Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Dave.


Today, I’m trying to work on my solo stand-up.

I plan to write 5-10 minutes of new material each month, so I can gradually edge towards putting together an hour. I have half an eye on doing the Brighton and Edinburgh Festivals next year, which may be a little ambitious. It might be better to make my first solo festival venture a split bill with another act, if that’s not too contradictory, to allow me time to hone the best possible hour-long set. I’d hate to waste my first solo show by doing something substandard. I’d also sooner be doing a show with Glyn at the festival as well, so I’m not focusing on just one thing.

This is not a step away from Doggett & Ephgrave, by the way. I cherish my work with Glyn. I just wanted to see if I had it in me to step up to the mic on my own. Not just step up to the mic, in fact, but say stuff.

The starting point for my material is my blog. By writing something every day for a year I’ve built up a reasonable resource, some of which might work in a live context. The problems with this are twofold: (1) anything I take from the blog has to be reworded so it doesn’t sound overwritten and placed, and (2) by continuing to post something new every day, I take a large chunk out of the time I could be working on my stand-up. This daily deadline may be self-enforced, but I still intend to keep it up.

The best way to tackle the first point is to just get on with it. Like most writers – and I hesitate before calling myself that – I’m lazy. I’m easily distracted by everything other than the blank page in front of me. I also spend far too much time tinkering away at a sentence, trying to make it as good as I can, which is sometimes a wasted effort.

To take a little pressure off myself, I’m going to try to make my posts more diary-based for a while (which a lot have been), so I can prioritise on what will work on stage. Whether I’ll keep to this or not remains to be seen. I know what I’m like.

Popular posts from this blog

Shakerpuppetmaker.

Image
Have Parker from Thunderbirds and Noel Gallagher ever been seen in the same room? The resemblance is uncanny. So much so, I think something’s afoot. If my suspicions are correct, I've stumbled across a secret that will blow the music and puppet industry wide apart. In the mid-60s / mid-90s at least. It doesn’t take long to see the signposts. There’s the similarity between the name of Oasis’ first single, Supersonic, and Supermarianation, Gerry Anderson’s puppetry technique. The Gallagher brothers would often wear Parkas . Live Forever was clearly a reference to Captain Scarlet and Standing on the Shoulder of Giants to the size difference between Noel and his bandmates. The more you think about it, the more brazen it gets. It’s fishier than Area 51, Paul is Dead and JFK's assassination put together. The only glitch to the theory is scale . According to Wikipedia, Anderson’s marionettes were 1’10” and Gallagher is 5’8”. How does he maintain an illusion of avera...
Read more

Stevenage: A (Tiny) River Runs Through it.

If ever a river was mis-sold, it’s the Roaring Meg in Stevenage. I just walked past it on my way to the retail park that has taken its name. They’re similarly uninspiring. The river is less of a roar and more of a dribble; cystitis sufferers produce greater flow. The retail park is soulless. What was once a thriving enterprise is nearly devoid of atmosphere, save an underlying essence of emptiness and despair. With a Toys R Us. When it was first built I was excited. Back then, the thought of a bowling alley, an ice rink, a Harvester and a Blockbuster Video within a small surface area was enticing. I celebrated many birthdays on site. There was an indoor cricket pitch there for a while where I once had a joint party with a friend. Why someone with an almost pathological fear of sport would agree to such a venture is beyond me, but I did it. Now, there’s very little at the Roaring Meg of note. The river would be a metaphor for the shopping ce...
Read more

Hoo-ray and up She Rises.

So much has happened since my last post in March that this blog risks sounding like an itinerary. The main news is that Hitchin Mostly Comedy will return in the summer at a new venue, the Queen Mother Theatre . The road to this decision was convoluted, though enough fell into place en route to leave me optimistic about this new start. The catalyst was a survey I ran via our mailing list a few months back, in which I asked, "If the club returned in the current climate, with tickets still around £15 (and with similar line-ups), would you still attend?"; the response to which, in simple terms, was a resounding yes. Nearly 250 mailing list subscribers responded in a single week, with around a hundred also taking the option to leave some feedback. And only two people were abusive, which counts as a win when you consider they posted their comments online anonymously. Imagine how many more insults we would have received if the comedy club was a woman. Particularly if she was Diane ...
Read more