoon in Edinburgh with all this appreciation shit flying about? Real life isn’t like this. I want a bit of a challenge here. I can’t seem to get a footing. I am staggering from one success to another. Reeling from the audience positivity I try to kill it early on by going on stage and starting off with something totally unprepared. It backfires.  I start ranting about the gents toilets and the phenomenon of blocked drains but somehow my rant chimes with the audience and before I know it they are on board.

I decide to move into an old bit of honed material. The idea is to raise the bar with something tried and tested and once they’ve upped their expectation, dash their hopes by moving into something new and substandard. I need to drive their pleasure down to manageable levels. No such luck. They tried and tested works well and so now I launch into my routine about the cinema. It should get clunky here as the smooth élan of tweaked material gives way to the jagged rocks of half-baked ideas. But no. Their gratitude knows no bounds. Even as I move towards my non –ending end, they appear to think my substandard finale will suffice.

I now move into, what for this gig, is the weak link. A routine about talking to my mother on the phone and trying to find some point of common interest. I truncate this routine in the interests of time management. It is usually about 10 minutes long all in and tonight I don’t have that time so I cut it. But in shortening it looses the spirit of it and it doesn’t quite work as well. The audience are still lapping it up but there is a slight dent in their feedback. It goes from say a ten to a nine. But it is enough to know that this isn’t working as well in the edit form. I make a mental note of this. This is genuinely the only lesson I take from this gig.

I finish with a routine about having cow eyes. Now this routine has a bit of history, I have performed it live four or five times. The first time I fluked it and the audience really went for it. I adlibbed it and the words just tumbled out correctly, it almost felt like a fully formed routine. In subsequent runs I tinkered with it and tweaked it and it never really worked after that. The more I tried to rationalise it, the more I screwed it up. I had begun to loose faith in it altogether and was considering confining it to the dustbin of history. However I was then advised by a fellow comic to get back to the spirit of the original version.  So I tried to do just that at a gig earlier this evening - a new material night. Alas the routine still didn’t work. So on route to this gig I rework it again. And now it has come up trumps. Or has it? See this is exactly what I am talking about. Is it really any better? Have I really progressed? Or is it just this audience giving everything five stars? I cannot really tell. This is the futility of this gig. And so I wrap up the gig and give the audience a warm tribute because they have been truly wonderful and that is what they deserve. But as I walk from the stage I feel simultaneously very happy and thwarted. 

After Gig

God this gig was good for the ego but I have learned nothing from this. Nothing! My Edinburgh prep is no further forward. Thanks comedy Gods. Nice one. 

The Deceased Comedian’s Ball – The Bedford Arms.

 12^th January 2014

 

Before Gig.

This gig is in memory of Ed Balls who used to run the new act night at the Bedford Arms and who sadly died of a brain tumour last year. Ed gave many of us comics our first ever gig and even after, helping us gain a little more experience. I used to regularly turn up to his gig to try out new material.

 

I hadn’t known how big tonight’s gig would be. Whether it would be in the main room? So when I turn up and see the main room is sold out I am pleasantly surprised. I also feel nervous and unprepared – exactly as I always felt at those first gigs I did for Ed. 

 

I am the third act on in the second section. The audience may now start to get a little tired and be losing their focus. The show is already running late so I am aware of keeping it tight (15minutes). 

 

During Gig

The start is hardly textbook I try to chat to the audience but they are not in the mood and so it jars slightly at the start. I switch onto material and am in the grove although I have changed my drinking material stuff all round about and this makes me really think about it a lot more.

 

I have decided to make changes to my Dentist routine as the section about “feeling naughty” has, to my mind been under performing for quite some time, if indeed it ever did perform. I need to have a far better example of naughty behaviour than “getting your receptionist pregnant”. I have an idea that I have to get the dentist pregnant instead of the receptionist. Who cares about the receptionist in this? What has she got to do with anything? The point is the dentist and it has to be more extreme than just pregnancy it has to be more extreme because the whole point is to contrast my behaviour with her idea of naughty which is to eat too much sugar. So something along the lines of getting her pregnant and talking her out of an abortion on the promise of some idyllic future only then to wrangle custody of the child so that I can make it eat sugar and not brush its teeth etc. I have the general idea in my head and it needs to be a rant. It really works and it lifts the gig, perhaps it is that good or perhaps it is the enthusiasm of the new bit triumphing over its actual weaknesses but it excites me. It works and opens a door to further improvement.

 

I also have a new section on American Girlfriend and this works less well but I think this is because I lost the rhythm. Here I am too bogged down in remembering the actual words as opposed to focusing on the sentiment and letting the words find themselves. I am able to get the show back on track with the Stephen Carlin standard “leave you for no one” (2012). 

 

I am now on the “Dumping a Mate” section but something is amiss.

The audience are laughing but not in the right way. They are laughing in the wrong places. Their timing is all out. They sound like they’ve been dubbed on. This is someone else’s audience from another gig laughing at something else material.  They are doing it all wrong.  Trust me, I worked with audiences before and they don’t usually laugh in this way. They go suddenly quiet as though contemplating something new and then they start laughing but in odd places and not in the correct rhythm.

 

“Debbie!” Shouts one woman. The interruption does indeed sound like it is intended for Debbie and not for me but unfortunately the cry of “Debbie” was of sufficient volume to count as a heckle and fall within my purview. “Who is this Debbie? And what has she to do with the gig?” Even as I ask her that I sense that the rest of the audience already know.  I turn to my right and now I see what it is. There is a giant screen behind me projecting “The Deceased Comedian’s Ball.”  But now somebody has obviously interfered with the computer projecting this image because now the instead of “The Deceased Comedian’s Ball.” It is showing the log in screen to Windows Vista with somebody’s log in name “Deborah” and Deborah is currently typing in her password (asterisked out so there is no security breach). Ever feel as though you are the last person in the room to know something? Well I am literally the last person in the room. Sometimes it is useful to use the technique of letting the audience get ahead of you and then playing catch up. I am playing catch up now. There is a good twenty – thirty seconds of me pulling faces while the audience laugh. This buys me eons of thinking time. I opt for pretending the audience along with Bill Gates (of Microsoft) are involved in a giant conspiracy to interrupt my set and stop me delivering “my truth” to the people. It is a rant built out of faux paranoia and faux fury, chastising the audience as though they were a class of errant school children. I want to run with this adlib as long as I can. I think I have already reached my allotted 15 minutes. I wish this had happened earlier. I run with the adlib until it runs out of steam but I know that that is not the end and that something is bound to turn up. So I pretend to wrap up the gig. Saying that I am looking forward to meeting Deborah. “And ask her password” shouts an old man with a moustache and three piece suit. Now phase two of the operation where I deconstruct going out on a date and trying to get back to a woman’s flat on the pretence of finding out her password or alternatively having sex with a woman just to gain access to her password. What is more evil? This second wave of adlibbing comes to and end but still I want to go on but I also know that I am by now over running. So I wrap up the gig by doing it as though it were an advert for Microsoft and this provides an out. I wish I could have done longer, just another five minutes please!

 

After Gig.

An average gig made good by a technical error. As I come off stage I am introduced to the woman who shouted “Debbie”. She apologises immediately for the interruption, oblivious to the fact that it raised everything up. It provided a tremendous opportunity to ad lib something and makes the gig special. I must admit my heart falls at these moments when somebody apologises for an interruption that I was able to make something of. Are you oblivious to my great adlibbing? Fuck off! If you ever heckle me please don’t speak to me afterwards. If I have handled it badly I will not want to speak to you anyway and if I have handled it well don’t undermine my achievements by reasonable behaviour.

 

Also I do wish I had worked in a reference to Ed Balls heckling me from beyond the grave. As though his spirit was interfering with the IT system. I think that would have been a fitting end to my set.

Edinburgh Festival - 13th August 2013

13th August 2013  Pleasance Court Yard 

13th show in the run

Length 55mins

Before Gig

I sit outside in an armchair thinking about my show. The armchair is located behind some containers that constitute the Pleasance “This” and “That”. I don’t think too much in detail about the show. I just know it should be tighter than yesterday. For once I don’t worry about caffeine consumed, food ingested, hydration levels, sugar levels, energy levels. I practice voices that I will not use on stage. I loose track of time and I only step into the backstage area about 5 seconds before the house lights go down. The audience sound chatty and energetic.

During Gig

I decide to muck about on the offstage microphone. The audience now appear ambivalent and but I get an enthusiastic applause and one whistle from a woman who seems to like me a bit too much for someone I have never met. Do I know her? I spend the first few minutes imposing various identities on her before giving up and thinking I’ve never met her. She is currently my favourite member of the audience, a position which sadly, she will struggle to maintain as the gig goes on. She will never be dislike by me but in the minutes ahead she will never again retain the lofty heights of the esteem I hold her in now. 

A mainly English audience today with one Irishman and one American. A few Scots, but barely enough to start a fight in a chip shop queue. 

My favourite audience member reacts strongly against my line about toothbrushes. She goes “Ughhh” I can see she is going to be a prude but hopefully a large over the top caricature of a prude, one that I can react against. I think earlier in the run her “ughhh” would have dented the start but I know it well enough to dodge her distain and keep it on track. I over extend my self of lottery, adding even more bits in today that ultimately detracts rather than adds to the routine. 

Certain absence of rolling laughter today. Always get the feeling I have lost the audience until I reach the punchline and they are still there.  I keep wanting to say to them. “Do you remember me from a few minutes ago? The guy you thought was funny?”

“Possessed by Demons” working better with rewrite now incorporated. More fun to be had here. I added new material about RBS which adds a Scottish angle and sets up the pay off better. 

“Just a number” not really getting laughs today but essential for the narrative and still with a dramatic quality. It is an annoying bit of material for me (difficult to get right).

Sugar stuff all well although I again said Dentist when i meant hairdresser. This happened yesterday and I need to think of them as two separate routines in my head rather than the one routine to stop this fuck up. 

“Dad Embarrassment” working well today but an erratic routine at the best of times. 

“Scrapyard” and “adults are weak” Ok but noticeable step up with “Kid” routine and this was just in the delivery. It is older bit of material and I perform it better. I’m stiller, pause better etc. 

“Feel the fear” has become a favourite of mine. A few days ago I bemoaned having to this routine. It looked ready for the chop but a rewrite and it has a new lease of life I am now enjoying this thing and having fin with this routine. 

“Tipping Point” has strong ending but setting up still feels a bit convoluted for my liking. 

“Probability” Energy starts to pick up here, and it is becoming a tight routine. There is woman in the audience who studied medicine at Aberdeen University. Audience interaction here about how my degree is better. This stupid one upmanship with an older woman pleases me and the audience no end. 

The show has been average ( and I actually mean average in the mathematical sense: adding several quantities together and dividing this total by the number of quantities, and NOT average as in a disparaging backhanded compliment “That was below average” way). 

The audience has been nice but there feels something missing from the show and I believe the audience will be going out slightly short changed. I realize I have to raise it at the end. I have to do something. I don’t know what “something” is but I don’t think the conventional ending covers it. If I stick on the conventional ending it will politely run its course I will competently (and I mean competently as in competent and not as in below average) bring the show to the end. I don’t want to competently bring this in. I have a certain feeling that I have to do something and I don’t what it is. It is more an emotion than any kind of logical thought. This perhaps gives me the incentive I need to go out on a limb at the end of “Nate Silver” and extended this section by ad-libbing and essentially hoping I hit something worthwhile. At first I don’t hit a comic theme but I carry it with emotion. It seems like I am struggling to find the words because I am struggling to find the words. I have the idea from yesterday to complain about Nate Silver not being an artist and I lead with that. But after trying a number of dead ends I find what I am looking for. I start asking what is the essence of success and why isn’t Nate Silver at the Edinburgh festival if he is “successful” I have hit the comedy seam and it builds a head of steam towards the closing section which for the first time this run truly changes gear, right at the end.

After Gig

This was not my best gig of the run but it is my favourite. The Ending tonight was the first time I really felt it was worthy of the name ending. It ended on a high and appeared to pull things together and have a definite conclusion. The difference between a “show” and a stand up routine is that in a stand up routine should end on a strong joke but it doesn’t have to structurally work. It doesn’t have to draw everything together. Perhaps this is the first “ending” I have done in my career. Maybe I was previously just getting off the stage?  

Tonight I feel I glimpse the better show that this could be and the better act I could be.  

I want to build on this from now on. The ending was far better than the show. Is a better last five minutes with an inferior preceding 50 minutes better than a better 50 minutes followed by a lackluster 5 minutes? Obviously ideally I want a barnstorming 50 followed by a high octane 5. That’s the dream. 

Edinburgh Festival - 12 August 2013

12th August 2013  Pleasance Court Yard 

12th show in the run

Length 55mins

Before Gig

The day after tomorrow is my day off and I am feeling in a slightly “schools out for summer” mood. All shows in the run are of equal importance at the Edinburgh Festival. Anybody could be in the audience in any night. There should be the same pressure on me every night but the truth is I don’t feel the same about every gig. Not every gig feels the same importance to me. Perhaps thats to do with the night of the week it falls upon or whether somebody I know will be in or how well the last show went or just my mood on that day? I don’t know but tonight does not feel as pressured as other nights. I’m not sure why. I am excited about performing the new “Feel the Fear” Section. 

During Gig

It is a full house. I am relaxed at the start. I am open minded to the possibilities of the gig. I am ready for anything the gig will throw at me. Scrub that. I am unfocused at the start and somewhat lackidasical, I have mistaken being ready for nothing for being ready for anything. A woman at the back waves to me as I take to the stage and I talk about her wave and no one else has seen it. So why mention it at all? I have to mention that I shouldn’t have mentioned it but even that may have a mistake. The start feels ill disciplined. When I finally launch into material, I can feel the obvious relief of the audience as they see that I know what I am doing. 

The initial “We all gamble section” goes better than any time in the run. I am adding bits into “The lottery” section all the time and I like it. It has a real momentum now and acts as a springboard for the start of the show. The audience are already really onside. It now feels like this is going to be the best gig of the run. The audience are up for it. They are there for the taking. They are so on board that I am already worrying if it will even be possible to raise them further for the end. The audience are already at max power. But suddenly they are not. Once I go into “Betting shop” there is a noticeable drop off of energy and almost a palpable air of confusion in the room. It makes me wonder if they didn’t hear a key word or something. I struggle on “Professional Gambler” the audience have deserted me. I don’t think I have ever known an audience to go from so supportive to nothing without some obvious faux pas. Now they suddenly get back on board.  Changes to “Demons” works well particularly bit about Demons being timely and punctual but this is still work in progress and needs more improvements. 

They love “Mirapex” and then “Vicious Circle of Debt” back to nothing. I am very relaxed today even in the bits they aren’t going for. But when I launch into all the sugar material I don’t seem to be able to pick them up. I decide I have lost them now. It will slide away from here so I deliberately alter my delivery, I bring the performance  down and suddenly they are there again. 

There is an American in the front row. I refer to him a lot - too much. There are American references in the show and there are British references and Scottish references. I keep saying things like “You’ll know about this” “You won’t have heard about this” “These guys know this” Its all pointless. I should just get on with the show. 

Dad Embarrassment the end punchline on autism gets nothing and I let it hand there. I make it obvious that was a point to laugh. I then tell them I knew they wouldn’t go with it because I have drop in teasers earlier but i decided to go ahead anyway due to my extreme arrogance. The audience just stare at me as though I are arrogant and maybe I am? And now they are away again. The kids material struggles but then I bring the performance down again and back on board they come. They are really start stop. I always seem to be able to get them back but never able to keep them. They keep wanting to be won over again. 

Reworked “Feel the Fear” flies. I incorporate new changes but also tag on bit about it being the best book i have ever read. The routine works well but perhaps more in the enthusiasm of something being new rather than something actually being good. 

Ending best yet. I adlib a rant about Nate Silver not being an artist and being a cold hearted man of commerce. I find this on stage today and realize that it is a door I can push further. This added on to the previous rant. So this builds nicely now to conclusion. 

 

After Gig

Felt like theatrical rather than club crowd but generally couldn’t work them out. They were not easy to predict when they would enjoy stuff and  then they wouldn’t. They were very stop start. The gig promised so much at the start and didn’t quite deliver. There was a feeling of not fulfilling it’s potential throughout. 

I was reacting to too many things in the room tonight and went way off script too frequently. Too many asides. Too easily distracted. Too unfocused. Bad Stephen. 

I moved about the stage too much. Too much walking. 

The Alternative Comedy Experience

TV Recording 8 July 2013

Before Gig

Tonight I am taking part in a television recording of The Alternative Comedy Experience. I appeared in the first series of that show and we are now recording the second series. Everybody keeps assuring me “Just do what you do. Don’t mind us with our cameras and lights.” Just do what you do. Do what you do? What do I do exactly? I’ve never thought about it before, I’ve just done it. Now that people are telling me to “just do it” I keep thinking about what it might be? What is it, that I do? I don’t really want to ask people, they’ll think I’m flaky or mad or something. I don’t think TV producers appreciate being asked “What do I do?” by bemused performers, seconds before they go on stage.

 

Tonight the show is being recorded at the Edinburgh Stand comedy club, a stage I have played many times before. It is filmed as a regular gig and then chopped up and edited into a TV programme. The beauty of TV is that mistakes are edited out. If I fluff a line I can just say it again. In theory there is less pressure on me than a regular live gig - where I am not afforded the luxury of second takes. So why then am I feeling more nervous that usual? In fact, why am I feeling more nervous than the last time, when I recorded Series One? Series One that was back in 2012, a different time. Back when I had the wind of youthful arrogance in my sails. During the first series I hadn’t known what to expect so I had done what most comedians do and shrugged my shoulders and said “We’ll see what happens” Last time Stewart Lee had assured me that “nobody will probably watch it anyway” Whether this was a ploy to get me to relax or a heartfelt prediction I will never know? But either way it worked. I hadn’t been too stressed about it all. This time is different. This time feels proper. This time the show has a pedigree. This time there is a benchmark of the first series. This time I know what I am doing. Knowing what you are doing is fatal, because if you know what your doing, then you know when your not doing it

 

Tonight is unusually hot. We are enjoying some kind of heat wave. The Edinburgh Stand Comedy is located in a basement bar. It doesn’t, of course, have air conditioning. Why would it? It is Scotland after all. In the sweltering July heat add TV lights and TV cameras and then throw a ban on anyone opening the back door, lest the outdoor sunlight flood in and ruin the subtle studio lighting. I am worried about dehydration: both the audiences and mine. Unfortunately there is not much I can do about the audience. They’re going to have to drink for themselves. But I can at least prevent myself from suffering heat stroke.  I chug down bottle after bottle of free mineral water. Eventually the bottles of water run out and runners miraculously appear to offer to get me yet more free mineral water.  Free mineral water, generously afforded by limitless TV budgets. This is the life, free bottles of water, cascading down in an endless rush of decadence. I am on free water, nothing can stop me now. Unfortunately, the TV budgets haven’t stretched to installing extra toilets backstage and now there is a queue for the toilets as I realize I may be over hydrated.

A sound guy comes to attach a clip on Microphone to my lapel. Can I still go to the toilet now? Won’t the sound of me peeing get recorded and added to the DVD extras? Will the Director mock my pissing technique, safely ensconced in his director’s gallery?

 

During Gig

Tonight I perform an unusual set comprising of some very new material, some old routines brought back for one night only and bits of last years Edinburgh Show. I have attempted to give it a through line but it is really just a ragbag of unconnected routines (so the same as every other stand up set then). I discuss sugar and dentists, I discuss rioting. I discuss disgraced MP Eric Joyce. I discuss paranoia. Then I move onto a routine about the drug Mirapex. I am working with this routine live a lot at the moment and it is currently in a fairly mutable form. It doesn’t stick to a predetermined set of words. “Just do what you do” right? So I do what I do, and I don’t stick to an exact form of words.  Tonight I mention someone who is bipolar as an example (other nights it may be dyslexia or some other condition) but I come unstuck when I realize I don’t know what the noun for Bipolar is. Mental block! Is it Bipolarity or Bipolarism? I go for Bipolarity. Bipolarity sounds right in my head but the way it comes out of my mouth sounds wrong. Maybe it isn’t bipolarity, maybe it is bipolarism. I say bipolarism. That sounds worse. I stop. This is TV. They can edit that out. I go for bipolarity again it turns to mush in my mouth. I ask the audience what is it bipolarity or bipolarism? They don’t seem to know. It would have been good to have sorted this out before going on stage. It has now become a thing, this bipolarity. It has punched a whole in my set. I am now convinced that it is bipolarity. We go for it again (spot the “we” now. If I am going to fuck up I am more than happy to share the blame with the audience). The audience laugh as I launch into the set up - of course they do, I have had about five attempts at this. But they don’t laugh at the punchline, as the joke is no longer about the original concept it is now about a man who cannot say a joke without screwing it up.

I do other routines that go as planned with all the right words in the right order so nothing interesting to see there. But the bipolarity displays a level of sham-bollockness  that I don’t think I would ever have committed at a regular gig. The possibility of editing in postproduction, led me to make a bigger car crash of it than I otherwise would have. It is impossible to just do what you do when there are TV cameras there. They affect your thinking.

 

After Gig

Hopefully, the bipolar section will be cut out completely. But will it though? Such is Stewart Lee’s contrary view of comedy; he may well choose to keep it in through sheer perversity. Or it could be edited to make it look like I got it right and thus TV is vindicated as a medium.

Behind the Fringe - Edinburgh Festival Series 2

Piccadilly Comedy Club 9^th May 2013

This year’s first Edinburgh Preview

Before Gig

Tonight is my first preview for my new Edinburgh Festival Show “Gambling Man”. So no polished finely honed routines tonight. 100% brand new stuff. 100% raw rookie material. And as I move towards the Edinburgh Festival the new set will start to gel but tonight is the first preview. Tonight is the most un-gelled this show is ever going to be. Tonight I feel a stranger to my own material. I feel like the groom on the night of an arranged marriage. I think I may have glanced this material across a crowded room but I’ve never really been alone with it. I will need a tolerant, forgiving audience this evening. God I hope they’ve never seen stand up comedy before. I hope they are not expecting professionalism. I stumble on to stage with a notebook. A heap of uncharted new material. I scarcely know where to begin. 

During Gig

This women is brilliant, she is amazing, she is the best ever. This women sitting at the back row, I think she is the best audience member I have ever had. For starters she not only laughs but she laughs in the right places - that is a rarer quality than you may think. Some audience members feel the need to fill any pause with a laugh. Tsk, tsk. Not her no, she understands a thing or two about punchlines and set-ups. God this was meant to be. She has timing, wonderful impeccable timing. She never tramples on my punchlines.  And she laughs for the correct duration of time. Not too short to leave a bald silence but not too long to muck up my rhythm. I think she may have done this before.  And the quality of the laugh is pure gold. She does not have a sarcastic laugh, or a annoying laugh or worst of all a funny laugh. I hate funny laughs.  Laughs should never be funny in themselves. People start laughing at their laugh instead of my material. Her laugh is warm, it’s infectious it spreads along the back row like a pandemic.

And she’s brave too. She happily laughs when no one else is laughing. Sometimes this solitary confidence can alienate other audience members who’ll refuse to join in out of pure stubbornness. But she charms them with her laughs: they want to join in too. But she actually gets the material, that’s the thing. SHE. ACTUALLY.  GETS. IT. I can see her face, I can read her body language, she is with me every step of the way, she follows the logic of every step, she correctly anticipates the next move. There is that little conspiratorial look that she gives me, she knows where the material is going. Even when I stumble she forgives it and picks things up again when I get back on track. To be honest she is carrying this audience, if it wasn’t for her I’d be dead in the water. But she keeps the faith and she is their leader. Where she goes they follow. Thank God she’s here. There are around thirty people in the audience, some of them tourists. I don’t think the audience knows quite what is going on. It is some approximation of a comedy routine, but something’s not right. Why is that Scotsman on stage reading off bits of paper and why does he sometimes um and ahh as if he’s not quite sure what he’s saying? Why do routines suddenly trail off to nothing and why is there no thread to his thoughts? Why does he grasshopper from one subject to the next without any links? This, I imagine is what they’re thinking. So thank God for my best audience member ever. She is so into the routines that she is whispering to the person next to her. That is how much she is engaging with new material. It speaks to her and she can’t help speaking to the person next to her a little bit. There we go another whisper. That’s fine I don’t think anyone else in the audience can here her whispering. It’s slightly off putting to me but the audience cannot hear it. Yes I think they can actually hear it. Is she whispering or is she actually talking to her neighbour? Has it got louder or is it just me? I wish she wouldn’t do that. It’s rude, it is distracting to the audience and off putting to the comedian. At least if you are going to chat please heckle and then it is out in the open and I can deal with it. Ah she is heckling now. She has pre-emptied the end of a routine, the routine is still born. No point ploughing on with it. I admit my defeat on that one. She covers her mouth like a naughty kid. She knows she blew that routine to Kingdom Come. At least she has learned her lesson now. Except she hasn’t because she is at it again. Every jokes a spring board for a conversation as far as she is concerned. This is starting to irritate me. I mention something about Gordon Brown being the most successful failure I know. Now she’s off on one now, discussing the banking crisis. I try to riff along but it falls flat. She knows she killed that routine stone dead. Don’t claim you were trying to help me. Don’t claim you were trying to help me. She says it. Apparently she was trying to help me.

Oh for Fucks sake!!! You are the worst audience member ever! I don’t mind heckling when I know the material and I can divert off script. But this is different. This is an Edinburgh preview, the purpose of which is to try out new material, which I can’t get around trying out because you are monopolising the airtime. Now I am annoyed. She is eating into my time like a giant PacMan. I wish I were one of the PacMan ghosts that could attack her. Now she is on about something about a plane crash. “I wish you were in a plane crash” I retort. But there is too much on an edge to it. The audience knows I am annoyed. And she is surprised, a little hurt. The rest of the audience pulls back a bit. It’s awkward. It’s overkill. I went in too hard. I taken a sledgehammer to kill a fly. At least I’ve shut her up but at what price? No she isn’t shut up. She’s back again, wounded but alive. I have failed to neutralise the target while I am now guilty of a war crime. It is the worst of both worlds. I went in too hard and alienated the audience but I didn’t shut her up. She is the worst ever. I hope she never comes near a comedy club again. Why did I like her?

After Gig

Total waste of time. Only tried out about half the stuff I wanted to. Now I am back to liking her again. At least she tried.

New - 17th May 2013 - Tom Stade Tour Worcester

Gig Report Friday 17th May 2013

Tom Stade Tour Support - Worcester

Prelude

I have never experienced divine intervention, neither in real life nor on stage. There is, of course, a first time for everything. Tonight’s gig is in a church, well strictly speaking an ex-church. The church has been deconsecrated - they’ve undone the magic in layman’s terms - and it has reverted back to a building. Let the swearing commence! The venue nevertheless retains many of the trappings of a church. The pews are all still in place, there are lecterns on the stage in the form of eagles. The stage, located where the alter once stood, still sports a grand chair carved from wood, where once a priest/vicar/bishop would have rested his bum in between hymns and eulogies. This ex-church still looks too like an ex church for my liking.  Will the audience feel they have to be on their best behaviour? As a non believer I am unfazed by the church. As an ex-catholic I actively want  to say something needlessly provocative. As an comedian I am aware that location can affect an audience’s mood. 

Before Gig

We (Tom Stade and I) are made very welcome by the venue staff and shown to the green room which once served as the vestry. We are offered beer, we decline. We are offered food. I order a disappointing Burrito. We are not offered tea and coffee, we take it anyway. We are asked about intro music, we couldn’t care less. I select Janet Jackson. 

During Gig 

There is no curtain to emerge from. There is a door that faces the audience. Once you are through that door you are on. You then have to mount the stage (more a platform) by a set of steep steps in full view of the audience. It makes for an unavoidably clunky entrance. You cannot bound on stage. The stairs run towards the front of the stage. So an over enthusiastic run up and you will overshoot the edge of the stage, crashing into the front row. No, my entrance can only be described as stately. I feel that I am about to deliver a sermon or as a headmaster address a school assembly - perhaps berate some boys for changing the lyrics of the national anthem. The stage feels at once too high for a comedy gig, my feet are level with the tops of the audience’s heads. Sometimes stages that are too high make it more difficult to break the fourth wall. I spend the first few seconds bouncing about on stage just to compensate for the entrance. “Look at me I can move nimbly.” 

But all worries are for nought. From the beginning this is the ideal audience. They are warm, they are generous, they are fun, they are comedy literate, they are up for it. They are so Friday night in the best sense of the word. There is no compere on before me and I do no preamble or compere myself. I just start and they are into it right away.  The set proceeds well, I chuck in some new stuff about petrol stations and Hitler’s dog, the new stuff goes down well while flagging up to me where the improvement will have to come. 

The venue looks like an ex Protestant church, I nonetheless use it as a spring board to talk about Catholic guilt and milk the apparent segue for all it’s worth. The shocking lack of architectural knowledge these days, is providing rich pickings for any comedian prepared to stray into the topic of building design. I talk about catholic guilt but as cast my head around the church apparently taking it in. As I turn momentarily to the back of the stage something catches my eye. I see writing on the chair. Emblazoned across the wooden chair reads “Jesus is All”. I pause to look at it.  I don’t really understand what “Jesus is all” could mean. Surely even the faithful believe that there is more than just Jesus? What about God? And wasn’t the Holy Spirit a guy too? Maybe they didn’t have space for “Jesus is significant but by no means is he the be all and end all”. I look at it again. The text is in some kind of medieval olde world font.   The “All” looks like “ill”. In a instant of time I know what I will do. It takes me a fraction of a fraction of a second to make my plan. Often I will get an idea on stage with no clear idea of where it will lead, I just wing it. Other times I have a vague strategy but no clear end. Sometimes it becomes apparent I have no end in mind as I fail to find an ending on stage. Tonight is different. the whole routine springs into my head in a oner. Beginning, middle, end it is all there. I know how I will pace it, I know the pauses, I know where I will emphasise certain words. It pretty much came in zero time. Is this divine intervention? Or years of application finally paying off? We will never know. 

I am worried my eyes will give me away as I turn to face the audience again. I am so pleased with myself at the routine I am about to deliver, that I fear there is a mischevous glint in my eye that will indicate I have a plan. I don’t want to look like a man with a plan. I want to look like a man with no plan. I want to look like George Osborne. I want to look like I am making it up as I go along. I think a premeditated air could scupper this. I pause just enough to compose myself. I try to dampen down the gleam in my eye. “Pretend it is a woman you like Stephen, Pretend it’s a woman you like, now pretend not to like her.” I do a second take at the writing. “Have you seen this?” I casually chuck in “Jesus is ill? I’m not surprised. Nailed up to a tree like that. Illness is understating it a bit if anything.” and so on. There is then a bit about Jesus phoning in a sickie to the Apostles (inaccurate of course the telephone wasn’t invented till 1888. Still the audience are so carried away they let me off with it).  

After Gig

The half-eaten Burrito waits for me back stage looking more wretched than ever. I am desperate to listen to the recording of the gig to check on the “Jesus is ill” section. I can’t remember the specifics even now. A routine I had mapped out in my head only five minutes before is vaporising in my head. (I will never know the details. Mysteriously the recorder stopped at 2 minutes 17 seconds, too early to catch this routine. There is no record of it - ohh spooky.)

New - 25th Feb 2013 - Angel

Gig Report Thursday 25th April 2013

Angel Comedy Club

Before Gig

Tonight I am headlining the Angel Comedy Festival at the Angel Comedy Club. Headlining comes with certain onerous responsibilities like being funny, ending the night on a high, looking professional etc. The Edinburgh festival is looming (3 months away) and I have to crowbar new material into my set to road test if for Edinburgh. I have written a new piece of material about a pig in a zoo. I have never performed this piece before. I am desperate to try it out. I don’t know if it will work. I feel in my bones that it is funny. I am very excited about the pig material. Me being excited is always a warning sign. Every new bit of material is the best thing I have ever written. Every new bit of material is the best thing I have ever thought. Not only will it be hilarious but it will transform not only my act but the art of comedy itself, things will never be the same again. Two days later the new bit of material is invariably lying discarded never to be repeated again. “How could I even have thought that that was ever funny?” So imagine my trepidation at having a new piece of material on my hands that I believe to be funny. I am seriously worried. If I think its funny, imagine how unfunny it may turn out to be. The pig material is seven minutes long. If I try it and it doesn’t work, it won’t work for a whole seven minutes in a row. That is an eternity in a stand up gig. That is a third of a twenty minute set. After bombing for seven minutes it will be virtually impossible to pull the gig back and I don’t mean just me set. I mean the entire gig. Seven minutes. 

Various assessments of the audience are floating about the acts’ green room. The audience are quiet, they are loud, they are easy, they are hard, they are warming up nicely, they are starting to flag, you should have been here last week, thank God you weren’t here last week. 

During Gig

OK. So I just want to start with a smidgen of old stuff to establish myself, just a whiff of the tried and tested as a yardstick against the new stuff. Just enough to get the audience on side and then as quick as possible straight into the pig section. That then gives me ten minutes at the end to do whatever I want, but i have to try out the pig routine.  This is operation pig. Objective pig. If I try the pig routine in its full seven minute glory then I die (only in real life, not on stage) a happy man. Remember just a smidgen of old stuff at the start  and then into the pig routine. It shouldn’t take more than a minute before going into the new stuff. 

My first impression of the audience is one of pushing a giant boulder up a hill. This audience aren’t giving much. I open with the heroin material and they don’t buy into it, almost to the point where I question if I’ve done something wrong like screwed up the timing? The heroin routine ends to mediocrity. I should be going into the pig section now,  but I abort the pig section. I need more time. I need to get the audience on side. So now a bit more of the old stuff and on to giving up drinking, still the audience hold back. It comes alight in the middle and I think now I’ve got them, but no, the audience fizzle back down again, the drinking stuff ends on a lull.  Not ideal for starting new material. I should be going into the pig section now but again I abort it, I don’t feel I have enough momentum behind me.  My confidence in the new material, shaky at the best of times, is dwindling further and I haven’t even started it yet. Now I am doing yet more tried and tested stuff. 

I feel like a pilot using up yards of precious runway while he tries to do the perfect landing.  

Still more old stuff on alcoholic percentages. This is going better, that boulder is starting to edge up the hill but as I end that bit I still don’t have the audience where I want them. This is a now or never moment. Now is not the right moment to go into the pig section. I don’t have sufficient trust of the audience yet. But due to time constraints, I can no longer delay. There is fleeting pause, just slightly too long, while I decide. Then a moment when I feel like I am drawing myself up to my full height to take on the school bully. I think I do physically stand up a bit. I wonder if the audience catch it? But I have decided to commit to the new stuff. The common sense part of my brain considers this a bad idea. But wasn’t it common sense that got me into this in the first place?

I start the pig routine, I launch into the opening set up. It gets a laugh from the people standing at the back but it is a better reception than I was expecting. And now into section one proper of the pig routine and the laughter is now moving forward from the back of the audience to the front. By the end of act one of the routine the whole audience are on board in a way they never were for the old material. So far so good. Now into Act 2 of the routine. Will they like this? I dip my toe in the water a little bit further but yes they do like this. I am really relaxing into this. Fortunately the audience laughter buys me thinking time for the next part of the routine.  I am feeling my way with this routine. I have a number of bullet points written on my hand but the wording itself is loose. If it appears that I am making it up on the spot that is because I half am. 

The routine involves a Polish woman. There is always a bit of my middle class brain that is thinking, is this racist? Or could it be perceived as being racist? Or will people not laugh because their laughter could be perceived as being racist? The audience are going with it and two Russian women down the front are nodding at every new section of the routine. I don’t know if they are nodding because that is how Russians perceive the Poles? Or because that is how Russians perceive themselves? Mental note to self, ask them after the show why they were nodding. Further note to self, don’t bother, you will look like a nutter.

They go with every bit of this routine better than I could ever have hoped for. 

7 minutes into the Pig routine and I have reached the end of it, only I don’t really have an ending. Only now does this become a problem. I knew I didn’t have an ending when I stepped on stage but I didn’t actually believe I would ever get this far or if I did would be so elated it worked that I wouldn’t care it didn’t have an ending. Now I do care there is no ending. I confess I don’t have an ending to the audience and they forgive me.

Buoyed up by the success of the pig section, I arrogantly plough ahead with some half baked new stuff on the lottery. It works but not as well, giving my set the shape of a hump backed bridge. I should have quit after the pig victory but victors never know when to get off the field. 

After Gig

The pig stuff worked really well. Better than my tried and tested stuff. Does that mean it is better than the tried and tested stuff? Or does it mean that it is worse? Does it means the audience don’t know what they are doing? Was my instinct right about the new stuff or does it mean it was wrong? I don’t know. I will have to do the pig stuff again. 

Archive 30th January 2013 - Islington

Show Report Wednesday 30th January 2013

Islington, London.

Prelude

Comedians are fond of telling audiences that “This is the weirdest gig

ever” usually in response to someone heckling, going to the toilet, a

man blows his nose into a handkerchief or a glass is accidentally

knocked over and rattles. “This is the weirdest gig ever”. The

something that happens usually falls comfortably within the remit of

the job description. The average walk down the high street is weirder

than a weird gig. Gigs are never the weirdest gig ever. That said

tonight’s gig is weird and may be my weirdest gig ever. At points I

don’t feel like a comedian at all, I feel like a ringmaster trying to

co-ordinate a shambles. At the end of the gig a woman will shout out

“But you held it all together” and perhaps that is the sum of what I

do tonight.

Before Gig

I enter the venue. A standard bar, slightly chainy feeling, slightly

corporate. Plush but soulless. They have booths. They serve food.

Through the back is the function room. As I enter the function room

there is an abrupt change of atmosphere. It doesn’t have poles for

pole dancers but it does have neon signs showing women in various

states of undress. It does have mirrors on the ceilings and curtained

off booths – presumably for reclusive drinkers. It also has mirrors at

45 degree angles so you can see your own lap in front of you. It also

has a mattress in an alcove. I imagine some Islington version of Tony

Soprano hanging out here and doing - - whatever. There is a small

audience and they seem friendly and intelligent.  There are two Greek

women in the audience. One of them explains to the compere that

boilers in Greek homes can set the house on fire if left on. She

further explains that Greek women often use the excuse “I have left

the boiler on” to avoid or halt certain unfavourable sexual encounters

which is interesting.

During Gig.

So I come on stage. It all seems so routine at the start. I talk about

the sexual overtones of the room. I do some material about not

drinking. The opening is conventional enough. There is no hint of what

is to come. A girl in the audience talks to her friend. It is audible

so I stop to find out what is going on. She has a Spanish accent. I

call her Spanish. She corrects me.  She is Greek. Apparently what she

has is a Greek accent. She is the Greek girl who was talking earlier

about boilers. I knew she was Greek but my instincts told me she was

Spanish and so I disregarded this information in place of blind

prejudice. I went with my gut which is obviously racist. I say, “I am

obviously a racist”. It gets me out of that hole for the time being.

So I go back into material, Facebook. I start to talk about Facebook.

A man comes into the gig late as he has been in the toilet. “How’s it

going?”, he asks. “Alright so far” I answer. “He’s Scottish", heckles

the Greek girl.  So I have to put that fire out then back to the

material. “So the thing about Facebook…blah…blah…blah.” Somebody

receives a text message and I feel the first real hint of irritation

stirring in me. Can’t people switch off their phones?  I plough back

into the Facebook stuff but it feels that the momentum has now gone

out of the gig; there have been too many interruptions. I talk about

relationship break-ups and how you get to know people and their

vulnerabilities and how you could sell this information when you break

up. Some laughter now. Good, this thing is starting to build again. I

can claw this back from all the interruptions at the start. “Beep-

beep” another text message arrives. Now I am getting pissed off. Can

this person not switch off their phone? Didn’t they get the hint? Now

the Greeks are chatting. What is it? Are they translating for each

other or are they just bored and chatting amongst themselves? The

relatively small size of the audience makes their chatting all the

more annoying. I think it’s ratios. 10% of my audience are chatting.

It's so damn rude. I tell them so. I shut down the Greeks chatting.

Now another girl is chatting to the man next to her. I don’t know if

she is foreign or not. She may be German. She may be English. I will

never know. I am not about to make another mistake about nationality

by guessing her country of origin. I tell her not to chat. Not in a

witty way, just a matter of fact way. God I sound like a schoolteacher. This

is not the way to do it. Focus, focus, back into material. Let’s talk

about giving up sugar. So now I talk about sugar but I can feel myself

getting annoyed. Some line has been crossed now. I have not lost my

temper yet although looking back, it was inevitable from this point.

Now the phone, the same phone that received the previous text

messages, starts ringing. “Turn off the phone!” I tell the Greek girl

but it is not her phone it is somebody else’s. This is the first

moment a little demon whispers to me “walk off stage. Just walk off.

You’ve had enough.”  But I don’t listen to it.

“I just want to get a fucking beer,” yells the Greek girl. She is

annoyed about been wrongly blamed for the phone. She stomps off to the

bar.  Fuck this. This is pointless. This gig is fucked.

I’ve  never walked off stage in my life. I've been booed off stage. I have

been ejected from stage by the audience. But I have never left

voluntarily before my time is done. I have never quit. I have seen

other people walk off stage and I don’t like it. I consider it

unprofessional and stroppy. I don’t admire that kind of behaviour. But

now I think I might walk off. It comes in waves like nausea. It rises

and then abates. Maybe it’ll be Ok? Maybe I will stay? I think I am

over it now. No I am not over it. Here it comes again and this time I

think I might leave. The debate is now raging in my head. Should I

stay or should I go? I don’t know if the audience can see that I am

contemplating leaving?

We are ten minutes in. Now the girl who may be German or not is

chatting to the man next to her. Maybe there is a translation issue

here? Maybe there is a communication breakdown? But I feel the couple

are mocking me for the shambles that the gig has become. I think I am

now definitely going to walk off. It must be obvious to them now; I do

a walk about the stage. I seem to remember sighing and looking off to

the side. I contemplate the future of this gig. I should stay and see

it through. I’ve had to deal with far worse. No, don’t give up. I am

definitely going to say and see it through.  At the moment I talk

myself into staying it swings the other way. “I don’t know if I want

to do this anymore” I tell them. I teeter on the brink of walking off.

“No stay “ they say. But as the last act, I am all they have now. They

would say that wouldn’t they? I sit down on the stage. This seems to

make it more intimate and gets their attention. The Greek girl brings

me a beer and sits it on the stage next to me. “I don’t usually drink

but I may tonight.” I have no intention of drinking but I want to

acknowledge the kind gesture.

“No” “Stop” “Don’t do it” The audience clamber to stop me drinking.

They think I’m an alcoholic on the brink of falling off the wagon.

They see what they’ve driven me to. Suddenly we've bonded. They feel

they’ve saved me and now have a vested interest in me continuing. I am

going to stay. I hand the beer back to the Greek girl. But now SHE

takes umbrage. She cannot understand why I don’t want to drink. Why

would anyone not want to drink? I have to placate her. Now she’s

upset. This could all slide again. I promise to accept a Lindt

chocolate in place of the beer. I eat the chocolate while talking with

my mouth full. It has a caramel centre. Yum. I sit on the stage and do

another 15 minutes from there.

After Gig

Contrary to walking off I have in fact stayed longer than I was booked

For, representing an opposite but equal level of unprofessionalism. I

don’t want to think about this gig in retrospect.  Analysising it

would be pointless and may upset me. It was the weirdest gig ever.