I sit here writing this 12 months to the day that the awesome Mickey Sterrett won a gong show at mr Bens, this was a superb performance from a stand up act that I was instantly a fan of, but Mickeys win was not the significant factor of the evening. March the 5th 2012 I set foot on a comedy stage for the 1st time and told some jokes. They weren't all mine, I told two old jokes and one that was from sickepedia, I quickly learnt not to do this and thankfully had written some semi decent jokes of my own.
I have written a lot of stuff since that night and discarded most of it but 110 gigs later I now know my comedy voice and what direction I'm going in. This year taught me a lot about myself. I'm one of the older open spots and one of the least intelligent in terms of writing but what I do works for me and I'm not trying to be anything other than funny and likeable. It sounds quite sad really but my main aim is to be liked. I don't want to be the next Lois CK or Bill Hicks or Daniel Kitson, I want to be the 1st Jim Bayes and mould myself into a bookable act.
In this 1st year I have created a 20 min set that works as an opening 20 and as a result I now get a little bit of paid work. This is great but I am still a million miles from where I need to be to say that I am a real comedian. I have met people along this journey who are superb as comedians and indeed people. If I am to be noticed ahead of these people then only one thing will do it and this is graft. This is why I will be driving to Wincanton in a few weeks (4.5 hours drive) for a 10 min unpaid spot. These are the things that I must do in order to gig as much as I can to be a better act.
I would say I am a better act than 6 months ago and being offered paid work I guess proves this but as a fellow comic stated I have a great ability to perform with materiel that is not so good. It's true and this was a trusted opinion not a bitter attack or anything, I think a lot of other acts like my stuff a d what I do and they would book me if they were bookers but I M not content that I have anything that puts me in the mickey Sterrett ball park.
Mickey has bad gigs too of course but you listen to him talk and live what he is saying, he won that gong show a year ago because he is making jokes from topics with depth which very few open spots do to that standard (although an awful lot of open spots are still of a very high calibre which just shows how hard it is to make it)
So where does my act fit in the current market? Well I can only think the way I think so my act will not change hugely so here's the thing, another year of gigging like hell tweaking what I already have and adding new stuff and I will be ok. I won't win awards, I won't e regarded as refreshing or original or different but as long as I'm regarded as funny then I am happy.
It seems to me some acts forget who they are gigging to, most audiences have middle of the road views on things, most audiences like a knob joke here and there along with the stuff that makes them think. I am the act that balances out a night where someone with intelligent thought provoking humour had just been on, I'm the guy that just wants to be the audiences mate tell some funny stories be silly and go home. I am very aware of how audiences see me and even how some acts see me. This helps me, I know if I'm to be reviewed if it will be good or bad, for example review me this week in Birmingham and I think it would say, likeable with some good jokes but also talks nonsense a lot. It's how they see me and not how I see myself that counts and this is why I wish I could be reviewed at every gig just so I know where I am going wrong sometimes.
More honest feedback from other acts would help too but it's not easy to say 'that knob joke you did was a bit hack' when the audience were laughing their tits off, but the flip side is booked see through that and progression will not happen.
This next 6 months is massive for me, I have some new ideas to work in, some paid gigs coming up, some good for progression unpaid stuff and a whole year of experience under my belt now.
This year I very much am a man with a plan.
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