I nominate that Geordie bloke who got shortlisted for the Perrier. Are there really that few talented comics out there at the moment? I saw him in the street here in London last week, and in a last-ditch attempt to grab people's attention he's hilariously dyed his hair from blond to fright-wig red. Cnt.

You have to remember that for every bad professional comic there are a dozen truly appalling amateurs. I saw a bloke at an amateur night in Australia who was trying to make witty, observational jibes about articles and adverts in a newspaper that HE WAS HOLDING. He hadn't learnt the articles and he couldn't even find his place. INcredibly, the audience tolerated him for an uncomfortable 5 minutes before they turned the mike off.
After him there was a pro (or semi-pro) standup who was a "big" woman. She got heckled nastily from the start and unfortunately got side-tracked from her act in answering the heckles. This is why there are few professional female comics. It's also why I'm getting increasingly annoyed by the Corpses' inability to refer to a woman (even in passing) without mentioning her sexual partners or c*nt.

Actually, having looked at the site again, that last bit wasn't true, as the entries for Doon Your Way and the Nualas make clear. The memory of that poor woman struggling to avoid being sidetracked while answering all the heckles had me seeing red. I apologise - that damned evidence, eh kids?

>I say it was whoever was appearing in the Comedy tent at the Reading Festival '94, when Pavement were playing the main stage.
>
>God, he was shite. Pavement were funnier than him.
>
Shit, I was there! It was Dave 'Tinky-Winky' Thompson.

How about Sean 'hope I get famous before I lose ALL my hair' Meo?

">I say it was whoever was appearing in the Comedy tent at the Reading Festival '94, when Pavement
were playing the main stage.
>
>God, he was shite. Pavement were funnier than him.
>
Shit, I was there! It was Dave 'Tinky-Winky' Thompson."

You might remember me, Simon. I was wearing a T-shirt, and I just wandered past the comedy tent, before going off to join the thousands of others gathered near the main stage.

Were you the tall one?

No, I had slightly longer hair.

Was that the day when half the acts were so bad, they apologised after a few gags and started crying? I think that wrinkly american bloke came on and saved the day a bit. Can't remember his name. Oh yes I can, it was Rich Hall.

Or was that '96?

I have a Festival Programme still, at the bottom of a cardboard box somewhere...

Lee Evans to my mind....it's not like Norman Wisdom had any charm, but to rip him off...

And to compound it, I saw him with Bill Hicks rip off, now hollywood b list actor Dennis Leary. No Cure for Cancer...god job in his case.

This idea that Leary was a Hicks rip off annoys me. As far as I know Leary and Hicks started doing stand up at the same time in opposite ends of the States. Hicks is the more radical in many ways - but gag for gag I found Leary funnier. Hicks' classic routines are genius - but some of his earlier ones combine mysogyny and rock-bore-ism to horrific effect (viz: his routine about Debbie Gibson being raped by Hendrix's guitar). Leary does not have the socio-political scope of Hicks in many respects, but his No Cure For Cancer tape is brilliant - "Hey! These things are bad for you? I thought they had Vitamin C in 'em and stuff."

There's a Brummie guy, I think his name's Andy Robinson or Andy Robertson. I saw him at Reading a few years ago, and I've seen him doing warm ups for various BBC comedy shows (Buzzcocks, Fast Show). He used the same routine every time (almost down to the last semicolon) and he was cack every time. Come back Chris Addison, all is forgiven.

Can we get any confirmation on the Hicks/Leary timeline? Sorry, but they're too damn similar...

It was just before he did his run in London on the 'No Cure for Cancer' tour I saw him (with Lee Evans)...he was doing a warm up at the Comedy Store...

Like I said, I find Lee Evans more annoying and useless...but nonetheless, for me, the two of them together took the damn biscuit. Leary was just trying to shock the audience (in much the sameway Goatboy did) with stories of New Kids on the Block f*cking the quenn...Funny thing was, the only time people started moaning was when he dared to rag on Elvis, and his dying on the toilet.

If I'm wrong about Hicks/Leary I apologise..but I don't think I am...Hicks started at 14ish...died at 31 (ish?)...Stuart Lee would know...

Actually - it dawned on me earlier that supposedly both Hicks and Leary were inspired by/ripped off a comic called Sam Kinison (not sure of spelling...). Haven't seen any of Leary's recent stuff - but he must be better than Lee Evans, surely? Anyway even if he's never funny again he's OK by me for the 'No Cure...' material alone.

Hicks started about aged 16/17 and died early thirties of pancreatic cancer. I don't find that he and Leary are that similar except that they're both American and 'angry'. Sam Kinnison?? If you want to find who inspired Hicks and Leary, go no further than George Carlin, the original grumpy US social commentator. (Hicks has stated Carlin was an nfluence).

I find the idea of Debbie Gibson being raped by Jimi Hendrick's guitar quite amusing. As I'm a woman, does that make me a misogenist (or however it's spelt)? "Discuss"

>I find the idea of Debbie Gibson being raped by Jimi Hendrick's guitar quite amusing. As I'm a woman, does that make me a misogenist (or however it's spelt)? "Discuss"
>
Hey ho. I suppose there's no accounting for taste... I have to say I found it a bit sick myself. Loved his routine on JFK tho' "Bill, it was long time ago. Stop going on about it. OK - I'll stop going on about it - if you stop going on about Jesus. It was 2000 years ago, stop going on about it..."

Carlin's trajectory is intriguing - starts off safe and mainstream, discovers the "counterculture" and its attendant drugs and swearing in the late 60's (good friend of Lenny Bruce; attacks police officer when Bruce is arrested for 'lewd' stage act and ends up being arrested too), abandons "straight" material altogether and becomes huge underground success in the 70's with - for the most part - gentle, observational humour, and remains at the head of the field for a decade. Hit by heart attack in mid-80's, partly as a result of showbiz-clich� excess. Comes roaring back in late-80's with a vengeance, and for the next five years is responsible for some of the best, most blistering topical stand-up you could hope to hear. (Around this time, in 1992, Hicks referred to Carlin's most recent HBO Special in awe, saying he was "on fire that night".) However from late 90's on Carlin suffers the fate of most left-leaning humorists: he becomes too angry. Tom Lehrer simply stopped writing topical material when he reached this stage: both Jules Feiffer and Garry Trudeau say they find it increasingly difficult to continue, the older and angrier they get. Carlin doesn't appear to have noticed, and continues regardless, but by the time of writing all traces of humour have evaporated from his act, leaving only a furious, jaded ex-hippie standing screaming on a stage. He was a magnificent performer, but he's unlikely to ever be funny again.

Sam Kinison was a bloody funny comic, even when his material was unacceptable. (Imploring men to abstain from anal sex with their women - "C'mon, guys, there's other ways to hurt 'em.") His three disastrous marriages meant that his act was suffused with material that berated women, which can sometimes make his albums difficult listening, but they are worth it. (It's very odd listening to it - you realise there are echoes of him all through Hicks's performance, no matter how individual a style he created for himself.)

Kinison is responsible for the best demolition job on a heckler I have ever heard...

HECKLER: Speak up!
KINISON: Yeah, that's what your mom said to me as I was leaving your house this afternoon, although she was difficult to understand as she still had my semen in her throat... She said, (gargles) "Sam, don't forget to tell my retarded son not to fuck with your act"... And you may not recognise here when you get home. I shaved her back.

He is definitely worth a listen, but brace yourself.

And now: back to "Worst stand-up ever". (Incidentally, anyone who had the misfortune to catch 'Live At The Hackney Empire' in the early nineties will know that some pretty strong contenders for this title were showcased there...)

Around the time that Bill Hicks suddenly gained popularity in the UK he and Denis Leary were interviewed on Just For Laughs by Clive Anderson. They were asked about the similarities between their styles but they didn't think there was any unless you counted the "angry" thing. I still have it on tape (I'm sad that way.)

Denis Leary's motives may be suspect but No Cure For Cancer still had its moments. His style was to go for shock value where Bill Hicks genuinely believed what he was saying and wanted people to stop being complacent and actually think for themselves.

Anyway, neither would make my list for worst standup. Hell, does Bernard Manning count? Can he even count?

How many blacks does it take to change a country?

One if it's britain, and they desroy my beautiful country because they look and smell funny, and i was here first.

There you go: conclusive proof that i can count... sorry, that should have read: conclusive proof that i'm a cunt.

[Sorry, this isn't putting anyone forward as 'worst stand-up'...]

I've never heard of George Carlin before, but do you know of 60s US comic Mort Sahl? He was lauded on both sides of the Atlantic during the early 60s 'satire boom'. I heard of him because the 1st ever, dummy copy of Private Eye (the one with the 'End of Churchill cult' story on the front) had a short piece slagging him off, probably written by C.Booker. I read somewhere that he disappeared from view in the later 60s because he got obsessed with the Kennedy assassination, but made a comeback a few years ago. I haven't heard his stuff at all.

Mogwai, why don't you start a strand about 60s US comics, so we can go into more of this stuff?

Never seen any George Carlin stand up but Kevin Smith loves him and cast him in his last film (some will say, it should stay his last film) Dogma...as the Cardinal Glick I believe his name was.

Sorry I'm a bit sad when it comes to Kevin Smith.

>Kinison is responsible for the best demolition job on a heckler I have ever heard...
>
>HECKLER: Speak up!
>KINISON: Yeah, that's what your mom said to me as I was leaving your house this afternoon, although she was difficult to understand as she still had my semen in her throat... She said, (gargles) "Sam, don't forget to tell my retarded son not to fuck with your act"... And you may not recognise here when you get home. I shaved her back.


Must've been in the delivery, sorry. And surely "Speak up" isn't exactly a heckle?

>
>
>And now: back to "Worst stand-up ever".

Richard Blackwood.

>Must've been in the delivery, sorry.

Mmm. My many omissions and mis-spellings, in retrospect, do detract from its power and add to its "you had to be there" status. I suppose I could try again... ah, tits to it. Go and get the album and hear it for yourself.

>>And now: back to "Worst stand-up ever".
>
>Richard Blackwood.

Seconded. All that "white boy" shit. I'd love to have seen his face if someone had responded to all that with "yeah, chalky?" He has come to believe his own hype, and that's always baaad news. Give him a couple of years of unwarranted success and enough drugs, and he'll be strutting round his country manor with a cane like Chris Eubank.

Blackwood: Who da man?

Everyone else living in the real world: Will Smith?

Blackwood: Yeah that's right. Sorry for wasting everyone's time.

Richard Blackwood - a pale imitations of any successful black comedian/actor/singer - done the british way.

Dave Johns.
Now THAT is an appalling attempt at stand-up. If I EVER have to hear his 'foreign body' routine or hear him insult random people with the phrase 'druggie eyes' I may just have to brutally torture him.
He did the warm up for something - I didn't make a beeline to see his performance! I think it might have been prior to Let Them Eat Cake.

>Dave Johns.
>Now THAT is an appalling attempt at stand-up. He did the warm up for something - I think it might have been prior to Let Them Eat Cake.

Then he and the show were perfectly matched...

Ah. I see my close personal friend "Mogwia" has made a posting. Can we all just assume that I agree with everything he says?

Hecklers suck, don't they?

Then again I'd heckle Iain Lee any day.

Mind, I'd rather s??t on his head.