Good Words and Good Books

I'm not sure if yesterdays critique of my critique (are you following this?) was the wisest move, and very possibly I was a bit hasty. I know a couple of the comics on the night said they had a great time (both pointed to the free beer as an important factor), although other comics I have mentioned it to were far more outraged on my behalf than I was myself.

I wonder if I should go back next month and learn some more?

Either way it was a relief last night to find myself in the warm fuzziness of the excellent monthly poetry night Bang! Said The Gun. I've mentioned before that I occasionally a dabble a bit in poetry, although it's very rare that it gets a proper outing. I like Bang! though, it has a lovely welcoming feel and is quite unlike other nights of it's ilk, being a showcase for its four regulars with an open-mic slotted in the middle. When it comes to poetry I seem to have accidentally fallen into a tradition of always writing something on the day I perform. Once I realised I'd been doing it, it seemed obvious to carry on...meaning I needed something new, fresh from my head...this what I came up with.

Spandau Ballet
Why can't the whole world be more like
Spandau Ballet?
Ready to put aside their differences in the pursuit of
Art, Music and lots and lots of money.
Oh! Tony Hadley
Oh! that one off Eastenders...
And his Brother.
Oh!...the other two.
If only everyone was more like you.
Only with better songs.

Now, eagle eyed followers of That Joke Isn't Funny will spot some connections to this blog entry from wednesday. To my delight my words are eating themselves. I'm blogging about my life, but the process of writing is actually producing creative results I can take away and use, and then blog about again. It's a literary Ouroboros. I'm also developing some stand-up based around my Job Centre rant. I will be Richard Herring before I know it, only younger and substantially less talented and successful than he was at my age.

I like performing at Bang!, it doesn't have the high pressure of a comedy club -which means its less innately thrilling- but still gives me the opportunity to banter a bit, try out mini-routines and make people laugh, and if I'm not funny it's fine because people aren't really there for funny. I'm going to do a longer spot on April 30th. It's at the Roebuck on Great Dover Street, near Borough station, you should pop along.

It also afforded me the chance to see the baffling Ant Smith, the self styled Gene Pitnet of Poetry who sings all of his words in a rather spiffing tenor. Very much a new experience.

And if that wasn't enough to cheer me up (and get me over my first official sign-on at Peckham Job Centre today), tonight I found myself selling t-shirts for the lovely Good Books. I go back with the band a little way, I did their merch for over a month of gigs on their first headline tour in 2007, and it was lovely to get requainted. Their new stuff is great and I can't wait for the second album. There first record, Control, was cruelly over-looked. It was one of the albums of the year for me. Go and have a listen.

My favourite moment of the evening came from one punter who visited me at the merch stand and told me she'd loved my performance. I pointed out I wasn't in the band, and she refused to believe me, mistaking me for GB Basstype Chris. She seemed to think he was even dressed in my shirt (he wasn't). I tried to prove her wrong by claiming that Chris wears glasses, and she said "well you could have just taken them off". I had no come-back to this. She had a point. I gave up. There are worse things to be mistaken for than Chris from Good Books.