Monday 8 May 2017

Brighton Preview @ The Leyton Star

This evening's show was a simple affair knocked together to ensure Andy Onions, Matt Duwell, James Harris and myself had a chance to run through what we're taking to Brighton this month and next. My usual room of choice had been seconded by a choir group so we were in the big one with an optimistic number of chairs. Come 8pm we were ready and there were enough people in place to tell us if we were funny or not so the show commenced.

Matt introduced the evening's entertainment and soon enough I was on with my intro track. The first row (hiding behind the usual front row of empty chairs) look slightly confused but joined in enthusiastically with the call and response. 

Pass the Box ensued (where my first world problems travel around the audience in the form of customised seven inch singles sitting in a box) and formed the links between the four tracks I had prepared. Response was pretty good throughout, though I lost track on Crisis of Conscience after catching Onions dancing around at the back. Must work on being less distracted.

I headed to the chairs as Onions got the assembled to turn theirs towards the TV screen on the left to begin 22.5 minutes of his show Powerpointless. Loud, brash and technologically impressive I won't give away too much but should you be in Brighton or Edinburgh for their respective festivals I'd very much recommend it. The game show music he uses is particularly good - and I think this in no way because I wrote it...

After an extended break it was Matt and James' turn and James started things off with his quietly confident, modestly eccentric, style. Older material blended with new and the audience, though tiring by this point, enjoyed it immensely. It was down to Matt to round things off and his take on pessimism provided an entertaining counterpoint to what had gone before. Come 10.30 everyone was knackered and it was time to go home.

This evening was also notable for an email I received a few hours earlier. "Andy Quirk's Got First World Problems" is confirmed for Edinburgh! For those of you who like to put things in diaries I'll be at Black Market (Room 2), 35 Market Street, Edinburgh (Venue 399) from the 5th to 26th August at 6.25pm.