If the cards had fallen differently Luke Haines might have been as big as Blur. As frontman of The Auteurs he was briefly tipped for Britpop greatness, so it is no surprise that he likes the idea of alternative histories. This special show, The North Sea Scrolls, was all about them, as Haines, former Microdisney linchpin Cathal Coughlan, writer Andrew Mueller and cellist Audrey Riley mixed spoken word with punchy lo-fi melodies.
Kieran and the Joes are a three-man sketch group (Kieran Hodgson, Joe Markham and Joe Parham, working with co-writer Tom Meltzer) who are young, personable and very neatly dressed in shirts and ties - but while they may appear clean-cut their comedy veers nicely towards the dark.
From the moment Adam Riches bursts onto the stage, spewing his business cards around as a manic showbiz agent who wants to sign up everyone and everything - including even the venue's walls and floor - this is a show of hyper energy and absurdist comedy.
Tiffany Stevenson ★★★★
The comic is currently appearing on Show Me the Funny on ITV, where her smily disposition is a welcome antidote to some of the sneery critics they have mustered. There’s boyfriend stuff in Cavewoman but Stevenson also delivers a few astute political observations, as well as the occasional unPC gag - such as suggesting Tina Turner's dance moves were inspired by her avoiding Ike’s punches.
A three-piece hailing from Seattle and its environs, The Cave Singers are an authentically hairy proposition. With his tweed hat and red beard, at this Edge festival gig singer Pete Quirk looked like a cross between the late Robin Cook and a stray leprechaun from Finian’s Rainbow, while Derek Fudesco dispensed his lovely, liquid guitar lines from beneath a blur of flying hair.
Don’t be fooled by DeAnne Smith’s gamine appearance of boyish clothing and Bieberesque hairstyle. And don’t be fooled either by the way her act begins with a riff on existential angst - prompted by an Australian waiter saying “No worries” when he took her order - which turns into a song (one of a few in the set) accompanied by a ukulele. Don’t be fooled because you’ll realise there’s a lot of much edgier and darker material that she gets away with because she looks and sounds so sweet.
Jason Cook has masterly audience skills, and he needed them all the night I saw him. A middle-aged teacher (who really should know better), whose refreshment clearly led her to the delusion that she was the person people had paid to see, kept interrupting. Even the engaging and unfailingly polite Geordie comic's patience was wearing thin, but he constantly bested her and got on with the job of making us laugh.
When you watch Glenn Wool, you realise the heights that a talented performer can reach simply by standing on stage and telling stories – not all of them necessarily true - when they are weaved with wonderfully crafted gags and slow-burn pay-offs, with some subtle political humour also in the mix.
When you watch Glenn Wool, you realise the heights that a talented performer can reach simply by standing on stage and telling stories – not all of them necessarily true - when they are weaved with wonderfully crafted gags and slow-burn pay-offs, with some subtle political humour also in the mix.
It has been, we can safely agree, a truly terrible week. Art, culture, call it what you will, is unequal to the task of diagnosing a nation’s ills, let alone curing them. But on a night such as the inaugural Comedy Prom, it comes equipped with healing balm. This evening was maybe not perfect. There were wrinkles, little bits here and there that didn’t quite work. But the Saturday night that the BBC Proms gave over to the business of laughter could not have been more opportune. This is going to sound hokey, but comedy on this occasion brought its audience close to a state of grace.
Something seems to have shifted in Jackie Leven’s life. About six stone, to be precise. At the Edge Festival show the Fife-born folk-blues-soul troubadour was, almost literally, half the man he used to be: the rotund, Rabelaisian figure of old was dramatically slimmed down and sipped water rather than, as at a recent Edinburgh gig, glugged from a bottle of white wine. Perhaps it’s the side effect of a bladder infection he told us (a little too much) about, and which necessitated a “comfort break” halfway through. Or perhaps, at 61, this notoriously hard-living man is finally looking after himself.
Something seems to have shifted in Jackie Leven’s life. About six stone, to be precise. At the Edge Festival show the Fife-born folk-blues-soul troubadour was, almost literally, half the man he used to be: the rotund, Rabelaisian figure of old was dramatically slimmed down and sipped water rather than, as at a recent Edinburgh gig, glugged from a bottle of white wine. Perhaps it’s the side effect of a bladder infection he told us (a little too much) about, and which necessitated a “comfort break” halfway through. Or perhaps, at 61, this notoriously hard-living man is finally looking after himself.