Man, it's been ages. But I've been poorly sick.
To be honest, I can't be arsed to go through every remaining show in tons of detail, so for some of them I might not bother. Sorry about this frankly piss-poor level of commitment.
Saturday 21 August
First, to the tiny grubby rock pub that is Bannermans, for Andrew Collins 'Secret Dancing'. Enjoyed this a lot, it was quite a low key affair but often those are the best!
Then shortly afterwards, to the GRV for the Collings and Herrin podcast. Sitting at the front for such things is always risky, but that's half the fun. Adam's mum and sister were with us, making it doubly so. Herrin was drawn almost immediately to A's mum, and to cut a long story short, Herrin planned to marry her so that he could be a 'caring' (ie pervy) stepfather to us all. Lovely.
Then later on to the Assembly for Richard Herring's own show, 'Christ on a Bike'. This was probably one of the highlights of the whole festival for me, what a brilliant show. Herring just gets better and better with age, like a fine wine or Johnny Depp.
Final show of the day was Andrew Maxwell at the Assembly and by this time we were flagging, and boiling hot, and his show was late starting, so maybe I wasn't quite in the mood for it. He was as funny as ever, with some great improvisation around the castle fireworks that kept disrupting his train of thought, but sitting in the roasting, uncomfortable venue with my legs nearly breaking from the lack of space, I just wasn't properly up for it. Same show in a comfier environment would have been ace.
Sunday 22 August
First show of the day, at the Gilded Balloon, was Helen Keen. I had only seen her briefly before, as a guest at a Robin Ince gig during the Science Festival, but her show was brilliant. Very shambolic but endearingly so. I'd definitely go again.
Then Paul Merton's Impro Chums at the Pleasance. Predictably good, as it always is, but perhaps the move this year to the Grand has taken a bit of the atmosphere away, as it didn't seem quite as much fun as usual. I've not enjoyed anything really at the Grand this year, it's just such a crappy barn of a venue. Mental note : avoid.
We then went to the Underbelly, taking a punt on Keith Farnan 'Sex Traffic', as a result of seeing him briefly on Calman Chats Up. The show was actually very good and funny, and Keith is charming. Didn't get much reaction from the crowd, which was a shame, but I'd go and see him again too.
Then to the Gilded Balloon for Axis of Awesome 'Songs in the Key of Awesome' - rescheduled from last week. Well worth the wait. Another of my favourite shows of the month. The 'Love Song' song is, for me, the best thing they've ever done. Just brilliant. They remembered us as well, which was nice!
Last show of the day was Sammy J 'Skinny Man, Modern World' which was amazing, although the burger story was not for the faint hearted. Sammy is incredibly funny but also a little unsettling, which makes me like him all the more. You never quite know what's coming. But, fantastic.
Monday 23 August
Over to Edinburgh early to go to a tiny bookshop for Richard Herring doing readings from 'How Not to Grow Up' which was, of course, hilarious. And what more could a girl want from her pervy stepdad than a drawing of a spunking cock in the front of her book?
We then went down to the Caves for what, I am afraid, turned out to be the most appalling, abysmal, piss poor excuse for a comedy show I can remember since seeing Gary le Strange about 6 years ago. The Ginge, The Geordie and the Geek. Hard to know where to start with this one. But I'll keep it (reasonably) short. Within moments of them appearing on the stage, I ferociously hated every single one of them. Rarely do you see a group of people so utterly charmless and devoid of any talent whatsoever. I could forgive them for not being funny - it's a hard job. But I couldn't forgive them for being so lazy, unfocused and utterly peurile. They seemed to have no idea who their intended audience was. Adults? Not with the piss-poor, childish 'material'. children? Not with the fairly regular swearing and (I'm retching at the thought) nudity. So who were they for? Nobody, including them, knows. To give an example of how well thought out their sketches were - two of them sitting, apparently at a bus stop - one says to the other, is that the 38 coming? The third one walks by wearing a large foam 38 on his head. Much hilarity ensues. And sadly, much hilarity DID ensue, because about 98% of the audience were vacuous fuckwits. Had we not been right on the inside of a very tightly packed row, we'd have left. So instead I got a pad out of my bag and pretended to be a reviewer, just so I didn't have to look at the car crash unfolding on the stage. This show had, inexplicably, sold out every date and extra ones had been added. This mass societal fuckwittery on a gargantuan scale can only serve to explain the popularity of John Bishop, Lee Evans, Michael McIntyre, Peter Kay, and Kevin Bridges. I honestly wished the venue would blow up just so it would end.
We had tickets for three other shows, but we weren't feeling too good, and the previous hour had sucked any shred of good humour out of us, so we headed home for a lie down.
Tuesday 24 August
First, to the Caves for Goring & Stokes 'Nerds of a Feather'. Stokes reminded me a bit of Brian Cox, so I was onside pretty much straightaway. His delivery was very reserved, but he was funny, and affable. Goring a bit less so - I think he was trying too hard to be a bit 'zany' and even the concept of zany makes me want to pull out my own eyes, so...yeah. Half good!
Then to the Pleasance for Ginger & Black who I'd heard lots of good things about, but never seen. They turned out to be pretty awesome. Their show had just the right balance of humour and misery, and I recommended it to several people after, as the crowd hadn't been that big and it definitely deserved better. Will look out for them again next year.
Staying in the Pleasance, it was Tim Fitzhigham 'Gentleman Adventurer' next. Some of the material was recycled from previous shows, but it's quite hard to say anything bad about Sir Tim. So I won't. It was fun.
Then back to the Caves for Tiernan Douieb 'Littlest Things'. I love Tiernan. His show was lovely, and funny, and had a good mix of trivial and personal material. At the end I felt quite emotional. A really lovely show, and lovely to have a drink with him after (also with Glenn Wool and Lady Carol).
We should have ended the evening there, but we had tickets for Josie Long's 'Monsters of Whimsy'. It really wasn't worth hanging about for. I don't mind a disorganised gig, but it was basically a shambolic gathering of all of Josie's mates, none of whom, it seemed, had any discernible comedy talent. We sat through three of them, I think, and they were utter pants. Also, the venue was boiling, and I began to feel sick. I snuck out, and when I didn't come back, Adam snuck out to come and find me, and apparently Josie had a go at him for leaving. She's really not been her formerly pleasant, affable self this year. Don't think we'll bother again.
More later.
