Edinburgh Festival Round Up (Part 2)

Bo Burnham (Words, Words, Words) – Emily thought I would hate Bo Burnham. I was hopeful that I would like Bo Burnham (realistically thinking I probably wouldn’t, and would just sit with gritted teeth for an hour). We were both pleasantly surprised. Bo Burnham is clever and talented and incredibly filthy. But he plays the piano like an angel and his songs are really catchy. The night we went was good because there was a guide dog in the audience and Bo got a bit obsessed with it. Although he kept getting the dog’s name wrong, it did make him realise how much dog-related material he had. Definitely worthy of the comedy award, although Emily and I had him pegged for best newcomer.

The Horne Section (with Alex Horne, Tim Key, Alun Cochrane & Jon Richardson) – Bar Mark Watson’s book launch (more of this, with pictures, in another blog post), The Horne Section was probably the most Fringe-y thing we saw in Edinburgh. Orchestrated by Alex Horne, it featured Tim Key and two other guest comedians being funny with music. There are also games (mainly audience battleships) and banter and at one point some chips were passed around (I only just realised quite how much food featured in the shows we went to). We were also treated to Alex Horne’s signature PowerPoint presentations, which were personalised to our audience and were a proper giggle. The guest comedians on our night were Alun Cochrane (cool, had an actual box of jokes) and Jon Richardson (said sex words over sexy music – I nearly died, Emily was fully aware of this and laughed at me). There was also a special musical guest for the night – Oompah Brass – who were great, but their tuba player was very ill and I spent most of their set terrified that he would throw up whilst playing his tuba and shower us all in sick (we were on the front row).  It was the absolute best. It felt like a Christmas party in someone’s (very big) front room, where everyone (audience and performers) was having fun (complete opposite of Comedy Countdown). I think it showed how good The Horne Section is that David O’Doherty was there just to watch (fact: David O’Doherty does not know what an ISA is; Alun Cochrane does). I so hope Alex Horne does this or something similar again – it was my highlight of the festival.

Oxford Imps – The Oxford Imps are phenomenal. They have so much energy and are amazing at improv. I’m in awe of them. They improvised a musical for God’s sake – and it was good aswell. I just love them.

Laura Solon (The Owl of Steven) – We went to see Laura Solon based on the good reviews she’d been getting during the first week of the festival (our choices were nothing if not well-researched). I’m glad we did. She was charming and clever and did an amazing range of characters (her show was a character-based adventure story about an owl from the Island of Steven). The only problem with the warm room and narrative-based nature of her show was that it felt like a well-acted bedtime story for two girls who’d managed four hours of sleep. One of us fell asleep (hint: it wasn’t me).

Josie Long (Be Honourable!) – I love Josie Long. I want to be her friend. She makes her own programmes and hands them out herself – how can you not love her? Her show this year was about wanting to be a better person, and the main elements of that are eating breakfast every day (in particular porridge) and talking to strangers. She has such enthusiasm about the stuff that she loves and it is pretty infectious (her 2008 show has made me obsessed with going to the Pitt Rivers museum in Oxford). She did a bizarre character piece at the beginning where she played a horrible female astronaut from Orpington in Kent and took questions about space from the audience. It fitted with her 2008 show ‘All of the Planet's Wonders (Shown in Detail)’ but the accent she did was very grating (she said arksed instead of asked and it drove Emily mad). I’m glad she only did that for five minutes. My favourite thing about Josie Long is that she’s clever and she shows it, and never does the lazy women comedienne thing of doing material about how hilarious/infuriating being a woman is.  I’m glad she was nominated for the comedy award, she deserves it. I’m going to see her again in Bristol.

We also went to see some friends of ours from Bristol in their Improv show Interrobang. It was really good, but I’d feel weird writing anything about it because I know them.

Edinburgh Festival Round Up (Part 1)

It’s nearly two weeks since I left Edinburgh and although there’s only a few days of the actual festival left, the Foster’s Comedy Award nominations were announced yesterday. I can’t say much for the Best Newcomer nominations, but I saw three of the five Best Comedy Show nominees (see below) and I’m seeing Sarah Millican in Bristol in October, so a fairly clean sweep (sorry Greg Davies). So with that in mind, here are my slightly fan-girlish round ups of all the shows that myself and my friend Emily (@Emilyin140 if you’re on Twitter) saw during our 3-and-a bit days in Edinburgh:

Jon Richardson (Don’t Happy, Be Worry) – I just don’t know how to feel about Jon Richardson’s show anymore. It should be said that I love Jon, so was almost guaranteed to like his show. And I’m fairly sure I did love it when we first saw it. It had Jon’s standard hilarious regional accents and good bits of physical comedy. Plus, I really appreciated some very accurately observed material about being from the North but living in the South. Also Jon spent £500 on some replica traffic lights (he mentioned this several times, so I thought it should be repeated here). However, I met Jon very briefly and somehow managed to maintain a non-swooning conversation where he said he didn’t think that night’s show had been very good at all. Admittedly, it wasn’t as laugh-out-loud funny as Dogmatic, but I still enjoyed it immensely. But now all of my opinions are confused, and I can’t remember what I originally thought. I’ve settled on the opinion that it was very good, but was lacking something. I’m sure Jon will find it though.

Russell Kane (Smokescreens and Castles) – I was convinced I didn’t like Russell Kane until I heard him on the fantastic Marsha Meets podcast. Also Emily really wanted to go and see him and I trust her judgement. I’m so glad I listened to both Martha and Emily. Smokescreens and Castles was one of the funniest and best structured comedy shows I’ve ever seen and I’m not surprised that Russell has been nominated for the comedy award. He reminded me quite a lot of pre-Sachsgate Russell Brand (post-Sachsgate RB just isn’t as inventively, originally funny), mainly because he’s very clever and from Essex. The majority of the show was hilarious and delivered with a huge amount of energy. Emily and I were sat on the front row and I was occasionally worried that Russell would hurl himself into the audience – I’ve never seen a comedian with that much energy. Also, we clearly give off an English student vibe, as he essentially delivered a bit about post-modernism just to us. Russell built a cardboard castle as well, which I just thought was the sweetest thing. However, the end of the show was heart-breaking. Emily and I were almost in tears. I’ve already booked tickets to see this show again in Bristol.

Bristol Revunions (Comedy Biscuit) – I’m not normally a massive fan of sketch comedy, I find it a bit hit-and-miss, but Comedy Biscuit was fun and likeable. It was also fast-paced enough that if you didn’t like one sketch, there was another along right away. The timing in their first scene was fantastic, even though I didn’t actually like the sketch. Their final sketch was pretty epic and added some catchy lyrics to the Jurassic Park theme song (we were singing it for days). There was also a model dinosaur – I love a good papier-mâché T-Rex. Also, we got ice-lollies halfway through. Free food in shows is always a win.

Comedy Countdown – Comedy Countdown was awful and disappointing. I hated it. I wouldn’t normally care so much, but it had the potential to be so good. Instead we got lazy comedians doing an hour of arse jokes. The only people who came out well were James Sherwood and Paul Sinha, who is actually amazing at maths. The high point of the show was some free biscuits. I had more fun talking to Emily in the queue beforehand. It was probably because Dan Atkinson wasn’t there. (To be fair, everything else we saw was of such a high standard that if something was bad, it would look really bad.) (Just to clarify, this show was comedians playing a shambolic version of the British teatime game show Countdown. It wasn’t an actual Countdown of any sort. Or this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdEadrw4O0U. I wish it had been that.)

Robin Ince (Carl Sagan Is Still My God) – Seeing Robin Ince was like going to an underground school (underground in both the cool counter-cultural sense, and the fact we were in the cellar bar of a pub).  Ince is clearly a passionate man and he threw both science and jokes at us in an infectively enthusiastic way. Some of the Carl Sagan passages Ince picked out were beautifully sad and read with such deliberation and thought – I’d love Robin Ince to do a Carl Sagan audiobook. There was a great contrast between his reading of Sagan’s take on the afterlife and a rant about the “medium” Joe Power, who for all intents and purposes is a charlatan. He was also joined by several guests: a musician whose name I’ve shamefully forgotten; Simon Singh (libel law Simon Singh), who talked about The Big Bang, and Matt Parker (talked about maths and death).  Parker did give my favourite of the Fringe: if you are in the 14-29 age group, you are statistically more likely to die in the next hour and a half than win the UK lottery. FACT! I really liked this show, despite a lot of the more complicated science going a bit over my head. My brain felt thoroughly enriched.

Part 2 (featuring Bo Burnham, The Horne Section, Oxford Imps, Laura Solon & Josie Long) to follow...

One From the Archives: A Blog About Tim Minchin

Just after my exams finished in May, I did an internship at the Hay Literary Festival (it's an amazing event, go here and learn all about it, you won't regret it). As well as getting to see/look after some awe-inspiring people (including Stephen Fry, Lynn Barber, David Mitchell (not the comedian, the one who wrote Cloud Atlas), Lucy Mangan, A.C. Grayling, Jacqueline Wilson (my 10-year old self died of excitement on that day)) I also got the opportunity to see a lot of comedians. Much as I enjoyed seeing Marcus Brigstocke, Ed Byrne, Ross Noble (who I didn't think I liked but I actually did) and Shappi Khorsandi, my absolute comedic highlight was finally getting to see Tim Minchin. I wrote a blog about it - imagine this is 3 months in the past...

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Today I fulfilled an ambition I must have had for about two years. In August 2008, Tim Minchin was performing sell-out shows at The Pleasance in Edinburgh, while I was there. I did not get chance to go. In October 2009, Tim Minchin did a gig at Colston Hall, in Bristol, the city I had moved to only weeks before. I could not get tickets. Today (31^st May 2010), Tim Minchin was at Hay. I am also at Hay. I saw Tim Minchin.

(At this point, in my head, there would be some kind of Hallelujah chorus. Imagine that now.)

I was sat in the centre of the second row – seats which had originally been reserved, but weren’t needed, and consequently had a perfect view. There is not much of a gap in the Barclays Wealth Pavilion between the stage and the audience, so I was close enough to be able to throw 5p’s at Tim (which he did ask to be done at one point). As I expected, he was amazing. He fluffed up a few times at the beginning, but he hasn’t done a live show for a fair bit, and to be honest, I like it when comedians and bands make little mistakes at gigs – it’s what helps to make a show unique. For fact fans, Tim played Rock &Roll Nerd, Inflatable You, The Pope Song (after which an old couple in the front row walked out), If I Didn’t Have You, Prejudice, Confessions, Storm, Canvas Bags (with amazing fan-based action – poor quality phone pictures to follow) and an encore of You Grew On Me. It’s quite easy to forget just how brilliant he is, both in terms of intelligence and musical ability He used the post hoc, ergo propter hoc philosophical fallacy to explain a bit about ice-cream men, and also why he doesn’t believe in God or alternative therapy, then did a second, sped-up version of The Pope Song that was almost perfect.

It might sound bad, but I think I enjoyed it even more because I was on my own. As a result of my boundless comedy geekery and love of forward planning, I am usually the one suggesting gigs to friends. This means I usually have very lovely company, but am often a bit concerned about whether or not the friend is enjoying it, as I feel like it’s my responsibility. I know it isn’t, and I shouldn’t worry, but I can’t help it. So to be at a gig entirely on my own meant I could concentrate completely on the show. It was a great novelty.

Straight after Tim finished, to a standing ovation I might add, I ran all the way around the site, in sandals, to see Idiots of Ants. I managed to sneak into the front row, and was really pleased I managed to see them, as they were hilarious. Some of the sketches were better than others – one about Where’s Wally doing a book reading at Hay was particularly inspired, especially as they brought that back into the show later – but all of them were really funny, and did their fair share of corpsing (apparently it was the last night of the tour). I would definitely go see them again. And I now understand their name! Apparently, when you say it, it’s supposed to sound like ‘idiot savants’. It doesn’t but it was a nice idea.

TM warns small boy (13) not to use him as a role model.

Amazing fan-based action

REVIEW: Adventures on the High Teas (Stuart Maconie)

It’s clearly great praise for a writer to be compared to both Alan Bennett and Bill Bryson.  However, when these comparisons scream out at you (albeit politely) from the covers of a book, it sets an almost unfeasibly high standard for the writer to live up to. Fortunately, in Adventures on the High Teas, Stuart Maconie rises ably to this challenge. Adventures on the High Teas chronicles Maconie’s search for Middle England – where it is and what it actually means – as he criss-crosses the country by train. (As a non-driver who relies on trains to travel at least 1500 miles a year between home and university, I have a lot of respect for trains). Maconie is a fantastic writer. As he travels from town to town, it feels as if he is taking you on the journey with him, like some benevolent uncle, charged with entertaining his nieces and nephews over the summer. There’s a great balance of fun and information, with a few moments of poignant stillness, which helps to make the fun even funnier. The facts Maconie imparts are all relevant and add to the narrative, rather than being informational window dressing to pad out the story. One of my favourite facts in the book: “Leamington Spa is, according to recent socio-linguistic research, right on the border of the north/south divide over the pronunciation of Bath”. (This is mainly because I have a friend who is living in Leamington Spa next year, but I still like the fact).  Maconie’s writing about the North/South divide is genuinely brilliant, in a way that I can only appreciate now, as a result of moving from Yorkshire to Bristol (term-time only). Even so, the topics within this book are so varied that there will be something for everyone, so, please, go and read it.

NB: Another great piece of writing about the North/South divide is ‘My North-South Divide’ by Laura Barton, an article from The Guardian, which can be found here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/jul/12/laura-barton-wigan-southerner