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Tour blog#3: The palace of tango

Thursday, March 24th, 2011

So, it’s the morning after the night before and I’m sitting in bed in the hostel in Malmö. I feel well rested after our first proper gig and Danny is in the bed opposite sleeping like a baby. Not sure if he is tired because of last night’s show or whether it’s because I kept him up all night with my snoring.

Anyway, the first show of our tour was a success. The club, Oslipat, is run by a couple of guys called Marcus and Fritte and it takes place at a venue called Tangopalatset. We found out about 2 days before the gig that there was an ongoing Internet campaign to boycott the venue by a group of militant Malmö revolutionaries who were taking a stand for an ex-employee at the venue. Unwittingly, we found ourselves in the middle of a political struggle – Not what we needed. Despite this, about 50 people turned up, mostly Swedes, but a few English people as well as a few Danes and Finns (By Danes and Finns, I mean the nationalities, not members of an Irish boyband).

Marcus had been very worried about sound checking nice and early…. which was lucky as all the equipment matched with their PA system… almost. With the clock ticking we cobbled together an elaborate web of cables that ran from one amplifier to another bypassing a set of speakers and somehow getting the mic to work via a headphone input… which still didn’t work…. then we found the right lead and everything worked like a dream. It’s always the way..

The show was fun. The crowd got really into it and there was plenty of audience participation and despite being Swedish they weren’t too reserved. What’s nice about the Danny’s show is that it uses the audience in such a nice way. Everyone is part of it without being picked on or singled out. And it was so nice to hear a strong applause at the end of the night.

So, the tour is under way. I haven’t quite lost that slightly sick feeling of worry about whether or not we’ll get an audience in Gothenburg and Stockholm, but it feels good to be back on the road. We’re heading north today, for a gig in Falun on Friday – It seems a shame to leave the spring in Skåne behind, but we’ll be back next week.

Danny has just woken up. He sat up, looked at me and said ‘You snored all night’, then rolled over and went back to sleep.

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Tags: Comedy, DJ Danny, Gigs, Malmö, Stand Up, Sweden
Posted in Comedy, Lagom, Stand Up, Tour 2011 | No comments »

Tour blog#2: Spring is sprung in Malmö

Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011

So, I’ve successfully met up with Danny in Malmö and we are now both sitting opposite each other on our respective computers avoiding eye contact. He has already complained (through a closed door) that I made too much noise when I went to the toilet and I’ve noticed that he has managed to get the best bed in the hostel room, which he has claimed by spreading out his dirty underpants. We’re only minutes into the tour and things don’t bode well. … …

The journey down was quite pleasant. I listened to some SRP2 which had a whole load of stuff from choral singing to trad jazz. I only switched off when they started the weekly Persian broadcast – Nothing against Persian, I should add…. just it’s not very condusive to driving down the E4.

Once I arrived in Skåne I stopped for a coffee in a roadside cafe/country club… I know I speak Swedish with a weird accent having learnt in Östergötland, but skånsk really does take the biscuit – I wasn’t sure if the lady was speaking to me or having some kind of choking fit.

We’re off to sound check in about 20 minutes, which means I have to jump back in the car… just what I need after 5 hours behind the wheel. Really looking forward to the gig tonight which takes place at Tangopalatset (more info here) . There are still tickets available, so come along and say hi (just try not to do it with a Skåne accent).

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Tags: Blogging, Comedy, Gigs, Malmö, plugs, Stand Up, Sweden, tour
Posted in Comedy, Lagom, Stand Up, Tour 2011 | No comments »

Good times in Gothenburg

Saturday, March 12th, 2011

Just back from a few days in Gothenburg. There’s one thing about the city which is so predictable. The weather. Having left the east of Sweden with blue skies and a thaw on the way, it was disheartening to drive towards black clouds that were spewing rain sleet and snow with no regard for the fact that it is already March and that we are all sick of the winter weather.

I was in town to check out the venue where I am on tour later this month with DJ Danny. We’re playing in a place called Sinnet and having now been down there, met the people who run it and seen the stage, I think the gig will be great. I’ll be blogging about the whole tour with Danny here and The Local should be running an article with a ticket giveaway in the next week or so. But in short, the tour starts on the 23rd March in Malmö and ends on April 1st in Lund. We also take in Stockholm, Gothenburg, Falun and Linköping. There’s a Facebook page for Danny on the go here

While I was in Gothenburg, I also had a fab gig at The Dubliner suporting the potty mouthed Canadian Jason Rouse. We had a great crowd of Swedes and non-Swedes and the atmosphere, as always at The Dubliner was tip top.

One more thing I should mention is that I stayed with an American friend Kurt Lightner who is a very talented printmaker. As a gesture of thanks for the use of his sofa – and also because I think his work is great – Here’s a link to his Etsy site. Enjoy (and why not buy!) his work.

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Tags: Comedy, DJ Danny, Gigs, Gothenburg, Malmö, plugs, Stand Up, Sweden
Posted in Comedy, Stand Up | No comments »

World Tour of Estonia and Finland

Thursday, January 20th, 2011

I went on an international tour last week. A mini tour of only two dates in two countries, but an international tour, nonetheless.

A quick hop with the budget airline that everyone loves to hate and I was in Tallinn, Estonia. I was met by my friend Louis who runs Comedy Estonia and Comedy Finland. He’d just got back from Australia, so even though it was midday, he felt like it was in the middle of the night. Mind you, we were in Estonia, so even though it was 2011, it felt like 1986.

We jumped in a cab and whizzed to Tallinn’s old town where we were staying and where the gig was taking place. I had read up a little about Estonia, but in truth, I had no idea that the old town would be quite so fantastic. The medieval architecture is breathtaking, with towers, fortifications, alleyways and city walls that you could spend hours wandering around imagining yourself as an oppressed Estonian serf or merciful Swedish duke.

The night’s gig was in a place called Drink Baar (which I highly recommend if you ever find yourself in Tallinn). I had some difficulty finding it as I left the address at the hostel. At the main square and thought that the easiest thing would be to ask someone outside another bar – Tallinn can’t be that big, I thought. Everyone I asked, I got the same response:

“I’m looking for Drink Baar”

“In here. This is drink bar”

I even asked a couple of policemen (who looked like thugs in uniforms) who looked at me like I was an idiot “This is Old Town. There are many drink bars”. Eventually, I found the place and it was filling up nicely. By showtime it was full to the rafters and the atmosphere was electric. Louis and the gang have built up a comedy scene there in a really short time and have established a dedicated and passionate audience. Oddly enough, they are pretty much the only people to do stand up in Estonia and they are now trying to set up a scene in Estonian.

I had a really fun time headlining. I did about 30 minutes with plenty of improvised material and finished off with a routine based on an Estonian guide book I had bought, which went down a storm. After the gig, we went to a very tacky nightclub called Shooters. The night was saved by meeting two drunk Latvian artists who wanted to know about London. I did a service to the world of art and told them to visit the Tate Modern and hang out in Shoreditch. I’d like to think I have given Latvia’s answer to Gilbert and George a nod in the right direction.

The next day (slightly hungover) we took the slow boat across the Gulf of Finland. This is an experience in itself. I got my first taste of the legendary drunk Finns. I was amazed that shouty, reeling drunks who could barely stand were not only allowed on the ferry, but were welcomed into the onboard shop to buy more alcohol. I’m not sure if I am turning into a conservative old man or whether I have actually been indoctrinated by Sweden’s draconian alcohol laws.

It would be ridiculous for me to offer a genuine opinion on Finland we arrived at five in the evening and left at ten the next morning. However, for what it’s worth, Helsinki seemed like Sweden with the volume turned down a notch or three. The gig was great, a really nice room which was sold out. The audience were about 50% Finns, 50% non Finn and I did about 30 minutes which included loads and loads of improvised material. And I finally got round to asking someone to video it. Click here for a small taster.

At the meal after, I met a few interesting folk, including a .com millionaire who had retired in his thirties, a Finnish TV presenter who was recently sacked for making a joke (which went viral on You Tube) and Finnish comedian Tomi Walamies who I am going to bring over to Linköping at the end of January for the secret launch of the new venue, Bastiljen. More about that soon.

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Tags: Bastiljen, Comedy, Estonia, Finland, Gigs, LinkÃ¶ping, Stand Up
Posted in Comedy, Stand Up | 4 comments »

Twenty Eleven is GO!

Sunday, January 9th, 2011

After New Years Eve’s resolution fest and blind optimism, the reality of the year’s first week can be a bit of an anti-climax. At least it has been that way for me in the past. This year, I’ve played it a bit different – No resolutions, no inflated expectations or declarations of forthcoming success as the bells struck twelve. And for a change, I’ve hit the first week of the new year running.

I started the week working the newsdesk of this esteemed organ and found myself in conversation with the head of media relations at Volvo – Not how I had predicted my year would start. I’ll be working a bit more for The Local over the coming months, so my name may pop up here and there under (hopefully typo free) copy.

The rest of the week continued apace with a voice over – I’m now the voice of the soon to be launched Windows 7 user guide. I also had an inspiring gig for a fascinating collection of people who were like a cross between a secret society and a club for aesthetes. It was an invitation only dinner where select guests who were all accomplished performers, singers, dancers and musicians, performed a turn on the theme of satire. Typically, someone would sing brilliantly, then be congratulated on having just got the lead in the latest production at Stockholm’s Folkopera. The acts ranged from Tango to Baroque dance, from Shostakovich to Chopin, from Hasse and Tage to Monty Python. I performed a routine about Swedish politics which went down well, although coming onstage following a virtuoso cellist who performed Shostakovitch with tears in her eyes was a hard act to follow. The evening ended with an ‘Allsong’ of Auld Lang Syne, topped off with a bagpipe accompaniment.

Otherwise, I’ve been working hard on promoting Linköping’s new venue, Bastiljen, which opens on the 3rd of February with my stand up club, LKPG HA HA! The headliner is Marika Carlsson who caused controversy earlier in the year with her show ‘En Negers Uppväxt’. I’m really looking forward to it.

I’ve also got a few English language acts coming over later in the season, including the Scottish Comedian of the Year, Ro Campbell and Maureen Younger who runs Laughing Cows in London, Birmingham and Berlin. PLUS, I’m organsing a national tour of Sweden in March with Danny Robins’ brilliant persona DJ Danny who hilariously attempts to make it as a superstar DJ. So far, I’ve got dates confirmed in Malmö, Gothenburg, Falun, Linköping and at Boulevard Teater in Stockholm with a couple more dates hopefully to be confirmed next week.

Twenty Eleven is GO!

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Tags: Bastiljen, Comedy, DJ Danny, Gigs, LinkÃ¶ping, plugs, Stand Up, Stockholm
Posted in Comedy, Lagom, LinkÃ¶ping, Stand Up | No comments »

Revolting Students

Thursday, December 2nd, 2010

While the students of the UK have been busy smashing things up and getting bonked on the head by the Boys in Blue, I had contact with 200 Erasmus students in Örebro. The gig was in the ultra space age Kårhuset on Örebro Campus. It looked like a bar from the future with tastefully uplit bottles of spirits and fancy beers. There were comfy sofas and lots of chrome. Wasted on students getting wasted.

The event was an international buffet where every nationality had to cook something special from their country. I was hugely disappointed by the English students’ contribution who had decided to try and make Cornish pasties with filo pastry. What’s wrong with traditional British student food? Was a Pot Noodle and a packet of Hob Nobs beyond them?

The idea of these events is to create a sense of unity amongst different nationalities, but often they just serve to reinforce stereotypes. The Germans made plates and plates of sausages (which encroached on the Polish part of the table), the French and Italian food was sublime and was snaffled up quick time. The Czech and Polish food was also great and, no joke, the Americans made peanut butter sandwiches. The weirdest was the Swiss contribution which was a large sandwich box filled with some kind of yellow gluttonous slime. Not one person touched it.

As I looked at the long tables filled with food, none of which involved pasta and tomato ketchup, I felt that these students from all over the world had come together and would be united in the shared experience of dealing with food poisoning the next day. It was beautiful.

The dessert to this culinary extravaganza was myself and Malmö based comedian Joe Eagan. There was plenty of room for silliness and I had a great time including showing off my stripy long johns. I was enjoying the pats on the back and international adulation after the gig when a Ukrainian student approached me and pulled me up about a routine I do about visiting a female Ukrainian doctor with big hands. He told me in no uncertain terms that the doctor in question could not have had big hands as Ukrainian women do not have big hands, as Ukrainian women are the most beautiful in the world. I apologised, as for all I know Ukrainian women are the most beautiful in the world.

The irony was that I normally do that routine and make the doctor Serbian, who may well also be the most beautiful women in the world. I just don’t know. I have never been one to judge beauty based on the size of a woman’s hand. If any readers have any suggestions as to which nationality in the world has the most beautiful women in relation to the size of their hands, I would appreciate this for future gigs.

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Tags: Comedy, Gigs, Lagom, Stand Up, students, Sweden
Posted in Comedy, Stand Up | 1 comment »

Twelve Steps

Monday, November 22nd, 2010

I got booked for a gig at Globen on Saturday night.

In my head, I was half way to Stockholm, picturing myself performing in front of 15000 people and meeting Sweden’s elite hockey ‘A Lag’… The illusion was shattered when I found out that it was actually Globen Linköping, a small hall in town run by the Temperence movement NBV. I readied myself for a much smaller audience and a totally different ‘A Lag’.

The event was a theatre festival where participants could try out different styles of performance. I ran a workshop in the morning and performed a 30 minute set in the evening. There was a party atmosphere and although the NBV venue is, by definition, ‘alcohol and drug free’, I couldn’t help but see the irony as the teenage contingent ran around with eyes like saucers, high on soft drinks, chocolate and sweets. They would have all been a lot calmer with a stiff drink or a toke on a joint inside them. I worry for the youth of Sweden when I think about their future dealing with obesity and rotten teeth having been exposed to so much sugar at such a young age. Kids in the UK and US are offered a much wider range of stimulants.

Before the gig I looked around the venue a bit to find out about what NBV do. From what I could gather they offer clean activities as an alternative to drink and drugs. However, one activity on offer struck me as wholly inappropriate. If I were a recovering addict, the last thing that would take my mind off my previous addictions would be ‘line dancing’. Not only would you have the instructor barking on about ‘having a couple of lines’ before you could enjoy the dancing, which to me gives a mixed message, but also, having already memorised twelve steps it would be a bit much to deal with any more steps.

The gig went well and I even got asked for my autograph. I’m gonna be big amongst the sugar-crazed youth of Linköping.

In other news, I had my first article in Swedish published. Had some help with the translation of course, and as usual, it’s just me moaning about the lack of culture in Linköping. But it is in Swedish. In a Swedish quality newspaper. And even if I say so myself, I feel quite proud about it. You can read it here in Corren

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Tags: Comedy, Corren, Gigs, LinkÃ¶ping, politics, Press, Stand Up, Sweden
Posted in Comedy, LinkÃ¶ping, Stand Up | 1 comment »

Planning ahead

Monday, November 1st, 2010

I’ve got a quiet week this week. So quiet, I’m even toying with the idea of going to a networking lunch tomorrow, where bland local businesspeople meet, eat a bland lunch and make bland conversation about the photocopying industry. Not really my kind of thing, but worth turning up at these things occasionally.

It’s also time to start planning ahead and do some groundwork for future gigs: In the new year, I’m going to be involved in a very exciting project in Linköping, opening up a new venue with a couple of stages, which also means bigger budgets and bigger names. I’ve got a few Swedish names in mind, who I’d definitely like to get along and also a couple of names from the UK.

One name who I hope will come down is the Kiwi comedian Al Pitcher, who is now based in Sweden (spending about half his time here and half his time on the UK, Irish, Australian and NZ circuits). I put him on last year at the Sagateatern in Linköping and he left the audience exhausted with laughter. He is brilliant and if you are Stockholm based, there’s a chance to see him at the Boulevard Teater this week and next (2nd, 3rd, 6th and 9th Nov). I guarantee you will laugh your socks off.

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Tags: Comedy, Gigs, LinkÃ¶ping, plugs, Stand Up, Stockholm
Posted in Comedy, LinkÃ¶ping, Stand Up | 1 comment »

Tack så mycket, Baby.

Friday, October 29th, 2010

So Paul Foot’s mini tour of Sweden drew to an end last Sunday and he left audiences either in hysterics or totally confused or both. He’s the kind of comedian that you either love or hate and I definitely fall into the love side. Watching him was an education for me, as he stretched the boundaries of the genre and also of the imagination. I was nothing but impressed by his ability to draw 20 minutes on subjects as benign as Shire horses and vans. He also made me laugh a lot.

I’m not sure what the highlight of his tour was. I am split between the experience of wiping tears from my eyes at Big Ben and looking at the audience, who had not come specifically to see Paul, and their reaction which ranged from one or two giggling uncontrollably, to many laughing without quite knowing why, to confusion, to looks of outright contempt. (Give me a comedian that splits the crowd, anytime.) Alternatively, my other highlight was watching him do a short guest spot at RAW on Saturday where he finished his set off with the immortal words ‘Tack så mycket, baby.’

Got a nice little write up too in The Velvet Onion, the place on the Internet where all Boosh related things can be found.

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Tags: Comedy, Gigs, Review, Stand Up, Stockholm
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Close to the wire

Thursday, October 21st, 2010

To put on a live comedy show, there are a few essentials: microphone, sound equipment, lights, audience etc, etc. Most important of all however, is the presence of the headline act.

I’m currently promoting a mini tour of Sweden, with the weird and wonderful Paul Foot. Last night was the first night of the tour in my home town of Linköping. Paul was due to arrive on the afternoon flight, jump on a bus and get to town in good time for the show. Clockwork. What could possibly go wrong? Answer: Ryanair.

Ryanair, who are always trumpeting about how their flights usually arrive early, were delayed. By an hour. Meaning that Paul missed the bus that got him in in good time…. Cue an hour or two of sweaty palmed worry as Paul’s progress from Skavsta was tracked via text message and frantic phoning.

In true style Paul arrived just before the break and was welcomed by the audience and comedians and myself who was able to finally breathe a sigh of relief. Thirty minutes later Paul was onstage with the audience in the palm of his hand, recounting tales of moist cakes and verbose car signage. Paul was brilliant live and again reinforced the fact that nothing beats live comedy as the experience was unique to that time and that place.

Tonight I am compering a gig with Paul in Märsta (wherever that is!?), then we’ve got our all English shows at Kafé Klavér on Saturday and Sunday. If you want to see one of the UK’s most interesting comedians before he gets big (and he is getting more well known by the day with his first appearance on Buzzcocks tonight), then come down to Klavér at the weekend.

You’ll get to see the author of this blog perform too! See you at Klavér!

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Tags: Comedy, Gigs, LinkÃ¶ping, plugs, Stand Up, Sweden
Posted in Comedy, LinkÃ¶ping, Stand Up | 2 comments »