Aug 9
Although I woke up a few times at night gasping for liquid, exhaustion and earplugs served me well and I had the full complement of sleep. I felt particularly good as after watching Sam Simmons (who is mind-blowingly good. He is an Australian guy who performs this piece about the secret life of a nutter, which involved groping my flatmate Mike in a sweaty embrace, sitting on his lap whilst spinning around an office chair in front of hundreds of people...front row baby! Actually, although it was brilliant, I did lapse into the odd moment of analysing the performance and wondering what it would take to be as talented a comedian as he, but that's what always happens), I managed to extricate myself and get home before midnight. I got up with that reassuring feeling that I had spent a night in a washing machine - that dazed disorientation of the deep sleeper.
I celebrated all things with a mammoth fry up before going to the Cabaret Voltaire for a midday spot, which went well (oh sleep, how you fix everything and yet how you so often evade me) before finding an original priceless copy of Shakespeare's Hamlet, which was nice...Not really. It's just that I felt good. The sun was out, festivally things were happening and (over lots of coffee) I sent out some reminders to journalists that I existed. The coffees came to a total of £4, which is a lot for 2 hours of WIFI use, so I compensated myself by downloading a couple of albums from torrents. Fair's fair.
I should mention that the other thing I did well was deal with Mike's fried. She's a Manchester-based comedy promoter and, although being ostensibly nice, an incredibly argumentative individual. After rising to her on a number of stupid things she was saying (1. Comedians should never sit at the front of a gig, 2. Agents aren't important, 3. Australians walk on their hands, well not that one) I finally decided that she was the promoter and I the comic, and I had better just agree with her. She then offered me a bunch of gigs in Manchester. I think she was positively reinforcing my behaviour. She could have equally offered me beer and dog biscuits. Mike apologised for her, but I told him it wasn't necessary and she probably had some points. Mike and I agreed that everyone's a little bit right and a little bit wrong and a lot opinionated. That's the kind of cliched summary I'm happy with in life. Everything else is ego. Done and done. And thus a fellowship was forged. Mike has diabetes. The kind where you get to eat all the time. As far as disabilities go, I could think of worse.
A bit later I returned to the flat to find an 80 year old man waiting at our door. His name is Hugh and he's involved in a show. He is using someone else's room for a couple of days. He's a nice chap, an actor, owns a bit of property and seems on the verge of senility, but holding on in there. He was coughing a bit so I made him a cup on tea, and he told me (among other things) that he used to play the timpani but now plays a cello that he's having restored. He told me about a house he owns, the problem with trains, why he refers to motorcycle riders as “organ donors” and his theatrical past and then suggested that Argentinian wines were inferior - which I had to pick him up on. Suddenly he developed a well-timed coughing fit to drown out a winning argument I was making about Malbec. Fiendish swine, these old folk. I sound incredibly bourgeois. At the time I was making roast veg with balsamic vinegar and pesto. Mike stuck his Northern nose in and muttered profanities about softness.
Flyering was a hell of a lot easier. It wasn't any better or more successful, just a tad easier to tolerate when you've had some rest. Mike suggested that I should be talking to people and selling my show. He's entirely right. I'm basically giving people flyers and saying “Free comedy at 9” and then the actual people who come to my show just wonder in on a whim. I should really be selling my show more, I'm aware of this, but I loathe flyering so much that I just half switch off and treat it like a job. “When you get rid of this pile of flyers, you can have an icecream.” By next week, I'll probably be binning them. Self-delusion is a powerful force in my life.
There was a powercut at the venue, shows were cancelled and I was only half-delighted when they announced my show could go ahead. I know I should want to do my show, I do, but if someone says “This gig may not happen” you start fantasising about sitting on a sofa somewhere having a drink and you think “Yes, that sounds like a better idea than standing up and talking for an hour.” The show went ahead (yay-boo) but for some reason they moved the location from the big room upstairs to some chairs put in one of the corners of the bar. This was EXTREMELY disruptive. I'm not sure if they were thinking “This guys had an easy run so far. Let's REALLY try and throw in some obstacles.” I couldn't hear whether the audience were laughing (they looked like they were) but I think the show flowed well and I got all the material in. I'm not sure if I rushed through some of it, but it didn't feel like it. I think the thing to remember is to make the most out of the material, keep the pace slow and improvise a bit for added pep. I think I'm saying less words like “Err....umm...right...and that's...blah blah blah...oh good, we're almost finished” so I hope the audience experience is improved. From 7 people I made £11, which is pretty good. Also a guy in the audience is doing a charity benefit in Scotland and asked me if I wanted to come up and do a set – so it couldn't have been that bad. Somehow I have 500 posters to get shot of. I might give them to audience members who donate to my pint glass. They look like they'd make lovely rabbit bedding.
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