I’ve been comparing the number of gigs I did this time last year with the number I’ve done so far in 2012. And while I don’t share the opinion that simply doing lots of gigs makes you a better comic, although it certainly helps, it is learning from these gigs that makes you improve.
Regular illnesses in the first three months of the year have taken their toll, so I’ve had to drop out of a handful. Currently, I’m about seven or eight gigs behind my 2011 self, so I bet he’s feeling smug. What he doesn’t know is that his Edinburgh show is going to get a poorly written one-star review. I wonder how my 2013 self is getting on.
And as I just mentioned the E-word, I can now confirm that I have a venue and time-slot all firmly booked. So Love and Langton’s Dirty Laundry shall go to the ball.
Last night, I had a frustratingly ‘okay’ gig. The audience were friendly, plentiful and up for laughing; and although I did get laughs, they weren’t as loud or as regular as I’d hoped.
I bottled out of giving a second outing to the material debuted on Thursday night, as it still needs more doing to it. And in front of large and paying audience, I do feel a responsibility to give them something I know works. Testing new material is what poorly-attended open mic gigs are for.
So instead, I opted for the five minutes of Edinburgh material I’d been working on for the past few weeks that I believed was ‘in the bag’. Unfortunately, I was mistaken; I have now taken it out of the bag and will be working on it shortly.