What Goes Around....

Today is a brief pondering type blog with little humour in it. Read at your peril. Not that there's any peril in it. Nor that you may have any peril on you at the time to place by said blog for aforementioned reading. And so on and so forth.....

Sometimes it is a bit odd how things come around. Last night at Fat Tuesday the line up included Dave Gorman and Ed Byrne. Along with Stuart Goldsmith it made for a fairly superb eve, and I have the hangover to prove it. I have worked with both Ed and Dave a few times before now, and they are both very lovely people and superb comics. What's odd about it is that I first went to see Ed perform live in my first year of university at Kent in 1999. I watched him do a full show, remembering fondly his now very famous material about the Cornpopper's catchphrase and how men's pants get increasingly bigger as they are taken off while women's get smaller. It reduced me and my friends to hysterics and way before I'd even considered taking on stand-up as a career we all queued for his autograph afterwards having seen him on the telly. Ed very kindly signed one to me saying 'To Tiernan. As in Tommy the Perrier award winning bastard' and it was stuck up on my student room wall for the rest of the year. Similarly, when finishing uni and having spent several months trying stand-up for the first time, I had become a big fan of 'Are you Dave Gorman?' on telly and was intrigued as to how Dave had gone on from the circuit to his own full theme based shows. Not thinking anything of comedy etiquette or such things I just emailed him and was over the moon to get a reply telling me that he just persevered with what he wanted to do and the best advice he could give was to do what you want to and not pander to the circuit, wishing me the best with my comedy career. I spent the rest of the day telling everyone I had got an email back and had put up with my flatmate telling me it was from one of the other 52 Dave Gormans who was having a laugh.

Then, several years later, I have them both at the gig I run and find myself introducing them onstage. Not only that but the family Byrne have now been en masse to my last two Edinburgh shows as Byrne the younger has directed them and will no doubt receive some sort of sarcastic text message from him for pointing this out. I found myself at some point in the evening just thinking how odd that all is, remembering hearing how Josie Long had had a letter written out on Fist of Fun by Stewart Lee and Richard Herring only to find herself constantly on several bills with them many years later. Its a testament to stand-up that this sort of thing happens. I suppose its a combination of the fact that acts still enjoy doing live comedy years into their career and also that the circuit is a smaller place than people think. There's probably some further clever theories, including the one that I just frikkin' rock and the world should deal with it, or the cop out theory that this is all a dream and I'm actually an accountant called Barry who feel asleep after eating a whole Gorgonzola. Needless to say, its a nice thing to notice and I'm still grateful that this sort of stuff happens. I'd hate to think a day would arrive where I stop meeting people who's work I admire and look up to. If that does happen then I hope the Gorgonzola thing turns out to be true.

Incidentally, Ed's new show is excellent and you should go and buy tickets for it asap:

ED BYRNE THE CROWD PLEASER TOUR DATES

And Dave was warming up for his Dave's One Night Stand which will be on telly soon, and again, is well worth watching, especially for the excellent Las Vegas story.

That's it. Tomorrow shall be back to whimsy and tomorrow night I am doing a gig in my onesi. You heard it here first.


Last note. For anyone who read yesterday's blog, I was emailed a joke that one of the small children left for me at the tours after I had gone. This is the joke. I think we can all agree that its sheer gold:

How does an onion put his coat on?
He puts an apple on his head!


Amazing.