In at the 13th Hour (or Day)

A belated Happy New Year, and an even more belated happy new blog.

I suppose I am drawn to leave this update for that very reason, it’s been lazily long since I last posted something here.  I suppose it’s justified however, as I have waited until I actually had something to post here.  So here it is.

The ACRE’s Annual General Meeting 2010, held late due to an inclement weather event.  Finally, everyone can get filled in as to where the ACRE find themselves professionally at the dawning of 2011.

Also, we've left the radio in order to focus on video projects, rather than being fired as we rather disingenuously suggested here.  We have another 2 sketches already filmed, and another waiting to be made.

As ever, the proof will be in the posting.

Journal of Cannonby: Come on Baby, Let's Do the Twist

I haven't posted one of these scripts for ages, because we stopped doing them.  This was the final script that was performed before the huge summer gap.  Gap?  What's this?  Are they to be starting up again?  PERHAPS!!

Narrator: Me

Boris: Dafydd

Cannonby: Jean-Pierre le Grenouille

Maude: Me

Vino: Jean-Pierre le Grenouille

Bevan: Me

Nurse: Me

Doktor: Jean-Pierre le Grenouille

Hazel: Dafydd

Boris: Dafydd

************

Journal: The Remarkable Doings of Cannonby

Come on Baby, Let's Do The Twist.

Narrator

In the last episode of Tales of Cannonby…

BORIS:      Here's the hidden passageway!

CNBY:       Destroy the gate!

MAUDE:    Throw the switch!

Narrator

Waw-ee, lots of exciting happenings and stuff.  There is an imminent crushing of Teal and Bludonna on the cards, they are aboot to be crushed into a fleshy winepaste, though we can only hope that Boris' newfound hidden passageway leads directly and conveniently to that chamber but I suppose we'll have to wait to find out won't we?  Eh?  Eh?  Let us join a reflective Mellencamp Vino, who stands in her i-viney tower atop the battlements of Vinehaven…

VINO:         Oh, for a goblet of fresh wine!  How many moon cycles have I suffered without the gush of wine to slake my tempestuous thirst?  *sigh*  I had hoped to lead Vinehaven into its most fruitful age, but during my time at the metaphorical helm we have been struck with the worst drought in our history.  I'd assumed that dethroning the last Vineleaders and banishing all men from the citadel in a feminist coup d'état would lead to a better Vinehaven for ALL!  For all the women at least.  But the random thoroughfare through the region has all but died out, which means no fresh blood slash wine for us.  You'd think an out of town colony of sexy women would receive more visitors, really.  It's all this gender equality business that's ruining it for us.  It's political correctness gone mad. *sigh*  If I look out of my i-viney tower down upon the courtyard, there's ne'er a person in sight.  Oh wait, actually there is.  Is this some sort of siege?  What the hell is going on?

Narrator

And far below, in the courtyard…

CNBY:     Pull your weight you metallic curmudgeon!

BEVAN:   Look, Captain!  I don't mean to pour vinegar in your toilet, but just shouting at ZX isn't going to make him work any harder.  He may look like a robotic killing machine but inside he is a vulnerable fleshy sac just like everyone else.

CNBY:     That sounds vulgar, but it isn't!  You've won me over with your innuendo-laden logic.  I will be satisfied that he is moving at his current pace.

BEVAN:   That's very good of you, Captain.  Just look at the door there, you can see the outer crust of the polished oak cracking.  We'll be able to rush inside in a matter of hours!

CNBY:     Won't they have discovered us by then?

BEVAN:   Now, Captain.  You aren't meant to be the voice of sense in these conversations.  If you carry on like that you'll undermine the brittle equilibrium we've built up over these months, and then where would we be?

CNBY:     Still stuck outside the Castle?

BEVAN:   Touche.

CNBY:     That's not really a good enough punchline to deserve a touche.

BEVAN:   Touche.  Hoist by my own touche-based petard.

CNBY:     What is a petard?

BEVAN:   Well, according to wikipedia: A petard was a small bomb used to blow up gates and walls when breaching fortifications.

CNBY:     Well that's unbelievably coincidental, given the situation we are currently in.  Bevan!  Don't hoist yourself with that petard, use it to destroy the gate.

BEVAN:   Captain, given the flexible nature of radio broadcasting as a medium which requires imagination to really enjoy, and also the chaotic nature of this very story, your suggestion to use the petard I hoist myself with to blow up the gates is both as lazy and idiotic as it is genius.

CNBY:     That's the way I sail!  Blow the gates!

BEVAN:   Yes sir!

Narrator

But as the straight-forward team had concocted their petard-based scheme, Boris and the medical-centric characters were sneaking their way through the secret passages hoping to use the cack-handed distraction of Cannonby in their own clandestine plot to rescue Teal and Bludonna.

BORIS:    I see light at the end of the tunnel!

NURSE:   I see nothing within that sentence which could be misconstrued for comic effect.

DOKTOR: Correct.

BORIS:    There's a big ol' room just beyond the aperture here, it looks like a cross between a wine cellar and a brewery.  There're two beautiful women who are manning, sorry, there are two beautiful women who are womanning a lever, looking to bring down a giant mechanic foot and crush Teal and Bludonna into wine OH MY GOTT!

DOKTOR: Finally, we're back to the plot.

MAUDE:   Throw the switch!

HAZEL:    Yes, Miss Maude.

BORIS:    (really long and drawn out) STOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP!

(sound of switch being thrown, foot descending and crushing Teal and Bludonna)

Narrator

Well I did not expect that.  It is a bit abrupt isn't it?  I mean I can see what they were going for, trying to undermine story cliches by actually killing off the hostages but surely that's not the answer?  I mean it wasn't particularly funny.  I think I've lost faith in this story now, I don't think I'm even going to listen next week.  See how you start the episode then.  Think you can just play with the listeners emotions like that, killing off long-running popular characters.  Who do you think you are, Eastenders?  Or 24?  Or The Wire?  I would imagine.  I've not seen any of them.  Well you aren't, you are The Tales of Cannonby, and next week you will continue to be, the Tales of Cannonby!  Come back to see what happens, who knows, it might be some kind of trick, or magic-ear puzzle.  On the Tales of Cannonby!  They are definitely dead though.  (gap)  Or are they?  Eh?  Eh?  They are yeah.  (gap)  They might not be though.  (gap)  See how I feel.  (gap) On the Tales of Cannonby!!!!

*******

It was left on a ludicrous cliffhanger...

How is that going to be sorted out?

Haribo, Lack of Ideas, Wil Hodgson and a World Cup Song

I am in work, and a child just pronounced Haribo 'huh-ree-bo' (rhymes with Kuriboh)(the example says more about me than I would like). Very amusing indeed. Kids and grown-ups love it so, across all the social classes it seems.

I have been at a loss for things to write somewhat this week, a mix of staying up late playing Final Fantasy 9 and having wrestling moves dancing around my mind during any free moment is not a healthy environment in which whimsy can flourish.

I went with mates to see a comedy gig last night, and I can't really write about that, because a page full of superlatives strung together to describe Wil Hodgson, while accurate and sincere, would probably seem mawkish. He is one of the most engaging performers I have seen, and surely a genuinely unique act.


It was one of the strangest room I have ever been in, we sat, as is our custom, right at the very front. We figure that having paid to get in, it makes sense to get as close to the performers as possible. Whereas everyone else decided it would be better to sit in the very back of the room, leaving a huge swathe of empty seats in the centre. This came together to give the impression that, for a lot of the time, our table was receiving a private, special gig. Which sounds either amazing or filthy, depending on how your mind works. It was amazing.

The gig was being compered by Elis James, which we didn't realise until the fact, which was a lovely bonus as he is a beautiful human being.  I will leave my strange praise there.


I frightened a man in the toilet afterwards, (filthy), when I walked in and saw a poster advertising 'An Audience with Derek Acorah' and said "oh for fuck sake!" much louder than I had intended. It is one of the ugly inequalities of the world that Hodgson plays in the lounge room and Acorah will play in the theatre. It is an indictment of the area that people will turn up to it. If there's any karmic justice in the world then ghosts will be proven to exist and Acorah will be pulled inside out by a Greater Demon during his set. I am getting a message from beyond, it says to buy Wil Hodgson's DVD from www.gofasterstripe.com. Them ghosties know what they are on about.


I am circumcising this blog entry here, as I have to record a World Cup-based song for our radio show tomorrow, since one of our running sections where we cynically jump on a bandwagon to become 'popular' is returning. I have to write the lyrics now, although I think I am going to be relying on 'hilarious' singing to sell this one, rather than incisive satirical points. I pulled Algeria and New Zealand in the office sweepstakes, so they will feature heavily I assume. If only as much fuss had been made of the rugby World Cup and I'd picked those teams (with Australia instead of Algeria). That might also appear in the song.


I am loath to actually end this entry now, as I feel that if I keep blagging my way through then I will accidentally stumble on things I can do in the song.


Nope.


~fin~

Indulging the Unusual - Unusuindulgence

It has begun. The process of doing weird things just to talk about them on the radio.

For me, the blogging and the radio have been hugely helpful in forcing me to be creative. I am someone who definitely needs fairly short-term deadlines to work towards, even if they are self-imposed. It is when I get into that mindset that I blog often, and since having radio shows every weekend it has become normal to work towards them through the week, rather than being a lazy sponge and watching weeks slip away fruitlessly.

In the sort of life-affirming seminars that get booked by schools and are forced upon children, a lot of importance is put on the taking of opportunities. One in particular that I remember touched largely on half-chances, and on how you should grasp and indulge every half-chance, because you never know what that could amount to. It was a similar philosophy that led me to take the music gig last Friday, and it will certainly, at least I hope, continue to inform my decision-making. But the sort of half-chances that I want to talk about are of a less serious variety.

During the gig, which was for charity, there was to be an event where the audience would be encouraged to throw pound coins at a bottle of Baileys, with the nearest thrower winning the bottle. I was asked whether or not I would like to be in charge of this activity, which I turned down automatically, as the thought of actively having to corral the drunkest members of the audience was not one I relished. As I thought it over by myself, however, I realised that I had to be involved in it. My childhood enjoyment of commentary kicked in and I suggested that both I and the organiser should run the event, and commentate on the throws. I thought this would be a weird and enjoyable experience, which it was, but foremost in my mind was the prospect of doing the radio show the next day and declaring that I commentated on a game where drunk people threw pound coins at a bottle of Baileys. And I was paid for it. I was quite surprised as I asked for each new competitors name, how docile their reactions were. It took me by surprise that simply having a microphone, and having already been on probably helped, put me as quite a figure of authority. The reactions I received were the reactions of people who were speaking to someone who knew what they were doing, while I was, at that point, massively winging it. That, I suppose, is really the key to genuinely being in control. I was a lot calmer and more casual while performing on Friday, and I think that helped, I certainly enjoyed it more, and it felt less like a recitation and more conversational.

The whole ethos of saying yes and going for silly things has probably seeped into our worldview in part thanks to Ray Peacock, who is a bastion of willfully daft eccentric behaviour. We haven't quite got to his level of not worrying about things, but I'd like to think we are on that path. I am using 'we' to refer to The ACRE, I am not being overly bombastic.

When I drove up to Dafydd's house to pick him up on Saturday, he was being accosted on the doorstep by two Jehovah's Witnesses. There're always two, a master and an apprentice. He flashed me a huge grin through the middle of them as I parked up, and he tells me that the belly laugh I let out at that point was audible to him. It later came out that he had been talking with them for quite awhile, keeping them talking because he knew I would turn up soon. It amused me all the more to know that he had indulged them at the door purely to amuse himself and me, which in itself, for me, was more amusing and noteworthy than being accosted by the religious in the first place.

I hope we can keep true to this silliness and open-minded indulgence of the unusual, those two very small occurrences brightened up my weekend no end.

the end.

Weekend Round-Up

From this weekend's experience it seems that only doing a Saturday show is a very good decision. We were really up for it, and I think it was one of the most solid shows we've done for ages.

Similarly, having the Sunday completely free to loll around being lazy and spending the entire day simply reading was an immensely enjoyable thing.

Last Friday there were several odd events that I didn't write about as I was planning on talking about them on the radio, so I'll do a quick recap of them now.

I have a standup routine about how I am unable to deal with kids, and given that I work in a room full of them everyday, its probably surprising how seldom new bits get added to that routine. The routine is set up as combating the 'kids say the funniest things' attitude, as in my experience their utterances tend to be on the highly annoying/brain numbing spectrum. Last Friday, however, I witnessed a kid saying something which amused me, and I decided I would commandeer this comment for my own comedic ends. When I actually got on stage, however, I forgot to add it in, so I'll tell it here instead.

I was in the toilet, washing my hands (in the sink hur hur hur), and a kid came in and asked me whether I had seen his friend. I indicated to him that I was in the toilet, and therefore had seen no one. He quickly understood his foolishness, but decided to awkwardly stay in the toilet regardless. He stood right up against the sink, staying there even when I moved away to dry my hands, so I commented that he must be very fond of the sink. He replied: "Yeah, it's my brother-in-law". While this isn't incisively hilarious, it was quite the surreal swerve ball, and I was quite amused. And then I kicked him out. Kicking out is the only language they understand. Apart from English. And some of them speak Welsh as well.

It was a fairly unconventional gig for me on Friday, I was originally meant to be compering a music gig, but it panned out so that I was actually doing two five-minute spots in between the bands. It went quite well, although the second set suffered because of the drunkenness of the audience and the state of shouty-excitement they had been whipped into in the meantime. It is possibly my failing that I couldn't win them around the second time, but instead I opted to call my set short and bring on the last band early. I think it was a correct decision.

After the first bit I fled the room. I was there completely on my own, so I figured it would be slightly weird to tag on to the end of a table after having just been on, so I escaped to the main bar. Whilst I thought I had secluded myself in an alcove, I had in fact sat myself right in front of the main door, so every single smoker in the crowd filed past me during this time. Most just passed through, though some stopped briefly and said "that was funny", which was really nice. I think it's probably par for the course that the comments I will remember will either be the negative or the boggling ones. Luckily I've not had any explicitly negative comments as of yet, and one of Friday's feedbacks is easily the most boggling.

A slight man, probably in his late teens, came up to me, looking slightly bedraggled and bemused. I haven't much experience of conversation with people on drugs, so this was quite easily the most stoned I have ever seen a person, but I would hazard a guess that he was very fucking stoned indeed. His opening gambit was: "Heeeeeeeeeeey! Mister Comedian!". It was an example of, literally, high camp, and I really wasn't expecting it as I attempted to cool down with a glass of water. I laughed in his face, which he seemed to enjoy. He followed this up with: "Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeey! Bill Hicks!". As I look back on it, I wish I'd replied: "I think you've mistaken me for somebody else", but in the moment I replied: "Yes, he is a comedian". He then asked me about Ricky Gervais and the IT Crowd, before admitting that he would say something about the set I had just done, but that he was so stoned it went over his head. I think I like the fact that he didn't engage in any way with the act, but felt it was necessary to come up and talk to me. I say 'I think I like it', because I am not really sure. It did amuse me. If I shamelessly morphed comments that people had given me after gigs together, I could describe my act as being 'a borderline surreal, byzantine and labyrinthine Bill Hicks'. Which sounds amazing, and anyone who'd want to see my act on the strength of that description would be incredibly disappointed.

I was very pleased after the gig, and this carried over into Saturday, and hopefully into the shows. The show after ours (3-5pm) is presented by a group known facetiously as ACRE Jr, made up as it is of younger siblings of 2 of the ACREs. BUT WHICH ONES!?

It was the birthday of one of the ACRE Jrs, so I celebrated by manhandling him off the windowsill (but what was he doing there!?) carrying him on my shoulders in a reverse torture rack position, before 'eliminating' him over the top of a settee. I did this not by, as is conventional, dumping him off my shoulders, but by throwing myself bodily over the settee, still carrying him there. We ended in a crumpled explosion on the floor, stuck upside down because our arms were entangled. I then later forced him to play an Arthur Isherwood track, the medley 'Happy Birthday/One Year Closer (To the Grave)'. The track begins as a grizzled tearjerker over the top of plinky old-school piano, complete with buzzing vinyl pops, but then morphs into contemporary death metal, eventually including more experimental death-ska. It is painfully disparate and chaotic, especially at the ridiculous volume we played it in the studio. I capped this off by climbing on the desk, and adding the the screamed vocals 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY!' in studio. I felt it was appreciated. And just hated in general. (Appreci-hated, hahahaha, I got paid to tell jokes last week so shut up). That track can be downloaded from our website.

Here ends the entry.

Journal of Cannonby: Now I Know How Joan of Ark Felt

The title of this one has less relevance to the script than they usually do. I was listening to The Smiths as I was struggling for a title, because the story in this one was particularly all over the place, so no one thing could sum it all up. So I just wrote the lyric in. It makes about as much sense as the actual story.

The script was read/played by:

Narrator: Me

Cannonby: Dev Vhardi

Bevan: Me

Boris: Dafydd Evans

ZX Ilfracombe: Me

Doktor: Dev Vhardi

Nurse: Me

Vino: Dev Vhardi

Crimson Maude: Dafydd Evans

Hazel: Me

*****

Journal: The Remarkable Doings of Cannonby

Now I know how Joan of Ark felt

Narrator

Well, what do you want me to say? Nothing has really happened for the last month so it seems fairly unnecessary to do a recap, but I suppose I'd better had. Teal and Bludonna have been captured by the cannibalistic Priests of Vinehaven, and almost every other major character is amassed somewhere, still fairly lost within the dense forestry outside the hidden walls of the citadel. Doktor Li Faiseas and his able assistant Uh Nurse are tending to the weakened crew; Cannonby, Bevan and Boris. Of course there're limits to how far they can help ZX Ilfracombe, as the medics specialise in human biology, and are poorly equipped to tamper with the industrial exoskeleton that sheathes the human bits of ZX.

Boris: I am really concerned about the cyborg, he's fizzing and popping a bit. It was so long ago that I can't remember whether he was in the lagoon or not, but if he was that water couldn't have been good for him.

Cnby: (banging as though slapping ZX on the back) Nonsense! ZX is a sturdy piece of equipment! He's built like a behemoth! In the highlands where he was constructed they called him the Iron Giant. And with the added assistance of the spirit of Ivan Oleinme he is even capable of withstanding Ragnarok!

Bevan: I see you are staying true to last weeks promise of more Final Fantasy references.

Cnby: Tonberry King!

Boris: Jumbo Cactuar!

Bevan: Geezard!

Cnby: Wendigo!

Boris:

Bevan: Oh, bin bags.

Doktor: The desire to hit you is very tempting / Though I can understand what you are attempting / You are trying to really nail the Final Fantasy niche / but random references aren't funny, capiche?

Bevan: Well, we'll never know unless we try…

Boris: And it works for Family Guy.

Nurse: Well, it's causing our metallic patient to get quite stressed.

Doktor: And he's already in quite a mess / Better to just give it a rest.

Boris: I agree.

Bevan: Yes.

Boris: We have to plan how to rescue Bludonna and the freak.

Cnby: He is disgusting. I say leave them, they just get in the way and clog the script up with their needless dialogue.

Bevan: Oh Captain, what an awful thing to say. Bludonna and Teal get a tiny percentage of the dialogue, especially when compared to some of the lengthy diatribes you get.

Cnby: Well that's a load of hogwash! The characters who have the largest percentage of dialogue are probably you and Boris, or perhaps its been skewed in recent weeks by the ridiculously epic poems that the Doktor and Nurse seem to be performing on a weekly basis now. No, don't argue Bevan! And even if they don't actually say much, the plotlines seem to focus extensively on Bludonna and Teal. It's ridiculous, this story is called CANNONBY, that's me! I am the Captain, how have I become marginalised in my own tale!?

Bevan: Well maybe we'd trust you with these lengthier pieces more often if we felt we could trust you to read them out properly.

Cnby: It's hardly my fault that I am played by a steady stream of varying guests every week. None of them get the experience that is needed to read the script successfully. The production of this show is shambolic, and I refuse to be held responsible for the messing of my own lines.

Boris: You should, you are to blame.

Cnby: Which wristwatches are swiss wristwatches?

Bevan: Exactly.

Doktor: Oh come on you lot, please! / You think fixing this robot is easy?

Nurse: Because it's not.

Doktor: We don't do this a lot. Now quiet down while we set to our work.

Nurse: You burkes.

Cnby: So I'm guessing we have to save those idiots then.

Bevan: Yes, definitely.

Boris: But how?

Bevan: Well didn't the good Doktor say last week that he had once been one of the priests? Surely he'll know some hidden way into the….

Cnby: (interrupting loudly) I say we burst in through the main gate and cause hell!

Bevan: Um, I'd really rather not.

Boris: No, that sounds stupid.

Cnby: Nonsense! We've got ZX Ilfracombe with an Ivan power-up, what could possibly go wrong? He has a blunderbuss for a groin!

Nurse: You should reconsider that tactic before it is too late.

Doktor: This ZX is in no fit state, to be fighting.

Bevan: They're right Captain.

Cnby: Ha! To nonsense with you, ZX, come on, up you get. We're going to kick some priestly buttocks.

ZX: Priest. Buttock.

Cnby: See, he's fine. Onward!

Bevan: No Captain, come back.

Boris: He is such an idiothole.

Doktor: He is gung-ho to the point of perversion / But his assault will at least cause a diversion / Let those three go on their merry way / We'll sneak in and save the day.

Nurse: Through the old passageway?

Doktor: That would seem the more sensible way.

Boris: Hip-hip-hooray.

Narrator

But are these flippant celebrations too early, just what does await our heroes inside the insides of the Haven of Vines?

Vino: (Shouting) Hazel! Take the prisoners to the dungeon, hand them over to Crimson Maude.

Hazel: Yes, Miss Mellencamp.

Vino: What an ugly twosome they are. A seal-headed freak and a hideous madwoman. They taint our beautific citadel with their festering presence.

Hazel: Yes, Miss Mellencamp.

Vino: This citadel that I, Mellencamp Vino, have slaved over for many years to beautify. It's not easy being the Head Priest of Vinehaven, Hazel, not easy at all. But I love beauty, and I live to beautify.

Hazel: Yes, Miss Mellencamp.

Maude: A lovely piece of exposition from you there Head Priest Vino.

Vino: Thank you Crimson Maude; head of torture and wine fermenting. What brings you from your hallowed dungeon?

Maude: I got sick waiting for the new batch of grapes you've got for me. Hoo-hoo-hargh! What beautifuls grapes we've got ourselves ere! A grizzled little lady and a mans with an oct-ur-narwahol for a head! Wonderful wonderful! Should get us some gnarly wines from these-uns!

Vino: Splendiferous! Hazel, set the goblets, tonight we drink deeply of the blood of fools!

Hazel: Yes, Miss Mellencamp.

Vino, Hazel and Maude all laugh manically.

Narrator

Skies above! What nefarious plans the clearly evil trio have upon Teal and Bludonna. Mellencamp Vino, Crimson Maude and Hazel Sick are clearly experienced in the process of abduction and wineification. I am appalled. Cannibalism is still cannibalism even if you are using goblets instead of cans. Gobletbalism. Will the efforts of Cannonby, Carmarthen Bevan and ZX be in vain? Can the sneaking tactic of Li Faiseas, Boris and Uh Nurse succeed? Will we ever hear Teal's plaintive bark again? Return to us on the flipside, and we'll discover the answers together, as we follow these tales of Cannonby!

*****

Didn't think I'd manage this weekend's Cannonby. It has been a slog to translate and no mistake. Skies above!

If you appreciate the effort, let us know:

acrecomedy@gmail.com or @adamgilder for tweeting business.

Fanks like.