Oooh, doesn't this look all nice?
Showing posts with label stand-up. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stand-up. Show all posts
Wednesday, 17 November 2010
Monday, 8 November 2010
bAdvertising
I figured I should finally write a little something here to commemorate the fact that come the end of this month, we of The ACRE will be celebrating our first live show. We've done live stuff before, in our ones and twos, but this will be the first time we've collectively written an hour's show and will be performing it off our own impetus.
All the live work I've done before has comprised of doing a turn at someone else's night, on a bill of acts unrelated to me. I'm finding it considerably more daunting to be putting on a night of which the main attraction is meant to be us. My relationship with the Facebook event page is best described as neurotic, "What do you mean you aren't attending, Person-I-Vaguely-Knew-in-School!? You fucking cock!" etc.
And on the other side of things the fact that there are actually confirmed attendees fills me with dread when I am holding a 10 minute script which is meant to be exactly 6 times longer within 3 weeks. It will be. I am going to write the hilarious fuck out of that script. When I'm done with it it won't even know it was born.
Yes, yes, self-indulgent passive-aggression, we get it. What is it about?
The show is cleverly hurriedly cleverly called bAdvertising, which is 1) concise, 2) amusing, 3) a clever play on the iProduct way of naming things and also 4) sums up our basic stance that it is bad.
We're running it in the Gartholwg Lifelong Learning Centre, so we are writing it as a mock adult learning course, which is apt, and is a conceit we hope will cover any sticky spots in the script ("Hay, this bit is educational, that's why you aren't laughing!").
There will be at least 1 actual joke.
I suppose I am documenting this here for posterity and to placate my own worry that though I am not specifically writing the show at this point, I am at least doing show-related work.
On the off-chance that you, the hypothetical person reading this, is within reasonable distance and of a desire to come and see it, all the details can be found here.
Now, I am going to pull a pad and pen out and actually write for it.
"Knock knock". "Who's there?" "Advertising." "Advertising who?" "".
Saturday, 15 May 2010
Late Night Gig Update
Hello everyone, I felt it was my duty to provide feedback and closure on the gig tonight, as I made such a fuss over it.
It went very well, it was a seated crowd so that didn't cause an issue. Luckily, I was introduced with such vigour that the chatting subsided and most people were paying attention when I started, which meant I didn't have to battle to get attention.
I tried a lot of new jokes, as well as finding a use for the pink trilby I bought in Bristol oh so long ago, and also reading some poems. I am very much enjoying spreading myself out creatively. The specific material I did about the charity worked quite well, which is heartening. Its the only time I'll ever do it I imagine, but nice to know that one off writing can still pay dividends.
The bands were amazing, I ran out of the room to hide during Tiger Please, because I knew I had to go back on, so I had to stay in the zone like Ken Shamrock. It was an acoustic set from their guitarist and their singer, with a lot of covers but plenty of their own stuff as well. I am currently listening to their Seasons EP, which is outstandingly accomplished given how young they are. The singer does not look as if he could possibly house the voice he has, and he was lovely when I met him afterwards. I hope they become as massive as they look like they will become, if only so I can have a handy, but lame, claim to fame story.
Magden Audio, the members of which had organised and run the night where worse for wear for drink when they took to the stage, but their barefaced apologies when they messed up amused me greatly. They hit their stride after a few cockups and the energetic headbanging that followed is more tribute to their performance than any sentence of mine could be. They were awesome.
I will likely share some interesting tales from what happened in my next entry, I'll be talking about it on the radio I imagine, though some of it isn't suitable.
I trust you are doing magnificently.
Pip pip.
Also, I got paid £20 for my clowning, I do believe this means that I have 'made it'.
Tuesday, 4 May 2010
My Sketchy Bank Holiyesterday
Since yesterday was a day where the banks were on holiday (hence; Bank Holiday = ETYMOLOGYTASTIC!?) both myself and my ACREmpatriots spent the day playing with creative equipment, attempting to bash out some more sketches to showcase on our youtube channel.
Sometimes our slapdash, last-minute approach to sketch writing makes me slightly nervous as to whether or not certain ideas will be funny or not. These nerves are further compounded by the knowledge that if we got a sketch filmed, we would definitely put it out regardless. I think I should've learned to have faith in our funny bones by now.
I was ill in the run up to the filming day, so I wasn't bringing any ideas to the meeting, but luckily my dearth of new ideas didn't spread to my ACREolleagues, who both brought funny nuggets that we spent the day nurturing.
The first idea we worked on, Sampson's, was a parody of old instructional videos. Sampson turned up in combat slacks, so the idea was to have a video helping a soldier reintegrate into society. This sketch will probably seem the most polished by the time we're done with it, because so much of it is done in the editing, specifically a patronising voice over and sound effects (cheesy ones). We observed that the extent to which the video was defined by props that came to hand was ridiculous, but delightful. The various 'steps' of how to reintegrate were almost completely informed by various items we found around the house we were filming in. Hopefully this won't come across as slapdash in the finished sketch, it is, however, meant to seem random. We were quite pleased with the flexibility of the way we film, and how we can adapt the sketch to implement these silly props, but in the end it all depends on how funny it looks. We edited the majority of it together, and we were still giggling by the end, so I suppose that augers well. The voiceover is still to do, and we're planning to release it tomorrow, the same time as the podcast. Fingers crossed.
The second idea was to do another mock-news report using my Benjamin Bold character, which I was quite pleased with. I am glad that we are happy and confident in suggesting that we integrate other members' characters into new ideas. The actual topic of the mock-report, however, would require filming in a variety of locations, and as daylight would likely abandon us mid-filming, we decided to put the sketch on the backburner, until we can plan it properly and dedicate an entire day to the filming. I doubt I'll wear the toothbrush moustache for Bold this time around, perhaps I will research other fascistic facial hair and have it on a rota-system for him.
So in the end we decided to film the third idea instead, which was a much simpler, straight sketch proposed by Dafydd. Writing and practising the sketch, which was just a conversation between the three of us, was reminiscent of the first time Sampson and I decided on the topics of our first material. Hard to believe that was over a year ago now, but it was heartening to realise that we are still committed and on the same path, knowing that the decision to get creative wasn't a flash-in-the-pan fad.
The three of us had a meal in The Billygoat's Gruff (pub anonymised) and workshopped turns of phrase for the sketch ad nauseam, until we had a huge list which we cherry-picked from. The assumption there is that we actually came up with some cherries, which, of course, you'll have to be the judge of. I had one single pint of cider with my meal, and devolved into something of a mess, which, as a young male, is something of an embarrasment. It would be very cheap for me if I become an alcoholic. We commandeered the function room upstairs, since Dafydd is an Ogreman at the Billygoat's Gruff (this changing the pub name lark is probably confusing) and so we had the run of the empty room. I had expected the room to be akin to the dingy pits which pass for function rooms in these parts, and so I was very pleasantly surprised. It was genuinely classy up there, which will hopefully add to the sketch, although when I took a preliminary glance at the footage it looked quite dark, so it may end up seeming quite moody and gritty, which will contrast (hopefully comedically) with the actual sketch.
The last sketch was the hardest to film, because it was quite late by this point, and we were all flagging slightly. Not wanting to name any names but Luke Samspon specifically proved a handful, with me and Dafydd having to coax him into action like children poking a spiderweb with a stick in order to rouse the spider. Luckily we all kicked into action eventually, though that episode may prove to be the point where the historians look back and nod sagely and declare that it was all a tragic inevitability.
If our comedy endeavors ever bear fruit commercially, I can envision a time when we will have to struggle with the rampant diva side of Sampson's personality. It'll get us some publicity I suppose.
I don't think I've played it up enough to be really ridiculous here, so the accusation that Sampson is a diva may sound like a real criticism. It isn't meant to be.
The funniest moments of the recording process, for us, often come when we mess up, which is why we put a blooper after every sketch. Quite innocuous things can seem substantially funnier because of the strained and contrived situation that filming/acting is. Because we are so aware of what is meant to happen and what is meant to be said, any deviation from this can be stupidly funny.
It takes us ages to film stuff, far longer than it probably should, because of how dedicated we are to trying to make each other laugh, rather than sacrificing the laugh in the moment to make sure the sketch gets filmed and is funny. It's a similar thing in the radio, when I would sneak hidden abusive messages to Dafydd in the playlist information to throw him off his game when introducing songs. When we were filming the conversational sketch in the function room, Sampson brought us out of our slump and injected energy into the proceedings using two novel methods which I will now outline.
In the first instance, he picked up a number of bar mats before flinging them individually, Gambit-style, across the room at his camera, each time repeating "Muh-fucka". Apparently, this was an impression of Ike Turner.
The second method was to give us a quick run-through of his 'Hitler's Mother Sketch', in which Hitler's mother is characterised as a loud, shrill, stereotypical New Yorker Jewish woman, which is both reductive, xenophobic and mesmerising in equal measure. It is impossible to not get swept up in the passion of the performance, in which Hitler's Mother offers him advice as though shouting up the stairs to her reclusive son, advice such as; "You've got to get ayngree Aydolf, they won't listen to ya if you're not ayngree".
I'm not sure yet which of those will appear at the end of the sketch, 'Hitler's Mother' is hilarious, but possibly offensive. I am uncertain how easily misconstrued that performance would be. We'll see how it looks in the recording.
In other 'me-being-involved-in-comedy-on-youtube' news, the video roundup on the Welsh Unsinged Standup Act (WUSA) Competition from my heat is up now, with me alphabetically placed at the beginning of the video, which is handy for people who want to see me in it (which is everyone, I am the king). My set was edited so that the very beginning and the very end appear on the video, which is interesting because it's a mix of my oldest jokes and brand new stuff I'd only tried that night, and the rude bits from the middle are gone, which means I can show it to my mother. Which is nice.
That video can be found here.
We should be releasing a new podcast and the sketch tomorrow, in which case I will be plugging away to my gut's distress, so keep your bananas peeled for that.
I hope you have a pleasant evening.
@adamgilder
acrecomedy@googlemail.com
www.theacre.net
Sometimes our slapdash, last-minute approach to sketch writing makes me slightly nervous as to whether or not certain ideas will be funny or not. These nerves are further compounded by the knowledge that if we got a sketch filmed, we would definitely put it out regardless. I think I should've learned to have faith in our funny bones by now.
I was ill in the run up to the filming day, so I wasn't bringing any ideas to the meeting, but luckily my dearth of new ideas didn't spread to my ACREolleagues, who both brought funny nuggets that we spent the day nurturing.
The first idea we worked on, Sampson's, was a parody of old instructional videos. Sampson turned up in combat slacks, so the idea was to have a video helping a soldier reintegrate into society. This sketch will probably seem the most polished by the time we're done with it, because so much of it is done in the editing, specifically a patronising voice over and sound effects (cheesy ones). We observed that the extent to which the video was defined by props that came to hand was ridiculous, but delightful. The various 'steps' of how to reintegrate were almost completely informed by various items we found around the house we were filming in. Hopefully this won't come across as slapdash in the finished sketch, it is, however, meant to seem random. We were quite pleased with the flexibility of the way we film, and how we can adapt the sketch to implement these silly props, but in the end it all depends on how funny it looks. We edited the majority of it together, and we were still giggling by the end, so I suppose that augers well. The voiceover is still to do, and we're planning to release it tomorrow, the same time as the podcast. Fingers crossed.
The second idea was to do another mock-news report using my Benjamin Bold character, which I was quite pleased with. I am glad that we are happy and confident in suggesting that we integrate other members' characters into new ideas. The actual topic of the mock-report, however, would require filming in a variety of locations, and as daylight would likely abandon us mid-filming, we decided to put the sketch on the backburner, until we can plan it properly and dedicate an entire day to the filming. I doubt I'll wear the toothbrush moustache for Bold this time around, perhaps I will research other fascistic facial hair and have it on a rota-system for him.
So in the end we decided to film the third idea instead, which was a much simpler, straight sketch proposed by Dafydd. Writing and practising the sketch, which was just a conversation between the three of us, was reminiscent of the first time Sampson and I decided on the topics of our first material. Hard to believe that was over a year ago now, but it was heartening to realise that we are still committed and on the same path, knowing that the decision to get creative wasn't a flash-in-the-pan fad.
The three of us had a meal in The Billygoat's Gruff (pub anonymised) and workshopped turns of phrase for the sketch ad nauseam, until we had a huge list which we cherry-picked from. The assumption there is that we actually came up with some cherries, which, of course, you'll have to be the judge of. I had one single pint of cider with my meal, and devolved into something of a mess, which, as a young male, is something of an embarrasment. It would be very cheap for me if I become an alcoholic. We commandeered the function room upstairs, since Dafydd is an Ogreman at the Billygoat's Gruff (this changing the pub name lark is probably confusing) and so we had the run of the empty room. I had expected the room to be akin to the dingy pits which pass for function rooms in these parts, and so I was very pleasantly surprised. It was genuinely classy up there, which will hopefully add to the sketch, although when I took a preliminary glance at the footage it looked quite dark, so it may end up seeming quite moody and gritty, which will contrast (hopefully comedically) with the actual sketch.
The last sketch was the hardest to film, because it was quite late by this point, and we were all flagging slightly. Not wanting to name any names but Luke Samspon specifically proved a handful, with me and Dafydd having to coax him into action like children poking a spiderweb with a stick in order to rouse the spider. Luckily we all kicked into action eventually, though that episode may prove to be the point where the historians look back and nod sagely and declare that it was all a tragic inevitability.
If our comedy endeavors ever bear fruit commercially, I can envision a time when we will have to struggle with the rampant diva side of Sampson's personality. It'll get us some publicity I suppose.
I don't think I've played it up enough to be really ridiculous here, so the accusation that Sampson is a diva may sound like a real criticism. It isn't meant to be.
The funniest moments of the recording process, for us, often come when we mess up, which is why we put a blooper after every sketch. Quite innocuous things can seem substantially funnier because of the strained and contrived situation that filming/acting is. Because we are so aware of what is meant to happen and what is meant to be said, any deviation from this can be stupidly funny.
It takes us ages to film stuff, far longer than it probably should, because of how dedicated we are to trying to make each other laugh, rather than sacrificing the laugh in the moment to make sure the sketch gets filmed and is funny. It's a similar thing in the radio, when I would sneak hidden abusive messages to Dafydd in the playlist information to throw him off his game when introducing songs. When we were filming the conversational sketch in the function room, Sampson brought us out of our slump and injected energy into the proceedings using two novel methods which I will now outline.
In the first instance, he picked up a number of bar mats before flinging them individually, Gambit-style, across the room at his camera, each time repeating "Muh-fucka". Apparently, this was an impression of Ike Turner.
The second method was to give us a quick run-through of his 'Hitler's Mother Sketch', in which Hitler's mother is characterised as a loud, shrill, stereotypical New Yorker Jewish woman, which is both reductive, xenophobic and mesmerising in equal measure. It is impossible to not get swept up in the passion of the performance, in which Hitler's Mother offers him advice as though shouting up the stairs to her reclusive son, advice such as; "You've got to get ayngree Aydolf, they won't listen to ya if you're not ayngree".
I'm not sure yet which of those will appear at the end of the sketch, 'Hitler's Mother' is hilarious, but possibly offensive. I am uncertain how easily misconstrued that performance would be. We'll see how it looks in the recording.
In other 'me-being-involved-in-comedy-on-youtube' news, the video roundup on the Welsh Unsinged Standup Act (WUSA) Competition from my heat is up now, with me alphabetically placed at the beginning of the video, which is handy for people who want to see me in it (which is everyone, I am the king). My set was edited so that the very beginning and the very end appear on the video, which is interesting because it's a mix of my oldest jokes and brand new stuff I'd only tried that night, and the rude bits from the middle are gone, which means I can show it to my mother. Which is nice.
That video can be found here.
We should be releasing a new podcast and the sketch tomorrow, in which case I will be plugging away to my gut's distress, so keep your bananas peeled for that.
I hope you have a pleasant evening.
@adamgilder
acrecomedy@googlemail.com
www.theacre.net
Thursday, 29 April 2010
Yep, It's Still Shining
I probably shouldn't have left it so that my post last week didn't have a conclusion, that was slightly inconsiderate of me. It's the sort of thing that would annoy me as a reader. So my apologies.
The gig went quite well, I did eventually get gonged off because instead of telling jokes I floundered and repeatedly called god a cunt, but in doing so I raised £4 for charity, so maybe there is a god after all. But he is definitely a cunt.
I was able to try out my new story, which was an excellent opportunity as I was then confident enough in it to use on Monday, where I took part in the second heat of the Welsh Unsigned Standup Act competition, which I did really well in, I am through to the semis. I will need to pull my socks up a bit if I want to have any sort of chance in the next round, which is in July.
I think all the fussing and second-guessing that happened last week was definitely worth it, as stressful as it was at the time. It is a process I think I'll have to go through for all new material, just to be certain that I have enough of a grasp on it, although I am hoping that as time goes on the chances of completely blanking like I did in Neath will fall away, eventually becoming 0. I suppose the more material you have the more there is to call upon should things go belly-up. Similarly, the more confident you get as time goes on, the more you'd be able to confidently cover and fill without feeling as though things will crash if you veer from material. Throughout this paragraph I have slowly replaced the term 'I' with the term 'you', I don't know whether this illustrates that my comments are just baseless hypothetical conjecture or whether it's just a trick to distance myself from my own comments.
I automatically use 'you' where I mean 'I' a lot, and it annoys me. It's linguistic trickery, where I remove my agency from the comments, so that it sounds hypothetical and passive, rather than sounding as though it directly involves or represents my opinions.
A little bit of meta-linguistic introspection for you all there, I can only imagine that you are all fascinated and delighted with it.
In only slightly less solipsistic news, we've been slogging away on the sketches, with Hard Reset now joining Just Another Minute on our youtube channel. The feedback we've received has been positive which is great, but I am bracing myself for the eventual, inevitable swathe of 'epic emo gay faggot'-style bile which I figure washes everywhere in the turgid typhoon which is the internet.
When it comes I will say to them (herein referred to as 'The Haters):
Do you know who I am!? I am a Semi-Finalist.
Yes indeed, that'll give them pause for thought.
The gig went quite well, I did eventually get gonged off because instead of telling jokes I floundered and repeatedly called god a cunt, but in doing so I raised £4 for charity, so maybe there is a god after all. But he is definitely a cunt.
I was able to try out my new story, which was an excellent opportunity as I was then confident enough in it to use on Monday, where I took part in the second heat of the Welsh Unsigned Standup Act competition, which I did really well in, I am through to the semis. I will need to pull my socks up a bit if I want to have any sort of chance in the next round, which is in July.
I think all the fussing and second-guessing that happened last week was definitely worth it, as stressful as it was at the time. It is a process I think I'll have to go through for all new material, just to be certain that I have enough of a grasp on it, although I am hoping that as time goes on the chances of completely blanking like I did in Neath will fall away, eventually becoming 0. I suppose the more material you have the more there is to call upon should things go belly-up. Similarly, the more confident you get as time goes on, the more you'd be able to confidently cover and fill without feeling as though things will crash if you veer from material. Throughout this paragraph I have slowly replaced the term 'I' with the term 'you', I don't know whether this illustrates that my comments are just baseless hypothetical conjecture or whether it's just a trick to distance myself from my own comments.
I automatically use 'you' where I mean 'I' a lot, and it annoys me. It's linguistic trickery, where I remove my agency from the comments, so that it sounds hypothetical and passive, rather than sounding as though it directly involves or represents my opinions.
A little bit of meta-linguistic introspection for you all there, I can only imagine that you are all fascinated and delighted with it.
In only slightly less solipsistic news, we've been slogging away on the sketches, with Hard Reset now joining Just Another Minute on our youtube channel. The feedback we've received has been positive which is great, but I am bracing myself for the eventual, inevitable swathe of 'epic emo gay faggot'-style bile which I figure washes everywhere in the turgid typhoon which is the internet.
When it comes I will say to them (herein referred to as 'The Haters):
Do you know who I am!? I am a Semi-Finalist.
Yes indeed, that'll give them pause for thought.
Tuesday, 20 April 2010
The Sun Shines Out of Mine
My day today has been coloured by a constant niggling level of nerves, due to having a gig in Swansea tonight.
I've written new stuff to flesh out my set, and been occupying myself by running and re-running through the set in my head, recording it and replaying it to myself and making a bullet point list of the running order of it in a series of tedious attempts to remember it.
My all-in attitude to memorising this new stuff comes from having blanked completely during my last gig and being left on stage open-mouthed and silent, looking like a grade-a bellend, and no mistake.
I've reverted to my old tactic of attempting to mesh the material in a (perhaps somewhat contrived) narrative flow, so that it is less staggered, and therefore, in theory, easier to remember. It seems to be working so far, and actually outlining the blow-by-blow of the material (this is a pun given the nature of the set, so I will titter to myself) has helped no-end in committing it to memory. Of course all this blathering might be hugely premature, only time will tell. I also plan on putting the bullet points on my hand before I go on, which I've not done before, but I think it's necessary, I want at all costs to avoid the complete blank that happened before.
I am a lot happier with the new material than I was with the stuff I had planned to say before I blanked, which I think will also be a lot of help. Being genuinely enthused by the things you want to say is likely a much better catalyst than trying to remember a story that you think people are going to react badly to. I also hadn't learnt it well enough.
This entry has devolved quite quickly into anxious hypothesising, it is essentially the blogging equivalent of rubbing palms together or biting your fingernails.
So in a slight change of focus, I am quite awed by how difficult it must have been to attend far-flung nights without the aid of e-mail, satnav and google maps. I have a spot tonight in a bar which I've never visited, and despite this I not only know exactly where it is, thanks to google maps, I also know where I'm going to park, as well as being aware of several alternatives should those spaces be full.
I am very grateful for all this technology, if I had to potter around Swansea by myself looking for the venue on the night, I think I would be reduced to a gibbering nervous wreck. Even as it is I am not wholly comfortable with the process, I get infused with a mix of excitement, of feeling very grown up indeed, and then with an acute feeling of being very clearly outside my comfort zone, which probably isn't hugely conductive when I am attempting to remember a new story I plan on telling.
I'm sure the only answer is to heed the advice that the Pub Landlord would surely give, which is to SNAP OUT OF IT!
The gig tonight starts quite late, so I am confident that I'll get there with plenty of time to spare, and I will use the time beforehand wisely, running through my set like I should have done before, where instead I sat staring into the middle-distance like a vacant dolt. That's right, a dolt.
This blog is a burst of rampant solipsism, I must apologise. Hopefully it hasn't been too nauseating getting to see the view of the inside of my brain, which seems to be lodged squarely up my own arse.
This has been an exercise in releasing nervous energy, if it's not enough I will have to torture a kitten or something, who knows.
Expect a blow-by-blow post mortem of the gig tomorrow. Actually, don't.
I've written new stuff to flesh out my set, and been occupying myself by running and re-running through the set in my head, recording it and replaying it to myself and making a bullet point list of the running order of it in a series of tedious attempts to remember it.
My all-in attitude to memorising this new stuff comes from having blanked completely during my last gig and being left on stage open-mouthed and silent, looking like a grade-a bellend, and no mistake.
I've reverted to my old tactic of attempting to mesh the material in a (perhaps somewhat contrived) narrative flow, so that it is less staggered, and therefore, in theory, easier to remember. It seems to be working so far, and actually outlining the blow-by-blow of the material (this is a pun given the nature of the set, so I will titter to myself) has helped no-end in committing it to memory. Of course all this blathering might be hugely premature, only time will tell. I also plan on putting the bullet points on my hand before I go on, which I've not done before, but I think it's necessary, I want at all costs to avoid the complete blank that happened before.
I am a lot happier with the new material than I was with the stuff I had planned to say before I blanked, which I think will also be a lot of help. Being genuinely enthused by the things you want to say is likely a much better catalyst than trying to remember a story that you think people are going to react badly to. I also hadn't learnt it well enough.
This entry has devolved quite quickly into anxious hypothesising, it is essentially the blogging equivalent of rubbing palms together or biting your fingernails.
So in a slight change of focus, I am quite awed by how difficult it must have been to attend far-flung nights without the aid of e-mail, satnav and google maps. I have a spot tonight in a bar which I've never visited, and despite this I not only know exactly where it is, thanks to google maps, I also know where I'm going to park, as well as being aware of several alternatives should those spaces be full.
I am very grateful for all this technology, if I had to potter around Swansea by myself looking for the venue on the night, I think I would be reduced to a gibbering nervous wreck. Even as it is I am not wholly comfortable with the process, I get infused with a mix of excitement, of feeling very grown up indeed, and then with an acute feeling of being very clearly outside my comfort zone, which probably isn't hugely conductive when I am attempting to remember a new story I plan on telling.
I'm sure the only answer is to heed the advice that the Pub Landlord would surely give, which is to SNAP OUT OF IT!
The gig tonight starts quite late, so I am confident that I'll get there with plenty of time to spare, and I will use the time beforehand wisely, running through my set like I should have done before, where instead I sat staring into the middle-distance like a vacant dolt. That's right, a dolt.
This blog is a burst of rampant solipsism, I must apologise. Hopefully it hasn't been too nauseating getting to see the view of the inside of my brain, which seems to be lodged squarely up my own arse.
This has been an exercise in releasing nervous energy, if it's not enough I will have to torture a kitten or something, who knows.
Expect a blow-by-blow post mortem of the gig tomorrow. Actually, don't.
Tuesday, 8 December 2009
The Swirly-Eyed Snake of Trust
The blog community is so selfish. I log on, hoping to have something to read at any hour of the day, and it turns out that I am completely up to date on the blogger’s that interest me. This is utterly unacceptable. And so it has come to pass that I have to fill the void myself, though it is unlikely that I will be as surprised and enthused by my own writings.
Blogger, blog thyself!
And I begin by recycling.
I was asked earlier on today to explain, in detail, what I was doing on the 17th of November (2009). Now perhaps I am too trusting, or too self-involved, but I set about detailing it right away. I was actually surprised by how much information I was able to dredge up about what I’d been doing.
Using the resources at my command: twitter, blogspot, diary, e-mails, even amazon, I was able to reconstruct the day. This is what I sent:
*****
Hopefully this isn't over the top, but here we go.
Here is an approximate account of myself and my behaviour on 17th November, 2009.
I estimate that I woke possibly around 9 or 10 a.m. as I was able to have a lengthy bath (there is no other kind) cook food, and also edit a podcast. The house would have been empty bar me and the puppy, as my father would have been asleep, as he works nights, my mother in work, and my sister in school. Therefore it is likely that I would have spent some time in psychological battle with the dog, as he wasn't fully housetrained, and so given to bouts of inappropriately-located bowel expulsions and random acts of violence on his box and also the pig that used to be the doorstop before he killed it. As it was a Tuesday, I was likely editing the Sunday edition of the radio show I do with Dafydd and Luke, as I would have edited the Saturday one on the Monday. I know for certain I spent most of the early afternoon editing, as I have left twitter evidence for myself at twitter:
Editing is a long and arduous process. This is an ongoing lesson I am learning.
5:10 PM Nov 17th from web
I have checked my e-mails from that day, and it was the day I received Dafydd's stings and jingles which he recorded for the podcasts, which I must have been inserting into the recordings. I also received confirmation from Amazon for a purchase of a cowbell, which I bought as a secret santa for a colleague.
By the time I tweeted that, however, I would have been in work, as I would have left my house at 4:15PM in order to reach work before 5:00PM, when my shift starts. As it was a Tuesday I would have listened to Episode 6 of Richard Herring's podcast 'As It Occurs to Me' on the drive in to work.
In work I usually spend Tuesday researching 'Footballer or Religious Figure' for that weekend's radio shows, though whether I did so on this particular day is not certain. If I did I would have been on wikipedia researching Vicente Rodriguez Guillen, better known as Vicente, who plays for Valencia CF. I then researched Don Quixote in order to fabricate an untrue history for him. I then researched Mia Hamm and Ludmila Javorova for the Sunday version.
Another tweet from later the same day:
Trying to find subliminal messages in shower gel products I was frightened by the inclusion of the ingredient Sea Kelp. Seek Help.
7:49 PM Nov 17th from web
proves that I spent at least a portion of my time in the bath attempting to back up my theory that gender stereotyping in shower products is rife, as ingredients in the purple can include 'Enriching Jojoba and Passionflower' and the 'for men' equivalent includes 'Birch Bark and Sea Kelp'. A diary entry from the 16th notes that I was reading Kurt Vonnegut's 'Slaughterhouse 5' and it is likely I would have read this while in the bath.
I was likely in text correspondence with a friend throughout the day, as I usually am. I may have spent the night watching the iPlayer or 4oD, probably also discussing ideas for the radio, specifically the stings/jingles, with Dafydd on MSN.
I am actually surprised that I am able to piece so much of it together, though it is a pity I didn't keep a diary entry on the
day itself. Entries on the 16th and 20th gave me a rough idea of what sort of thing was going on.
I trust that you aren't going to use this information for evil.
Gilder
*****
I do worry that I am too trusting. I assumed that as the individual is an art student, the information will be used in that direction, which is more likely the case. Though if I am abducted and taken to a shady terrorist sleeper cell, we will all know who to blame. Osama Bin Laden.
I have a gig tonight and so I have to play around with new ideas so that I can incorporate them into an existing set without them feeling clunky and out-of-place. I am excited about trying them out. They are about elk, surreal labyrinths and Nick Griffin’s taste in music. I don’t particularly want to discuss Nick Griffin, as I’ll simply be adding to the reservoir that is that topic, but hopefully my take is sufficiently unique and concise to give a go.
No doubt I will fail to document on this blog whether or not the material went well, so we can all just assume that it did, and sit cross-legged on the floor in homage to my greatness.
Just like that.
Blogger, blog thyself!
And I begin by recycling.
I was asked earlier on today to explain, in detail, what I was doing on the 17th of November (2009). Now perhaps I am too trusting, or too self-involved, but I set about detailing it right away. I was actually surprised by how much information I was able to dredge up about what I’d been doing.
Using the resources at my command: twitter, blogspot, diary, e-mails, even amazon, I was able to reconstruct the day. This is what I sent:
*****
Hopefully this isn't over the top, but here we go.
Here is an approximate account of myself and my behaviour on 17th November, 2009.
I estimate that I woke possibly around 9 or 10 a.m. as I was able to have a lengthy bath (there is no other kind) cook food, and also edit a podcast. The house would have been empty bar me and the puppy, as my father would have been asleep, as he works nights, my mother in work, and my sister in school. Therefore it is likely that I would have spent some time in psychological battle with the dog, as he wasn't fully housetrained, and so given to bouts of inappropriately-located bowel expulsions and random acts of violence on his box and also the pig that used to be the doorstop before he killed it. As it was a Tuesday, I was likely editing the Sunday edition of the radio show I do with Dafydd and Luke, as I would have edited the Saturday one on the Monday. I know for certain I spent most of the early afternoon editing, as I have left twitter evidence for myself at twitter:
Editing is a long and arduous process. This is an ongoing lesson I am learning.
5:10 PM Nov 17th from web
I have checked my e-mails from that day, and it was the day I received Dafydd's stings and jingles which he recorded for the podcasts, which I must have been inserting into the recordings. I also received confirmation from Amazon for a purchase of a cowbell, which I bought as a secret santa for a colleague.
By the time I tweeted that, however, I would have been in work, as I would have left my house at 4:15PM in order to reach work before 5:00PM, when my shift starts. As it was a Tuesday I would have listened to Episode 6 of Richard Herring's podcast 'As It Occurs to Me' on the drive in to work.
In work I usually spend Tuesday researching 'Footballer or Religious Figure' for that weekend's radio shows, though whether I did so on this particular day is not certain. If I did I would have been on wikipedia researching Vicente Rodriguez Guillen, better known as Vicente, who plays for Valencia CF. I then researched Don Quixote in order to fabricate an untrue history for him. I then researched Mia Hamm and Ludmila Javorova for the Sunday version.
Another tweet from later the same day:
Trying to find subliminal messages in shower gel products I was frightened by the inclusion of the ingredient Sea Kelp. Seek Help.
7:49 PM Nov 17th from web
proves that I spent at least a portion of my time in the bath attempting to back up my theory that gender stereotyping in shower products is rife, as ingredients in the purple can include 'Enriching Jojoba and Passionflower' and the 'for men' equivalent includes 'Birch Bark and Sea Kelp'. A diary entry from the 16th notes that I was reading Kurt Vonnegut's 'Slaughterhouse 5' and it is likely I would have read this while in the bath.
I was likely in text correspondence with a friend throughout the day, as I usually am. I may have spent the night watching the iPlayer or 4oD, probably also discussing ideas for the radio, specifically the stings/jingles, with Dafydd on MSN.
I am actually surprised that I am able to piece so much of it together, though it is a pity I didn't keep a diary entry on the
day itself. Entries on the 16th and 20th gave me a rough idea of what sort of thing was going on.
I trust that you aren't going to use this information for evil.
Gilder
*****
I do worry that I am too trusting. I assumed that as the individual is an art student, the information will be used in that direction, which is more likely the case. Though if I am abducted and taken to a shady terrorist sleeper cell, we will all know who to blame. Osama Bin Laden.
I have a gig tonight and so I have to play around with new ideas so that I can incorporate them into an existing set without them feeling clunky and out-of-place. I am excited about trying them out. They are about elk, surreal labyrinths and Nick Griffin’s taste in music. I don’t particularly want to discuss Nick Griffin, as I’ll simply be adding to the reservoir that is that topic, but hopefully my take is sufficiently unique and concise to give a go.
No doubt I will fail to document on this blog whether or not the material went well, so we can all just assume that it did, and sit cross-legged on the floor in homage to my greatness.
Just like that.
Thursday, 8 October 2009
Here Is What I Have Been Doing In Far Too Much Detail
Busy, busy, busy. Ish.
Due to my few-hours afternoon job, I am usually free to lollop around and sleep through the morning every day, but it seems as though the fates have conspired to ensure that this week my mornings have been booked, forcing me out of my lazy stupor. Properly booked in as well, I have a diary and everything. And I wrote the stuff in there to be sure I remembered. I was proud of how grown up I am become but then I remembered that I turn 22 next week so perhaps my pride is more than slightly hubristic. I have far more of a tee-hee-hee mentality than my age can honestly justify. Although I have to counter that by saying I also have a streak of bleak cynicism also. This is now turning into a sell-yourself love ad, which is depressing for many reasons which I have no vested interest in pursuing.
My Monday morning enforced wake-up was due to more training I (and my broadcompadre) was undertaking in order to be fighting fit when the station goes live. I have chosen this phraseology as I enjoy the image of a radio station coming to life and rearing up like the Megazord, from off’ve the Power Rangers (Mighty Morphin’). I have a similar lexical imaginings when it comes to the line “The hills are alive” which conjures up visions of a golem terrorising Austrians, though this is ruined by the arrival of the line “with the sound of music”.
What I have learnt from my two radio training sessions is that people who are in the business of training are cruel people indeed. There is a definite method to the training process, which is to shock and frighten the trainees initially, and then eventually tell them they are great and their show will be brilliant. I resent this emotionally trying method, where the anally retentive radio schedule must be adhered to SIEG HEIL! but then also make sure to be yourself in the show, whilst not forgetting to cater for the community, and for god’s sake don’t forget to press the button when its time for the news and for god’s sake don’t say for god’s sake on the air because people complain more about blasphemy than swearing. Whether that last fact is true across the entire country I’m not sure, but it certainly is the case that in South Wales at least, the people with Ofcom on speed dial are the aged religious watchdogs, quick to do some stomping on any anti-religious broadcast. Jordi Cruijff! It is likely our show may not become a fast favourite among the religious contingent, as every pre-record so far contains off-hand bashing of christian rock (whose initial c was automatically capitalised, but I have gone back to make it lower case, because I am subversive as a U-boat).
My Tuesday was spent taking the puppy to the vet for routine jabs and flea spraying, where he was incredibly well behaved, and if I was a less staunchly serious individual I would describe his conduct as ‘brave’. I was later messed around by the clinic, who arranged an appointment for me to fill out some forms for criminal compensation, sat me in the waiting room, only to tell me 10 minutes later that the doctor wouldn’t be in today. Which I was pleased with, obviously. The meeting was rearranged for Wednesday, and the doctor was stand-offish and unnecessarily curt, harrumph. I am easily displeased.
Today I was awake in order to attend a corporate welcome, where I was reassured I was important, before I was able to grab as many free pens and key-rings as I clandestinely could, before slipping away without anyone noticing. Because I am important.
I was actually in something of a grump as I sat myself at an empty table, only to have the table sporadically and systematically fill up with each new arrival picking the seat furthest away from me. It was then that I fully realised that I can be quite inapproachable, decorated as I am with an intimidating beard and an automatic vacant grimace. The man stood behind the pensions stall seemed to appreciate my social awkwardness, just as I appreciated that he looked like a stretched Gordon Brown (stretched upwards) though I’m sure he realised my tenuous and superficial questioning about pensions was actually a wafer-thin premise to help myself to free pens. It takes a significant amount of social awkwardness to keep me away from free pens.
By my own introspective reckoning I am a social dualist, where, depending on my mood, I can be either Jekyll or Hyde. Although more accurately, I can be either extremely socially confident, or a complete hide-away. Last Friday I managed both within the space of a few hours.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to talk about it for fear of looking like a self-aggrandising hubristic tool, but I did an open spot in Cardiff, and it went really well. However it was a prime example of the awkwardness I am capable of.
The Chapter Arts Centre has been recently refurbished, but some sections of it are still being renovated, which is why there was a section just off the room where the comedy was being held that was pitched in complete darkness. After saying a stilted awkward hello to the organiser and noting to myself the good omen that was the opening strains of Desmond Dekker’s 007 (Shanty Town) drifting from the room, I retired to the dark place to wait, which must have looked like a creepy weirdo attempting to be tortured and artistic. It wasn’t. I felt as though since I hadn’t offered to help set up the room during the initial meeting, doing so now would look like a limp gesture, so I hid away. And instead of talking to other human beings, I decided to wait in the dark wrestling with my imagined faux pas. Or my faux-faux pas if you please.
Later I decided to loiter awkwardly just inside the door, where I failed to talk to Iszi Lawrence because the opening gambit that came to mind was “I follow you on twitter” and I decided it would be better just to look suspicious in the corner. Suspicious in the corner is a look, I discovered, I was born to wear, as my thought process of: “she’s tall, I wonder if she’s wearing heels, no she’s wearing two-tone shoes, two-tone shoes are cool, let’s look a the two-tone shoes for a bit” actually left me with a bowed head looking as though I was unashamedly ogling. I would like to take this opportunity to exclaim that I was not. I strive to do my level best never to ogle, and in situations where there are instances of ogling, there is always an abundance of shame.
When stood at the front of the room being funny, a situation where ogling is encouraged (hypocrisy), I was equally enthralled, although the compliment that you are at least as amusing/interesting as your shoes is probably not the sort of praise anyone wants. Some consolation can be taken in the fact that she is being compared to very engrossing shoes, and also in the fact that this entire mess of a paragraph exists only because I can’t find an interesting way to say: “Iszi Lawrence did some jokes, she was really funny”.
She mentioned her podcast at the end of her set (the self-publicising random insult!), which I was glad of because now I have 60+ episodes with which to block out the inane warblings of 11-year-olds choking each other. I think that was the exact reason those podcasts were recorded, and if at the end of my life I have created something that can be used in order to drown out children, then I will be able to donate my usable organs and have the rest of me cremated a happy corpse.
First prize for funny goes to Ben Partridge who doused himself violently with water in order to rouse a reticent crowd, stipulating that if they were unable to laugh at a sodden man, they wouldn’t laugh at anything. They laughed.
Also, my set went really well, did I mention that?
Due to my few-hours afternoon job, I am usually free to lollop around and sleep through the morning every day, but it seems as though the fates have conspired to ensure that this week my mornings have been booked, forcing me out of my lazy stupor. Properly booked in as well, I have a diary and everything. And I wrote the stuff in there to be sure I remembered. I was proud of how grown up I am become but then I remembered that I turn 22 next week so perhaps my pride is more than slightly hubristic. I have far more of a tee-hee-hee mentality than my age can honestly justify. Although I have to counter that by saying I also have a streak of bleak cynicism also. This is now turning into a sell-yourself love ad, which is depressing for many reasons which I have no vested interest in pursuing.
My Monday morning enforced wake-up was due to more training I (and my broadcompadre) was undertaking in order to be fighting fit when the station goes live. I have chosen this phraseology as I enjoy the image of a radio station coming to life and rearing up like the Megazord, from off’ve the Power Rangers (Mighty Morphin’). I have a similar lexical imaginings when it comes to the line “The hills are alive” which conjures up visions of a golem terrorising Austrians, though this is ruined by the arrival of the line “with the sound of music”.
What I have learnt from my two radio training sessions is that people who are in the business of training are cruel people indeed. There is a definite method to the training process, which is to shock and frighten the trainees initially, and then eventually tell them they are great and their show will be brilliant. I resent this emotionally trying method, where the anally retentive radio schedule must be adhered to SIEG HEIL! but then also make sure to be yourself in the show, whilst not forgetting to cater for the community, and for god’s sake don’t forget to press the button when its time for the news and for god’s sake don’t say for god’s sake on the air because people complain more about blasphemy than swearing. Whether that last fact is true across the entire country I’m not sure, but it certainly is the case that in South Wales at least, the people with Ofcom on speed dial are the aged religious watchdogs, quick to do some stomping on any anti-religious broadcast. Jordi Cruijff! It is likely our show may not become a fast favourite among the religious contingent, as every pre-record so far contains off-hand bashing of christian rock (whose initial c was automatically capitalised, but I have gone back to make it lower case, because I am subversive as a U-boat).
My Tuesday was spent taking the puppy to the vet for routine jabs and flea spraying, where he was incredibly well behaved, and if I was a less staunchly serious individual I would describe his conduct as ‘brave’. I was later messed around by the clinic, who arranged an appointment for me to fill out some forms for criminal compensation, sat me in the waiting room, only to tell me 10 minutes later that the doctor wouldn’t be in today. Which I was pleased with, obviously. The meeting was rearranged for Wednesday, and the doctor was stand-offish and unnecessarily curt, harrumph. I am easily displeased.
Today I was awake in order to attend a corporate welcome, where I was reassured I was important, before I was able to grab as many free pens and key-rings as I clandestinely could, before slipping away without anyone noticing. Because I am important.
I was actually in something of a grump as I sat myself at an empty table, only to have the table sporadically and systematically fill up with each new arrival picking the seat furthest away from me. It was then that I fully realised that I can be quite inapproachable, decorated as I am with an intimidating beard and an automatic vacant grimace. The man stood behind the pensions stall seemed to appreciate my social awkwardness, just as I appreciated that he looked like a stretched Gordon Brown (stretched upwards) though I’m sure he realised my tenuous and superficial questioning about pensions was actually a wafer-thin premise to help myself to free pens. It takes a significant amount of social awkwardness to keep me away from free pens.
By my own introspective reckoning I am a social dualist, where, depending on my mood, I can be either Jekyll or Hyde. Although more accurately, I can be either extremely socially confident, or a complete hide-away. Last Friday I managed both within the space of a few hours.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to talk about it for fear of looking like a self-aggrandising hubristic tool, but I did an open spot in Cardiff, and it went really well. However it was a prime example of the awkwardness I am capable of.
The Chapter Arts Centre has been recently refurbished, but some sections of it are still being renovated, which is why there was a section just off the room where the comedy was being held that was pitched in complete darkness. After saying a stilted awkward hello to the organiser and noting to myself the good omen that was the opening strains of Desmond Dekker’s 007 (Shanty Town) drifting from the room, I retired to the dark place to wait, which must have looked like a creepy weirdo attempting to be tortured and artistic. It wasn’t. I felt as though since I hadn’t offered to help set up the room during the initial meeting, doing so now would look like a limp gesture, so I hid away. And instead of talking to other human beings, I decided to wait in the dark wrestling with my imagined faux pas. Or my faux-faux pas if you please.
Later I decided to loiter awkwardly just inside the door, where I failed to talk to Iszi Lawrence because the opening gambit that came to mind was “I follow you on twitter” and I decided it would be better just to look suspicious in the corner. Suspicious in the corner is a look, I discovered, I was born to wear, as my thought process of: “she’s tall, I wonder if she’s wearing heels, no she’s wearing two-tone shoes, two-tone shoes are cool, let’s look a the two-tone shoes for a bit” actually left me with a bowed head looking as though I was unashamedly ogling. I would like to take this opportunity to exclaim that I was not. I strive to do my level best never to ogle, and in situations where there are instances of ogling, there is always an abundance of shame.
When stood at the front of the room being funny, a situation where ogling is encouraged (hypocrisy), I was equally enthralled, although the compliment that you are at least as amusing/interesting as your shoes is probably not the sort of praise anyone wants. Some consolation can be taken in the fact that she is being compared to very engrossing shoes, and also in the fact that this entire mess of a paragraph exists only because I can’t find an interesting way to say: “Iszi Lawrence did some jokes, she was really funny”.
She mentioned her podcast at the end of her set (the self-publicising random insult!), which I was glad of because now I have 60+ episodes with which to block out the inane warblings of 11-year-olds choking each other. I think that was the exact reason those podcasts were recorded, and if at the end of my life I have created something that can be used in order to drown out children, then I will be able to donate my usable organs and have the rest of me cremated a happy corpse.
First prize for funny goes to Ben Partridge who doused himself violently with water in order to rouse a reticent crowd, stipulating that if they were unable to laugh at a sodden man, they wouldn’t laugh at anything. They laughed.
Also, my set went really well, did I mention that?
Thursday, 10 September 2009
Pedestal to the Metal
Administrative bumph often means that genuine change takes a huge length of time to occur, and so a genuine overhaul is interesting news. One such overhaul occurred recently in Samoa, where they decided to change which side of the road they drive on. This has resulted in significant hilarity because some buses are no longer allowed to run because their doors are now on the wrong side of the bus, meaning that potential passengers would have to walk out into the middle of the road in order to board a bus. I say hilarity.
According the BBC article I’ve got this story from, the reason for this change was to enable Samoans to import cheaper automobiles from anywhere but America, because the left-hand drives they were having to buy beforehand were too expensive. Overlooking the poor arrangement of the previous sentence, I would like to express my interest that the change was made for business reasons. I think I should come clean and admit that I did believe I could make some humorous comment about this story, and have been proven wrong, rather than edit this piece out, however, I think it should be left in, as I am all for honesty and transparency in my blogging endeavour.
Another breaking story today, which I actually have something interesting to say about, was an article about the Beatles, who are a brand new band you probably haven’t heard of. The main thrust of the piece was that, in light of their entire back-catalogue being re-released in glorious mono, the journalist Stephen Robb asks why you aren’t allowed to dislike the Beatles.
“The Beatles seem to occupy a uniquely unassailable position in popular culture - everybody loves them. Don't they?” he asks.
He then discovers that there are indeed some people who hate the Beatles, or at the very least think they are overrated, which is of course such an easy thing to think due to them being so very highly rated. I was not alive when the Beatles ruled the world, nor did I listen to them seriously until fairly recently, and so I am of the opinion that they are ok. There are some songs I do not rate at all, but mostly they are enjoyable.
My interesting (we’ll see) point about the Beatles revolves around the first stand-up set I began performing with my friend (co-hopeful-comedian?) back around February, where a line about Pink not being the ‘rockstar’ she claims she is leads us to question what John Lennon would have made of Pink. Connoisseurs of the double act format will be aware that an extreme contrast between the two parties usually exists, and our act is no exception. Therefore the inquiry about John Lennon leads to my colleague brazenly declaring “John Lennon was an idiot”. Before we embarked on our comedy-attempts we thought there might be controversial lines in our sets, but to this day the only line that has been greeted with a sharp intake of breath and an “ooooh” has been the material on John Lennon. Bearing in mind this is roughly 30 years after he was killed, and the insult was merely “he’s an idiot” (followed by the declaration that “He thought he was a walrus”) is perhaps testimony to the pedestal he is held upon. Whether this is justified, which is the query of the original article, is of no interest to me, as long as I am able to enjoy Norwegian Wood (or not) at my own discretion. The Haruki Murakami novel which takes its name from that song, was the catalyst that made me investigate the Beatles seriously. If you are dying for some Norwegian Wood, I would suggest the novel before the song, unless you are strapped for time. My double act partner has a genuine dislike of the Beatles, the song ‘Octopus’ Garden’ especially, so if Stephen Robb is strapped for Beatles haters to interview, send him my way and I will patch him through.
Rather than disliking the metaphorical John Lennon Hero-Worship Plinth which hangs in the stratosphere in particular, I have a general dislike for putting anyone on a pedestal. When people are elevated to such a position where criticism of them is no longer tolerated, that is where ignorance begins.
I was recently watching clips of Robin Ince on YouTube, where I stumbled upon the commentary from a Ricky Gervais DVD (‘Politics’ I think) that had been uploaded. In the clips, Ricky chats with Robin, in what is either an amazingly fastidious act or evidence of the stunted mental growth somewhere within Ricky Gervais. It is the comment section which interested me most, as with most YouTube videos, as regardless of how good the content of the clip is, it is unavoidable that in the comment section, vacuous idiocy prevails.
I was surprised, then, to discover that actual thought was taking place in the comments below. One poster expressed that Ricky’s constant belittling of Robin was ridiculous, as Robin is a far better comedian. Further posts decried a number of comedians ‘better’ than Ricky Gervais, with particular focus on Stewart Lee. The problem with these arguments is that there are no clearly defined grounds of what a ‘comedian’ is and does, therefore arguing that one comedian is ‘better’ than another is always going to be a completely subjective process, which is why its important to explain what criteria you are judging them on. Of course a YouTube comment section possibly isn’t the place for that, whereas of course, I would argue a blog is (lucky you). An interesting poster simply inquired: “Stewart Lee better than Ricky Gervais, which planet are you on?”
I was intrigued that a comment on the famous video site would take the form of a riddle, thinking that slightly more information would have been welcome before it was necessary for me to answer accurately. With the small amount of knowledge available to me I tentatively answered: Earth.
I received Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle through the post today, which perhaps suggests that my opinion is going to be skewed, though I also own the stand-up DVDs of Ricky Gervais, meaning that I could make an informed decision, should I choose to do so. In terms of my personal preference, I believe that Stewart Lee and Robin Ince are better comedians that Ricky Gervais, regardless of how successful they are in purely monetary terms. I think the works of Stewart Lee and Robin Ince are more crafted and thoughtful than Gervais’, who often has dalliances with ‘dodgy’ topics, the actual aims of which I am uncertain of. When it comes to subjects which are likely to cause offence or leave people feeling awkward, it is important to understand the reason why the jokes are being made, the actual target of the jokes, and the message, and I sometimes feel that Gervais’ point is uncertain. This is of course my own personal reading of them, from one viewing, so it is completely possible that there is a justifiable point to the jokes.
The tone of the commenter, however, suggested that the quality of anything touched by Gervais was not to be questioned, purely on the quality of what has gone before. Which is, of course, rubbish. Each new offering has to be viewed on its own merits, and a mediocre, or rubbish, offering should not receive acclaim because The Office is good. When The Office first came out, I was slightly boggled by it, but I was likely too young to fully understand it, and so I am not really in any position to offer a credible view of it.
While I prefer a vast amount of comedians to Ricky Gervais, I am in no way saying he isn’t funny, and I do enjoy his work. I haven’t seen Extras, or any of the films he has worked on, nor have I heard the podcasts which has him crowned King of Podcasts, and to understand the phenomenon of his being held in such huge esteem, I would have to undertake a comprehensive study of its causes.
According the BBC article I’ve got this story from, the reason for this change was to enable Samoans to import cheaper automobiles from anywhere but America, because the left-hand drives they were having to buy beforehand were too expensive. Overlooking the poor arrangement of the previous sentence, I would like to express my interest that the change was made for business reasons. I think I should come clean and admit that I did believe I could make some humorous comment about this story, and have been proven wrong, rather than edit this piece out, however, I think it should be left in, as I am all for honesty and transparency in my blogging endeavour.
Another breaking story today, which I actually have something interesting to say about, was an article about the Beatles, who are a brand new band you probably haven’t heard of. The main thrust of the piece was that, in light of their entire back-catalogue being re-released in glorious mono, the journalist Stephen Robb asks why you aren’t allowed to dislike the Beatles.
“The Beatles seem to occupy a uniquely unassailable position in popular culture - everybody loves them. Don't they?” he asks.
He then discovers that there are indeed some people who hate the Beatles, or at the very least think they are overrated, which is of course such an easy thing to think due to them being so very highly rated. I was not alive when the Beatles ruled the world, nor did I listen to them seriously until fairly recently, and so I am of the opinion that they are ok. There are some songs I do not rate at all, but mostly they are enjoyable.
My interesting (we’ll see) point about the Beatles revolves around the first stand-up set I began performing with my friend (co-hopeful-comedian?) back around February, where a line about Pink not being the ‘rockstar’ she claims she is leads us to question what John Lennon would have made of Pink. Connoisseurs of the double act format will be aware that an extreme contrast between the two parties usually exists, and our act is no exception. Therefore the inquiry about John Lennon leads to my colleague brazenly declaring “John Lennon was an idiot”. Before we embarked on our comedy-attempts we thought there might be controversial lines in our sets, but to this day the only line that has been greeted with a sharp intake of breath and an “ooooh” has been the material on John Lennon. Bearing in mind this is roughly 30 years after he was killed, and the insult was merely “he’s an idiot” (followed by the declaration that “He thought he was a walrus”) is perhaps testimony to the pedestal he is held upon. Whether this is justified, which is the query of the original article, is of no interest to me, as long as I am able to enjoy Norwegian Wood (or not) at my own discretion. The Haruki Murakami novel which takes its name from that song, was the catalyst that made me investigate the Beatles seriously. If you are dying for some Norwegian Wood, I would suggest the novel before the song, unless you are strapped for time. My double act partner has a genuine dislike of the Beatles, the song ‘Octopus’ Garden’ especially, so if Stephen Robb is strapped for Beatles haters to interview, send him my way and I will patch him through.
Rather than disliking the metaphorical John Lennon Hero-Worship Plinth which hangs in the stratosphere in particular, I have a general dislike for putting anyone on a pedestal. When people are elevated to such a position where criticism of them is no longer tolerated, that is where ignorance begins.
I was recently watching clips of Robin Ince on YouTube, where I stumbled upon the commentary from a Ricky Gervais DVD (‘Politics’ I think) that had been uploaded. In the clips, Ricky chats with Robin, in what is either an amazingly fastidious act or evidence of the stunted mental growth somewhere within Ricky Gervais. It is the comment section which interested me most, as with most YouTube videos, as regardless of how good the content of the clip is, it is unavoidable that in the comment section, vacuous idiocy prevails.
I was surprised, then, to discover that actual thought was taking place in the comments below. One poster expressed that Ricky’s constant belittling of Robin was ridiculous, as Robin is a far better comedian. Further posts decried a number of comedians ‘better’ than Ricky Gervais, with particular focus on Stewart Lee. The problem with these arguments is that there are no clearly defined grounds of what a ‘comedian’ is and does, therefore arguing that one comedian is ‘better’ than another is always going to be a completely subjective process, which is why its important to explain what criteria you are judging them on. Of course a YouTube comment section possibly isn’t the place for that, whereas of course, I would argue a blog is (lucky you). An interesting poster simply inquired: “Stewart Lee better than Ricky Gervais, which planet are you on?”
I was intrigued that a comment on the famous video site would take the form of a riddle, thinking that slightly more information would have been welcome before it was necessary for me to answer accurately. With the small amount of knowledge available to me I tentatively answered: Earth.
I received Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle through the post today, which perhaps suggests that my opinion is going to be skewed, though I also own the stand-up DVDs of Ricky Gervais, meaning that I could make an informed decision, should I choose to do so. In terms of my personal preference, I believe that Stewart Lee and Robin Ince are better comedians that Ricky Gervais, regardless of how successful they are in purely monetary terms. I think the works of Stewart Lee and Robin Ince are more crafted and thoughtful than Gervais’, who often has dalliances with ‘dodgy’ topics, the actual aims of which I am uncertain of. When it comes to subjects which are likely to cause offence or leave people feeling awkward, it is important to understand the reason why the jokes are being made, the actual target of the jokes, and the message, and I sometimes feel that Gervais’ point is uncertain. This is of course my own personal reading of them, from one viewing, so it is completely possible that there is a justifiable point to the jokes.
The tone of the commenter, however, suggested that the quality of anything touched by Gervais was not to be questioned, purely on the quality of what has gone before. Which is, of course, rubbish. Each new offering has to be viewed on its own merits, and a mediocre, or rubbish, offering should not receive acclaim because The Office is good. When The Office first came out, I was slightly boggled by it, but I was likely too young to fully understand it, and so I am not really in any position to offer a credible view of it.
While I prefer a vast amount of comedians to Ricky Gervais, I am in no way saying he isn’t funny, and I do enjoy his work. I haven’t seen Extras, or any of the films he has worked on, nor have I heard the podcasts which has him crowned King of Podcasts, and to understand the phenomenon of his being held in such huge esteem, I would have to undertake a comprehensive study of its causes.
Monday, 7 September 2009
Voluntarily Volunteering Volunteering Observations
Volunteering is a strange process. Throughout the vast majority of my life I have not been a volunteering sort of person. In school I was often involved in a number of interesting extra curriculars, but this was always as the behest of teachers or friends. Since leaving Uni, however, I am attempting to buck this trend.
In order to have enough to write about, I am using the word ‘volunteer’ in a very broad sense. My first foray into the world of volunteering came when I was involved in giving University hopefuls a tour of the campus. Which I did once. In all truth this was not meant to be a volunteering program, I would have been paid for my efforts, but I did such an awful job of it I felt it would be wrong to chase up payment. There is an applicable saying referring to money and sense that I could apply to that anecdote, but I won’t. Though I have.
I am also broadening ‘volunteering’ to include comedy open spots, which I started seeking out earlier this year. These shouldn’t really be considered volunteering, as I very much wanted to do them, and arguably I was earning more in non-monetary terms than I was investing. I wonder whether open spots / open mic nights are officially considered voluntary work, although I am not inquisitive enough to do anything apart from include the query here.
In a more direct sense I will, in the near future, be volunteering for a local community radio station, but even this doesn’t quite fit the bill for me. Volunteering is usually portrayed in such a way as to seem like a burden and a hassle, but my experience of volunteering for the radio so far has been a joy, and genuinely exciting. For me, being involved in the workings of the station is less an unpaid use of my time, and more a fantastical romp through the airwaves, wondering quite how I have been allowed free reign to fill time between songs. Still, it hasn’t happened yet, fates may conspire against my radio aspirations. My comedy efforts have thrived thus far however, and I am fully confident that I will be equally competent in the radiographical sphere. Because I am a self-impressed hubristic eloquent yob.
It is interesting that I have the opportunity to discuss my understanding of volunteering to such a degree, as I am writing this whilst in work. Having run out of interesting (to me) BBC, Guardian and Chortle articles to peruse, I am forced to write my own words in order to pass the time. The responsibilities of my employed role require me to ensure the safety of computers, and the harmony of a cyber café. The dash of the ‘e’ in cyber café was placed there automatically by Word, I note this as it would be simply ghastly if the reader were to find within me a quantum of pretention.
My job of babysitting internet-browsing youths is particularly stress free at this point, as 4 kids playing Runescape are hardly ‘rowdy’ in any way shape of form. There are a group of my co-workers assembled in the corner of the room schmoozing, but instead of joining them and enjoying some rational human company I am compiling this facile correspondence to be flung haphazardly into the vacuum of the blogosphere. How deliciously futile.
A mixture of monitor-based-pain of the eye-area and a lack of sleep conspire to shroud the room in a foggy haze. Either that or a monitor has overheated in a Runescape based tragedy. I hope the second is the case and I am freed from the 20 minute minimalistic survival game until the end of my shift. On second thought I think I will wait it out.
I am now down to three children left under my scrutiny. Down to the final three. Who will win? You decide. The winner is Youssef Richards-Harrowby, whose name I have altered for security reasons.#
What this post proves is that my creativity is hampered by the potential for people to glance over my shoulder. Also sleep deprivation and lack of respect for the blog reading public.
I would end this post with a 'meh', but I hate that phrase with a passion akin to fury. 'Meh' is evidence of a lack of thought, and a lack of thought is the only truly evil action a human being can undertake. So why don't you 'ave a fink about dat den cleverpants?
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