mostly david ephgrave

One thing I've learnt from collating my 2015/16 Tax Return is that receiving a chiropractic treatment costs the same as a train to Kettering. Both services come in at £37.00, which isn't cheap, particularly when one leaves you in incredible physical discomfort and anguish and the other is a chiropractor appointment. But which was the most indispensable? I definitely gained more from having my bad back looked at, as the trip to Kettering was for a gig that, while in a lovely building (a converted bookshop that doubled as a music venue, with guitars, mandolins and ukuleles on the walls), the show itself was very disorganised. It was run by a couple of secondary school students with their parents, for which I didn't get my expenses recouped and came out the other side feeling like the elephant in the room, because I wasn’t a teenager; I tend to walk into these things (when I don't catch the train).  It could have been worse. That £37 t...

This is it: MY 2016 EDINBURGH FRINGE SETTLEMENT IS IN . To anyone who suggests my comedy career is progressing slowly: I WAVE THIS IN YOUR FACE . Look at the figures and you can clearly see I’m winning; I’m nearly three quid up on the game. Take that, Mr Chilcott, Careers Advisor at Thomas Alleyne School; I can make my living as a performer (as long as somebody agrees to consolidate my debt). Admittedly, that £2.52 BACS payment doesn’t take into account every aspect of the cost of my recent EdFringe run; this is just the Box Office Settlement after the remaining half of my venue hire fee was paid off. There's still the accommodation, the brochure fee, the posters & flyers, the flyerers, the subsistence, the PR, the previews, the train tickets and the adverts to consider. But forget all that; I’ve done good. I can afford to buy 6.3 red peppers from Sainsbury's and live like a red-peppered king. Joking aside, thing did work o...

It's a little soul-destroying when you're about to start a week of traveling not sure how you're going to pay for it.  So much of being a performer is speculating to accumulate, along with budgeting for something to then get to it somehow unable to afford it. This can even be the case when you're doing the more standard fee-based stuff like touring; however much money you're meant to receive and however better off you're supposed to be after you've done the work never seem to tally. To say this is frustrating would be an understatement. It's far worse financially when you're working on self-produced stuff, like my stand-up show this week; even when under the helpful umbrella a Free Fringe venue, where the expenses are slashed. You go in with the mindset that just breaking even would be a dream. Then, to top it off, a negative review or a poor turn-out can make you question why you even did it in the first place, if only for a moment.  i'm sure...