Skip to main content

Goes to Show.


It was good to get back on the Edinburgh Fringe horse today, metaphorically-speaking, after a nearly week-long hiatus, which was finally rectified by having my ear syringed so I no longer felt like I'm living under a bell jar.

When I left my appointment yesterday, everything sounded so clear on my walk through Princes Street Gardens it was as if my soundtrack was being provided by an award-winning Foley artist (who won the prize for Most Convincing Recreation of a Scottish Tourist Hotspot). This return to normality put me in an inordinately good mood for someone at the latter stage of an Edinburgh Fringe run, probably because I knew I’d finally be able to do my show again, which is the reason I’m here after all.

The only slight setback today was we went up a good five or ten minutes late due to a tech issue, which meant I was behind on time from the get-go, though it still managed to be a fun gig irrespective of that. The audience was tiny admittedly, with about five or six in (one of whom was my old drama school friend Claire), but they were very up for it so it made for an enjoyable gig. We regularly strayed from the material, which is always the sign of a fun show. Despite this, I still couldn’t help but be frustrated when the audience filed in for the show after mine on my way out, as they kept coming and coming and coming; another reminder of what a difference an even fractionally later start-time makes.

One small bit of a good news to end today: I’ve just clocked my cutting-hedge technology gag also made it into the Scotsman’s Top Forty Best Jokes of the Fringe; admittedly it’s essentially a reconstituted version of the Edinburgh Evening News Article, but I’m still going to use it; I’m no mug.
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

'...I'm Gonna Look at You 'til My Eyes Go Blind."

Over the past week or two, I’ve been on a bit of a Sheryl Crow kick, largely thanks to rediscovering her cover of one of my most-liked Bob Dylan songs. She has one of my favourite female voices, yet despite this, I only own one CD and that’s just a single (her '97 release ‘Hard to Make a Stand’); on that basis, you can only imagine how much of her back catalogue I’d own if I hated her (it would fall into minus-figures). Dylan, conversely, takes up more of my collection than anyone else, save The Beatles and Paul McCartney’s solo work. He’s one of those artists who, when you get him, you really get him - and once I’d tuned into his style as a student, I'd time and again be blown away by his lyrics; he’ll have more jaw-dropping imagery in one track than other people fit in a whole career. These days, I mostly listen to music in the morning when getting ready, and more often than not, this will consist of a suggested YouTube playlist when I’m in the bath, r...
Read more

Shakerpuppetmaker.

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

Not The Bayeux One.

The Carole King album Tapestry has been my 'getting-ready-in-the-morning' soundtrack for the past few weeks.  It's been a favourite album ever since I was a student, which makes for a pleasantly gentle way to usher in the start of a day. I've always been a fan of a well-crafted song, which is something of a Carole King hallmark, ever since she started writing with her first husband in the early Sixties. Tapestry may be an unimaginative choice for a favourite LP, as it suggests I haven't delved that far into her career, but it's still an undoubted classic; anything with '(You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman', 'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?' and 'You've Got A Friend' on it can't really fail; if nothing else, it proves she likes writing songs with long titles.  Next month, she's set to perform the album live in its entirety for the first time at a gig in Hyde Park, which I would have loved to have gone to, if it weren...
Read more