HeadSpill

Day 5. Did a couple of extra pick up gigs before my show, one of which on an outdoor stage was cancelled due to the rain. My 7.15pm show goes on after PBH (Peter Buckley Hill) who runs the free finge and is doing a brilliantly shambolic show of how, at bus pass eligable age he has used said pass to get from London to Edinburgh, just using buses. PBH is a bit of a legend on the fringe, but today was his day off and taking his spot was the lovely Josie Long, which was top.

Went for drinks with Jas, Lee, The Peter Vincent, Karen, and Wendy Wason. The rain pissed it down, as it had all day and the bar we shored up in had a big rainbow flag outside and the full of only men. Longley joined us and I wanted to do picture stuff with nipples, but Jas pointed out it was a bad idea.

Had a review from Three Weeks, not for my show though, just a spot I did at Pear Shaped in the Afternoon (edited for effect): “Gems came from John Cooper, who read hilarious passages from his diary, … just go and see John Cooper “. Not bad.

Been a belting Fringe so far, and really loving the venue. The Free fringe may not be as slick the well established places like the stand, but it’s still far better than some of the big paid venue’s. Averaging about 25 peeps per show, and everyone who’s seen it is leaving with grins and praise. Today got my first crowd that consisted of those who’d picked up on the Eczema theme of the show, and it was the best show I’ve had. I’m loving the fringe. It’s not going to my head though, there’s always room for improvment, upping the gag rate, and I’m here to work. I closed ‘PBH and some comedians’ which was top, and have been picking up as many up extra gigs as possible.

On the second night I got a bit drunk and there’s a bit in the show about….well, come and see it, but I’ve been collecting as many flyers as possible with comics faces on, tearing the nose out and getting other comics to put their nipple in the hole and taking a photo.

I thought it was so funny I went and bought the domain www.nipplenose.co.uk. Maybe I’ll do a quiz on facebook when I get enough pictures, and people can play gues the nipple. Like I say Edinburgh hasn’t gone to my head.

The first show is in the bag.

Good for a first show, the drummer from dodgy reckons it was the best thing he’s seen. I’m guessing he meant in the context of ‘in Edinburgh’ and ‘today’. After the final two previews; late freewheeling in Liverpool and a very tight show at the lovely Wolverhampton little civic, the first show was nice and comfy, but still needs tweaking.

I was mistaken for Lee (Martin), today while dressed as Danny (Pensive), which was odd. I’m going to use this month research a sitcom called ‘Gigs’n'Digs’ about a happy go lucky comedian who lives with his agent.  Hilarity Ensues.

My first preview show went well, still needs a lot of work, but to be honest I more impressed myself driving slap bang through through the centre of London. Stopping at some lights I looked to my left to see big ben and the eye and let out an odd maniacal laugh.

I did cockup on a couple things in the show, as well as forgetting to turn my dictaphone on to record it (fail.) and the ‘aftershow report’ video I recorded for 4laughs was far to dark to be or any use. Generally though, I’m quite happy with the shape of it, just need to tighted a lot of the material up without strangling the funny.

Writing my first Edinburgh show has got my head in knots. I’m swinging between getting too close to the subject matter and being too loose about what I want too say. It’s  like having a table half of ingredients and no recipie to bind them together. I do have a plan as to what it’s all about, but am trying not to fall foul of over marketing it in my head, deciding what it’s all about before it’s written.
There’s a danger in the kind of personal subject that this is, that if I outline too clearly what it’s about I’ll restrict my options to broaden the topics to tackle, but conversely to not have an outline is too wayward and provides no focus for what I’m writing about.

I’ve got 2 beginnings, several middles and no end at the moment, I suppose that’s the problem. 10 years back when I wrote little indie comics I didn’t have this bother, stories went all over the place and were about anything, but this is different, it has to have the ring of truth or indeed be true itself. Most of it is, about 80% of it is, but I have embellished some of it for laughs.

The problem with over analysing any subject is you can very easily kill any of the things that made it interesting in the first place, but then the hope is by doing that you’ll find that one area of common experience that is unspoken by everyone, but everyone knows, and finding that speck of common experience is comedy gold dust.

Sometime last year I think I fell out of love with comedy. There were no signs, I didn’t see it coming. Everything in my personal life was great. better than great. Comedy was work, good work, but work all the same. I moved in with my girlfriend, and that was, and still is utterly splendid on many levels. In hindsight it’s a simple trap I suppose, sex vs the adrenaline rush of comedy. Why go to a gig for that fleeting but massive adulation of a job well done, or on occasion feint praise and a three hour drive, when there’s a steady flow of love at home, like having a lounge bar in the front room. I got sloppy, was making notes, but not really writing and over the relatively short space of 6 months my set became unpolished and flabby.

When I was single I was singularly motivated, I went to gigs and worked, and when I wasn’t gigging I went to gigs anyway as it was better than sitting at home.
Living with someone else changes that. It sounds obvious, but you don’t quite know how and what shape you’re life will take until you’re in that position yourself. You can’t just do stuff when you want like before, you just get in each others way, or don’t each other at all.

I read that back and it sound’s terrible, but it’s not. When you live with someone in ‘togetherness’ your stuff and her stuff start off sitting next to each other on bookcases, but eventually overlap, and when there’s no room left, you have to assert that that space on the shelf is for your Beat Takashi films, and not her Monkee’s DVD’s.

In the five months since moving in there’s a facet of me that wasn’t there before, well rounded isn’t the word, a difficult birth of compromise and assertion, tolerance and aggression.

There’s a difference between what you want and what you need.

When I was single I had a point to prove, a good point, but a point nontheless, comedy was my passion, and performing my outlet.

Finding your bestest partner, and someone who loves you regardless, I forgot the point I was trying to prove, and the dawning horror that I might not have actually had a point to prove at all, I just liked making the funny on stage.

I never planned to get hooked up and settled, it just kind of happened. I once said quite loftily ‘a successful relationship is by it’s nature compromise’ and still think that rings true. However a good relationship is also life experience and experience is good.

I’ve started writing loads again, I’ve started writing a about something very close to me, which might be quite painful in places, but it isn’t born out of proving a point, just wanting to live life better and more than I currently do. Not that anything was bad before, by my actions and experience I’m just a little more defined.

This weekend I was Santa for a school Christmas fare. Not actually THE santa you understand but ‘one of the santa’s’, even though to me, after a very short time in costume I actually was Santa. I’d make the analagy that it’s a bit like being an Elvis impersonator, they are not actally Elvis, but If you asked them most would claim to actually be Elvis, even though like Santa, Elvis Presley is a mythological figure. Allegedly.

It’s the first time I’ve been santa, and while fun it’s quite demanding, and required me to stay in character for 2 hours with only a couple of (very) short breaks, in order to get through the inexhaustable supply of children queued up outside the wonderfully decorated grotto which I inhabited. I did scare a few with my very loud “HO HO HO! ing”, and one nearly cried when I asked the question ‘have you been good this year?’.

Before the kids came in I was asked “are you ready?” to which I replied yes. Then asked again “are you ready?” in a slightly loaded fashion which I took to mean, “Dont f**k this up”, “You’re not going anywhere now” and “Don’t break the childrens dreams” all at once. I was ok, it was cool.

If there was any presure at all, it came not from the childrens’ demands for a WII (My Santa didn’t know what a WII is, oh the hilarity of misunderstanding!), but from the odd parent who came in with an agenda, one of which made sure their child completed a huge mental checklist of presents, while they themselves fixed me a stare to ensure I complied with their clearly highly regimented and probably not very fun vision of what christmas is in their house, giving the impression of winning over a child’s love by throwing as many presents at them as possible, spoiling them to the point where they’ll probably grow up to be a bit of a knob.

But that was small potatoes, it was great fun, and for every kid who came in wearing an item of doctor who clothing, they now think Santa is close personal friends with the Doctor. I’m told I did a sterling job. Sweet.

Danny Pensive has made the front page of the channel 4 ‘4 Laughs’ website, after a sterling performance on Monday in Manchester.

It’s been a busy time for gigs,  and waiting for cheques in the post has become a terrible pain in the backside, making the month of November feel 750 days long, so long in fact that already my birthday feels like a distant memory, and it was only last week. My birthday itself came and went quietly accompanied by curry (rogan josh) and Doctor Who (Pertwee), and was bookended either side by Danny Pensive being king for the night in Carlisle, and me running the gauntlet in Liverpool to a split house.

I’ve started to write my new show, and have booked in a slot at the Leicester fest next year to do it, with an eye toward the Edburg’ fringe. It’s a show about living with eczema, and I’ve been spurred on to write it by a combination of my recent flare up and my new found domestic bliss. It’s a bitch to write,  already I’m delving into unpleasant memories, and there’s a bit of me thinking ‘how is this ever going to be funny’. Perseverence will tell.

I’m moving in with my girlfriend. It’s horrendous and wonderful all at the same time. I have agreed to share the same space 24/7 for the foreseeable future with a person who has a direct influence over my emotional and behavioral wellbeing. Am i Fu****g mad, or as I suspect possibly in **v* and becoming…I can’t even type the word….comfortable. It terrifies me.

I’ve been doing lots of ‘hard thinking’ recently, which is usually reserved for dire times such as the death of a relative or serious personal injury, where my brain goes into ’survival’ mode and strips away all the many fold creature comforts and niceties right down to the bare bones of what I need to get by. It wasn’t pretty, and kind of came down to a series of pros and cons. Pro’s included happiness, sharing, no longer being lonely, sex and knowing someone with a video camera. Cons included no more privacy, increased responsibility both financially and personally, and the slim possibility that it might not work out. But I don’t want that, and I have a tendancy to over examine things a little too much at the wrong end.

I love taking risks, and this is a massive wonderful risk, and I can’t live in a shared house forever.

It’s Saturday, I’m in a smoothy cafe in Bristol, it’s raining. Life is good.

Leicester summer sundae festival. It’s cult rock poet John Cooper Clarke! How we laughed at the naming similarity. Well, not really. But how rock is he? Well on close inspection most of his face is made of gold, even his eyes. I was impressed.