mostly david ephgrave

While there was no reason to doubt it, I was delighted by the excitement today's announcement that Dr. John Cooper Clarke will play July's Hitchin Mostly Comedy Festival provoked. I'd like to think my judgment of what our audience wants to see is pretty sound, based on the club's popularity, but every so often there'll be a slight undercurrent of worry, particularly when there's either a lot of money involved or the event's taking place at a different venue to usual. In the case of John Cooper Clarke, I'd been working on the booking for a few months and had every crossable appendage assuming the position in the hope it would come good, but knew all along it would only work if we held it at Hitchin Town Hall so we could get enough people through the door to fund it. This obviously meant whittling down a date that both John and the venue could do while striking a deal with both that wasn't too expensive when a show of this nature has more overhea...

Today was another extraordinarily long day, but now I’m at the tail-end of it, I at least feel the majority of the groundwork for my 2018 Edinburgh Fringe run has been done. The day started with a lengthy taxi ride to everyone's favourite destination - Edinburgh's Parcelforce depot - with my acoustic guitar in tow, to pick up my projector screen, projector stand, a suitcase full of equipment and another full of clothes, before returning to my digs to drop off my luggage to then take the rest of my stuff to the venue for my tech. I had a nice chat with the driver about what it’s like bringing a show to the Fringe (dropping in the usual “how much it costs to do it” clanger that always provokes a response), for him to tell me what it’s like to grow up and live in a city like Edinburgh. The conversation was so easy the journey sped by and before I knew it, I was in my venue, setting up. Of course no day on the Fringe would be complete without s...

Today was very productive, taking in a meeting regarding Mostly Comedy potentially taking on an additional venue in another local town (well city, technically, if that doesn’t give things away) plus a rehearsal for the last outing of my show ‘Now Who’s a Comedian?’ at Leicester Comedy Festival this weekend. The meeting was promising, which was great, as we’ve always felt Mostly could work well in another town provided the town had the right catchment and the people in charge of the venue were on board with the nature of the night, and were prepared to allow time for the club to grow. We’ve dabbled with taking it elsewhere in the past (most recently with last year's date at Letchworth’s Broadway Theatre which, if anything we were concerned might be a little too close geographically to Hitchin, though it did work) but something about the nature of this particular venue and its location definitely bode well for it being a potential new home; we’re going t...

I nearly didn’t do my show today, because the door to my venue has a coded lock which had fallen shut and no-one knew the combination. Various staff-members tried to force the door open, firstly with a credit card, before trying to wiggle the catch free with a blunt knife, closely followed by a sharp one. This was the tensest moment of all, as one false move and someone would end up in A&E with a stab wound; while I wanted the show to go ahead, I didn’t want it to be at the expense of somebody’s life. Just as we were about to give in, a guy (who for some undisclosed reason was covered in face paint) ran up to the door and punched in three numbers and we were in ; perhaps he was some kind of a low-level superhero, which would explain the heavy make-up. High security. The show itself wasn’t a favourite, as I couldn’t find my rhythm. This was mainly due to tiredness. It's frustrating though, as I hate doing a bad job, but then some days at the Fringe are going t...

After over twenty years in my possession, I have to face facts: my guitar amp has been lost or stolen.  Me and my Marshall Valvestate had a good innings. We'd been through a lot, from my earliest rhythm & lead guitar fumblings, to various incarnations of Big Day Out and beyond. It was my rehearsal companion, my vocal P.A. at small-scale gigs and - most recently - my piano stool when I didn't own a piano stool. It was also a cumbersome pain in the arse. We lost contact for a while, after I left it at a friend's house in Hove following a gig in Bognor...but we eventually had a tearful reunion. I then used it at a couple of previews of last year's stand-up show and left it at the venue because we had another date in the diary (which was eventually cancelled). I kept meaning to pick it up, didn't get around to it, and now it's vanished without a trace. Fuck it.  It's not the venue's fault; it's mine. I should have gone to get it sooner. The staff w...

Tonight I did a stand-up gig in a restaurant.  The words 'stand-up' and 'restaurant' don't sit together comfortably; they're the antithesis of 'Ebony' and 'Ivory', 'Stoppit' and 'Tidyup' or 'Wogan' and 'wig'. When you've settled into a booth in an American-themed diner to devour your BBQed rack of ribs, the last thing you want is some bearded git - me - talking to you through a mic in the corner of the room, doing material about AIDS. It's not an appropriate digestif.  The situation could have been horrendous, if it weren't for the fact that the other acts were lovely, and the people who ran the restaurant were too. It couldn't be helped; sometimes an event has to go a certain way to know it shouldn't go that way again. Comedy needs full attention to work; it's not jazz (thank God). We were also treated to a meal on the house, which was a nice touch. Well, I hope it was free; i...

I caught the train to London today to check a projector’s HDMI connection. Happy Valentine’s Day to me. The projector in question was at The Actors’ Temple; the venue where I’m sharing a handful of work-in-progress dates with Peter Broughton-Rates over the next few months. Using HDMI is new to me – Doggett & Ephgrave use VGA – so I had good reason to go into town for a mundane purpose. (Stop me if I'm being dull.) As is often the case with these things, my time in the room was rushed. I was meant to have half an hour to fiddle with the set up. This didn’t happen. I arrived to hear the strains of the film Taxi Driver coming from the studio. De Niro didn’t talk to his reflection for a good fifteen minutes into my proposed thirty-minute slot. If there had to be a bloodbath, why couldn’t he pick up the pace? Thankfully the guy taking the classes my visit was squeezed between was very helpful. The fact he was Martin from EastEnders was something for my own silent...