HeadSpill

The Manchester Comedy Festival kicks off this week and I’m not in it because I missed the deadline and didn’t get a venue for my show sorted. Event’s have a funny way of conspiring though, and as it happens the Literature festival runs on exactly the same dates, and I’m doing two things for that, and even have my face in the brochure for the Poetry Slam Final that I’m mc’ing at the Northern Pub. During the fest I’ll be compering a Doctor Who convention (see previous post) on Saturday and doing the late night Asylum next Wednesday. As well as that I’ve got a whole new night kicking off in November, ‘Northern Humour‘, a sunday new material/character/wacky stuff night in the Northern Pub which promises to be proper fun.

The fest appears to be a lot more low key than in previous years, which is a bit of a shame for something that really needs to be as in-yer-face as it possibly can. With no sponsership this year it’s hard to can as much exposure when all the work being done to promote it is more or less being donated by the organisers. Hopefully next year it will be bigger, but that’ll only happen if more people get behind it, promoters and comics alike.

I did my first Leeds tryout at Jongleurs last week, and if I’m honest a previous week of no gigs made me rusty when I needed to be ‘gig fit’. It’s a tough gig at the best of times, and worse if you’re in comedy for the art. This was swiftly rectified the next night when I did my first gig in a Jewish synagogue doing a half hour for the Jewish new year. Not the easiest of crowds either, but a good few of them recognised me from the comedysportz gig the previous week at the Comedy Store, which made the whole thing immediately more enjoyable. Someone commented on my big nose. Racist.

I got to meet one of my all time heroes this week too. Neil Innes, he of the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah band, at Bury Met. He’d didn’t play as much Bonzo’s as I’d like, but then I’m sure he’s pig sick of playing the same requests all the time. I was in proper fan mode and got my 40th anniversary bonzos tour t-shirt signed.

September has been incredibly quiet for gigs, almost like Edinburgh didn’t happen, my poor little ego going unloved and feeling sorry for itself. There’s a shedload in the pipeline fortunetly, including a return to the glorious Edinburgh stand in late october and a Darlington run out for my show in November.