Well last Friday was a bit of a special one: I got offered an open spot in a pro gig at Southampton and theres already a London driver! Bonus!
Turns out the 2 acts I am sharing my car with are Kelly and Tom; I met both of them before through the open mic circus but haven’t seen them at a gig for quite a while. Main reason I haven’t seen them is they been doing alot more out of London gigs Both Tom and Kelly are drivers and the last few months had clocked quite a bit of driver miles.
Before you jumped to any conclusion: Both of them are great acts and not just “mini-cab” drivers that tells joke! Tom was the MC and both me and Kelly are the open spots for the night. The gig itself is in an art centre with somewhere around 70 people in. Its alot of people for most gigs however it felt sparse as the room can swallow 150 people in relative comfort. Theres 2 row of LARGE tables at the front and a mini theatre stand closer to the back. The tricky bit is theres a big gap between the tables and the theatre stand so its hard to “bounce” energy from the front tables to those who sit on the stand.
I did Ok-ish. Not one of my good gigs and will give myself a 4-5 out of a 10. I did my surreal seagull stuff and the audience didn’t really went with it which is fair enough! At this stage it still work in progress and needed a bit more time to grow. Throughout my set the front tables enjoyed it the most: also with the bright spot light on stage it means you can only really see the first 2 tables and the stand was in total darkness. It puts you off a bit when you fling one of your gags at the stand and there is only silence: It makes you wondered whether they are sitting there smiling and enjoying the joke or they sitting there frowning with their arm cross. There is a moment I found amusing – amongst the darkness of the stand I can see the sound guy laughing his ass off in his sound booth brightly lit like a lighthouse in a harbour, like the metaphor it does provide a certain sense of assurance.
Tom did a great job mc-ing and Kelly had the best reaction out of everyone on the Bill! I haven’t seen Kelly for a while now and his act really came along nicely! He put the effort (and mileage) into his comedy and he certainly reaping the reward. Tony Law was the headline of the night and he delivered his set with the usual gusto and bonkersness. It was warmly received but it wasn’t exactly what the audience were looking for tonight. They are nice and amuse when it comes to surrealists but what they like and laugh at are interactive cheeky/naughtiness which Tom managed to delivered. It’s hard to be an alternative act on live comedy circus, not every gig will be your audience.
When Tom and Kelly shared a lift back to London we have a catchup chat about what each others are upto and what gigs are coming up. We ended up discussing the “gap” between 16+ act open mic nights vs out-of-town open spots on pro bills. Theres not much in terms of “progression” if you only do London Open mic unless you can have a competition win under your belt. Sure! Theres competition every year but then every year there will also be another new act who are “doing really well” on the circus.
For the rest of us not stellar but “competent” comedians its more important to build up an act and establish a relationship with promoters rather than winning competition (IMO). This means to gig at more places and seen by more people than just the areas of London inside the M25. It will mean miles of miles of road trip to far-flung outposts like Taunton and Yorkshire and getting back at 2-3:00 a.m. in the morning for a 10 min open spots. You won’t get much in terms of payment either: it will at best whatever the promoter can throw at you to cover for travel expenses!
Here lies the crux of the problem that all comic will have to choose – keep doing London open mic gigs with 15 other comics for 5 min slot and get home around 11:30 or jumped in a car and leave London at 4:00 for a 3+ hour round trip out of London for a 10 min spot and get back around 2:00 in the morning.
Tough choice this comedy thing we do! Open spot comic vs Open mic comic were literally “MILES” apart!
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I rarely talk about the material I do on stage but if you guys know me and/or seen my act before I open with a joke about racial stereotype of my family eating pets. Its crude but for most times effective and gets the laugh straight off the bat which makes the rest of the set alot easier to swallow. Most of my set is not heavy in stereotype compared with my first minute.
However this gag about my family eating pets is a “blunt” comedy instrument which can also put people off side too early in my set and making it a chore to win them back. This point is evident in a gong show I done on Thursday where I was gonged off stage in 50 seconds during a comedy “gong show” because the crowd didn’t like my opening joke.
From my POV the joke gets laughs and since my set does not wallop in Asian stereotypes so one gag like this in my set is IMO perfectly acceptable. However to open with this joke is a high risk strategy – you are gaming on the fact the audience are not so put off by being feed a stereotype that they feel reluctant to follow you to wherever you like to take them. This joke has been with me for almost 3 years since I first started comedy and most of my sets had begun the same way, the gag is sentimental to me but the last couple of gigs its been missing the mark. Maybe its time to drop that as the opening gag and just open with the seagull jokes.
Actually when I say “shopping” its more like “convincing” myself to walk in a shop than “convincing” myself to not buy anything because theres no need/bargains and than “convincing” myself I should walkout of the shop.
