After the disappointing
crowd numbers at Mr Bens on Monday i had high hopes for Thursday’s trip to Driffield
especially given that the last gig i did for Andy Woolston and Jed Salisbury
was amazing.
I had not taken into
account the Euro group C game between The Republic of Ireland and Spain, a game
which was well supported in the UK and that effected numbers at my 24th
gig. That said it was still not the worst turn out i have gigged in front of as
there were 6 in plus the other acts making it busier than bar 1:22, Verve and
CSCDDC all of which are gigs that are sometimes busy sometimes not so busy,
this gig is usually busier, I have heard around 15 times from my 24 gigs ‘it
was busier than this last time/its normally busy’ well it is true with this gig
a fact confirmed by an audience member who was there last time. The gig itself
would be hosted by the excellent Andy Woolston, he is confident, funny and so
easy to listen to. Jed Salisbury would open, i always enjoy Jeds sets, his
energy and persona deserve to be better recognised than they are (and they are
pretty well recognised) i hope Jed becomes pro soon he can more than hold his
own although tonight was a bit of a struggle and Jeds sparkle was effected by
this, that said i still think he showed qualities of an act that can deal with
any situation. I would be next and i wasn’t sure at all what to do, tried and
tested or new?? In the end i did a bit of both, a messy mix of new stuff i was
testing and my gong show stuff, i waffled on with no real continuity or
direction, there were laughs but on the whole i got nothing and was accidently
racist reffering to my girlfriends pet name ‘monkey’!! oh well i learned a bit
about my new stuff at least! Si Finnigan following me with his laid back charm
complimented by his apparently aggressive outbursts, all of which make him very
funny to watch and tonight was no exception as he used observations from the
car journey, jokes and banter with the only 2 in the audience that were
listening! Great set. The interval would create a gap between si and next act
Thom Milson who brings a new level to self depreciating humour then perks up
with stories of what he would do if he had a pet lion and how ludicrous the
idea would be! Thom has a great bit about the Face/off movie and looked like he
was going to build into that especially given that he had watched it the night
before (it was randomly on) however the bit is a little niche and Thom decided
not to try it finishing a little early. The dark joke merchant Simon Gutherless
followed with his one liners, always enjoyable. Mickey Sterret closed the show,
i have mentioned before i could watch Mickey all day, he just plucks humour
from despair in a way that makes you want to cry and laugh at the same time.
All in all i enjoyed
the night, it is always worth it to just go and gig, these tough gigs are
character building and you just never know who’s watching, i fell for the lad
who organised as they felt bad about it being quiet but they needn’t as i still
enjoyed the event for what it was.
As this is a double
blog given my 3 gigs in 4 days situation this week (4 gigs in total) i will
keep the details of my return to ARC gong brief, given the way this gong show
went last time (400 people booing me as my 4th gig descended into a
nervous bloke warbling nervously) it was like returning to hell, well not quite
hell, but a pretty unpleasant place... Grimsby maybe? I think returning was to
try and prove i had improved in the 19 gigs i have done since last time, if you
have not read my blog from that gig it is gig 4 and this is a sequel so you
need to read the 1st one!
I was picked from the
hat to go 8th (2nd to last as one of the 10 scheduled
acts did not show up)
I am not too naive to
know that going at this time was beneficial, the crowd of a little more than
100 people were warmed up and lubricated by the time i was going on, this
helped. Long story short i beat the gong but did not win. The crowd were built
of an older age group than i had seen before, average age maybe 40? There was
one crazy woman at the back who booed almost everyone! She was a numpty but the
rest of the audience were friendlier than last time. 5 people from 9 beat the
gong including a Peter Conlin who was debuting (brave!!) Jerry Buchan won, a
character act played by Rob Gilroy who is a protest singer, very funny! Running
him close was Rich Massara, he was a lot more chatty than in Manchester so im
glad, he’s actually a very nice bloke and a very good act. Danny Cox who is
only 18 was the other gong survivor, very likeable guy with an intelligent head
on his shoulders. Matt fong was unlucky not to get through, he was on course to
beat the gong but he tried a song and his singing not his comedy let him down.
My set was slightly
different than usual gong stuff, i was not ever going to win after watching
Rich and Rob i knew this so surviving the 5 mins was my aim so i changed my
approach for that reason and i did ok. I was not nervous oddly and i knew my placing
in the running order was on my side so i just casually ran through my set
getting a few moments of good laughter but also being booed by the worst comedy
audience member i have ever seen.
I felt good at the
end, the clap off was a waste of time for me in that i knew i had not won but
being in it was nice enough and despite not winning (as if i was ever going to)
i just felt good, like i am steadily going in the right direction.
MCing at the madness
of king George
No comments:
Post a Comment