Quote: Tony Cowards @ November 19 2009, 10:22 AM GMT

Not too bad thanks, been full-time (i.e. very poor) for 18 months now and just about feel like I'm getting somewhere but it's a hard slog as I'm not young or pretty enough to be fast-tracked by getting on telly.

Am now living near Swindon so I'm just up the road from you (presuming you're still near Bristol?), you still gigging?

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Have moved to warminster way. not gigging as much, well hardly at all really.
took some time out due to a bit of am-draming and am finding it hard to get gigs at all at the mo. have been going ten years too.
glad its going well for ya. if you ever go back to chortle, check out matt price's essay about the stand up.
or just go here even: http://www.chortle.co.uk/correspondents/2009/10/14/9784/looking_for_the_punch_line

There's a gig at Flavas yeah that's right Flavas in Ealing tonight and with a name like that it can't be bad.

If anyone's around that way there's a decent line up and *ahem* me too.

Had an amazing gig last night at Party Piece (which I think is one of the friendliest Open Mics I've been to).

After weeks of practice and lots of background reading I decided to tell more stories & characterisation and been really tough on puns keeping them to a minimum (but did the Kuala Lumpur one which went down really well - thanks guys!).

I even spoke to the audience (I hate speaking to people in real life) for the Descartes bit - using Roodeye's (I think) suggestion of explaining/talking through some of the more complicated bits, which paid off. And the Wu Tang Clan bit at the end not only got laughs but felt like a structurally sound place to end on.

Slowly getting something together that will be ok-ish for the Laughing Horse - determined not to repeat the Jongleurs nightmare.

Nice one. Congratulations.

Yeah, Party Piece is a real nice open mic gig

Quote: thefridaylink @ December 9 2009, 9:34 AM GMT

Had an amazing gig last night at Party Piece (which I think is one of the friendliest Open Mics I've been to).

After weeks of practice and lots of background reading I decided to tell more stories & characterisation and been really tough on puns keeping them to a minimum (but did the Kuala Lumpur one which went down really well - thanks guys!).

I even spoke to the audience (I hate speaking to people in real life) for the Descartes bit - using Roodeye's (I think) suggestion of explaining/talking through some of the more complicated bits, which paid off. And the Wu Tang Clan bit at the end not only got laughs but felt like a structurally sound place to end on.

Slowly getting something together that will be ok-ish for the Laughing Horse - determined not to repeat the Jongleurs nightmare.

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Well done, buddy. Were you on near the beginning or the end? I heard from a friend who went that a drunken flash mob showed up at the beginning of the evening. I also heard that there was someone on stage who could only be described as "mentally unstable" - did you catch them? If you didn't, there's a possibility my friend was describing you, so sorry about that. He can be a real dick.

I was on right at the end - last act of the night ... and missed the beginning.
The mentally unstable woman was on when I came in ... and yeah she was a bit weird ...but could also be doing envelope pushing performance art ... it was hard to tell. She sat right at the front and did these crazy full body laughs where her legs would rise up over her head which was impressive yet distracting.

There was also an actress doing a character piece who was brilliant and a high energy 4 piece sketch group - a bit like Cowards (that BBC 4 sketch group) who were also a class act. It was a really strong line up actually - no one I saw bombed and the standard of material was really strong for an Open Mic night.

Congrats friday! Good to see a top comic doing well.

3rd time I'm asking this but I never take notice so I'm asking again..

How long roughly is 5 mins of stuff on paper?

I have got a pen in my mouth so I'll probably write what you say down on my tounge.

Unless its abuse obviously, walking round with "c**t" in my mouth aint a good look.

=]

Quote: Mike T @ December 28 2009, 10:52 PM GMT

3rd time I'm asking this but I never take notice so I'm asking again..

How long roughly is 5 mins of stuff on paper?

I have got a pen in my mouth so I'll probably write what you say down on my tounge.

Unless its abuse obviously, walking round with "c**t" in my mouth aint a good look.

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It's a bit of a "how long is a piece of string?" question, but I'd say that for someone with a fairly average delivery speed it'd be about 1-2 A4 pages of (normal sized) printed material.

Of course it also depends on how many laughs you get and how much time that takes up.

When you first start doing stand up 5 minutes seems like a lifetime but once you've done a few gigs it's barely time to introduce yourself and get started.

I now get booked to do anything from 20 minutes to an hour, and on the odd occasion that I have to do a 5 or 7 minute spot I find it really difficult as it flies by in no time at all.

The best way to work out the timings of written material is to read it out loud, see how long it takes and then add a little bit on for laughter, heckles, interruptions etc, hope this helps and good luck.

Quote: Tony Cowards @ December 29 2009, 10:12 AM GMT

It's a bit of a "how long is a piece of string?" question, but I'd say that for someone with a fairly average delivery speed it'd be about 1-2 A4 pages of (normal sized) printed material.

Of course it also depends on how many laughs you get and how much time that takes up.

When you first start doing stand up 5 minutes seems like a lifetime but once you've done a few gigs it's barely time to introduce yourself and get started.

I now get booked to do anything from 20 minutes to an hour, and on the odd occasion that I have to do a 5 or 7 minute spot I find it really difficult as it flies by in no time at all.

The best way to work out the timings of written material is to read it out loud, see how long it takes and then add a little bit on for laughter, heckles, interruptions etc, hope this helps and good luck.

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Thankkssssssss =]

where is this party piece then? good gig to do is it?

Stoke Newington
Pangea Project
PartyPiece@gmail.com
or just turn up and ask nicely
Run by Tom Webb

I've been impressed
a) by the quality of acts on
b) by the friendly/supportive nature of audience - heckle free

It's a good place to try out new things.

Anyone done a Laughing Horse gig yet?

Quote: thefridaylink @ January 4 2010, 4:44 PM GMT

Anyone done a Laughing Horse gig yet?

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Generally good gigs although sometimes there's a lot of acts on with the emphasis slightly on quantity rather than quality, but overall they are decent gigs in nice rooms.

Which one are you doing?

Quote: Tony Cowards @ January 5 2010, 9:24 AM GMT

Generally good gigs although sometimes there's a lot of acts on with the emphasis slightly on quantity rather than quality, but overall they are decent gigs in nice rooms.

Which one are you doing?

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Good to hear, *he wildly jumps into the conversation* I'm at the Bristol Heat for the Laughing Horse NATY in Feb *runs away, shouts from a distance* I regret nothing!