Monday 26th November 2012

 
This edition of the J-blog, Dear Reader, will be an exclusive Gig Report on Cocktails & Comedy Part IV, which took place Friday night. Ticket sales for the show were excellent, at one stage we had a complete sell-out. Unfortunately we were once again struck by The Curse Of Cocktails & Comedy! Loyal J-blog readers will recall that previous shows have been mirred by horrendous storms, comedians getting sick and stairs collapsing beneath us. Well, Part IV was not exempt from problems, as we were contacted at Midday on Friday by comedian Freddy Quinn and informed that he had booked another gig for that very night, and as such, would not be attending.

It’s unfortunate that this occured, as not only do we lose an advertised comic, but it effects the flow of the rest of the show and the other comedians on the bill. Booking a comedy show is a subtle skill, part science and part instinct. A good promoter books acts that compliment each other’s styles. Losing one has a knock-on effect for the entire gig.

Part IV was the first time JUICE has used Rich Wall as our MC and Compere. Rich is a comedian who has come across our books a couple of times in the past, but for some reason, since our recent “expansion'” (which means “running-a-few-more-gigs”) we’ve haven’t exploited his considerable talents. After a great showing at Cocktails & Comedy Part II we we eager to book Rich again, and Friday night proved JUICE to be fools for not doing so earlier. Rich played very nicely on an in-joke shared by some loyal JUICE Fans in the audience, a joke that went back to his first appearence at Part II. Without going into too much detail, let’s just say his nickname is “White Power” Rich. He warmed the audience up nicely, and when we sprung upon him a last-minute request to perform a longer set of material in the middle of the show (to make up the absent Freddy Quinn) he took to it with aplomb and really fleshed out the middle-section. JUICE eagerly looks forward to working with Rich in the future. Hopefully, a dystopian future populated by Cyberpunks and slutty robots.

Despite his relative inexperience (in terms of years-active and gigs-gigged) JUICE is always confident in having Tom Allsopp open the show. Tom is a unique performer whose amiable storytelling quickly endears him to the audience. Before going on stage, Tom asked whether he was allowed to perform one of his poems, or if JUICE thought that wouldn’t fit in or go over well with the audience. We tried to assure Tom that we’d be very happy for him to perform whatever he thinks is funny. We’re not looking for comedians to alter their act to try and “fit in” with a weekend audience. Tom finished his set with the poem and, sure enough, it went down a storm with the audience.

Freddie Farrell had to carry the middle-section on his own, after some help from Rich Wall doing an extended set. Freddie has a couple of moments of slightly darker material, which play well in virtually any comedy room in the country. However, Stafford tends to be a different kettle of fish, and more often than not the nice people of Stafford don’t seem to enjoy dark jokes. Still, after provoking a few “ooohs!” from the audience, Freddie was always able to steer them back onside with his cheeky-chappy demeanour and some nice stories about his young son.

Headlining the bill were Jollyboat, a musical-comedy act with a huge amount of originality and energy. Jollyboat has achieved plaudits and success in the last two years, taking 5 Star Reviews for their Edinburgh Shows, reccomendations from The Independent and garnering lots of fans along the way. JUICE has been dying to book Jollyboat for months, and struggled to get them on the bill for Cocktails & Comedy. Negotiations on fees and arrangements finally alligned when Jollyboat were on their way down south for a batch of gigs in London. As long as JUICE could put the two brothers up for the night in relatively pleasant accomodations, then we’d be able to steer the Jollyboat into the Cocktails & Comedy harbour. Luckily for Stafford comedy-lovers, Rob Halden possesses a set of parents who are far too nice for their own good!

It was always our intention with Cocktails & Comedy to try and reach more female audience-members and to turn them into fans of JUICE (that sounds wrong). This was the first show at which we didn’t have any comedians of the female persuasion, and there was a fear that this would be as appealing to female punters. We needn’t have worried. As soon as the young, handsome and not-at-all-dangerous Jollyboat brothers the audience made, what can only be described as, a series of high-pitched squeals and screams. It was like Beatlemania in its heyday (or any of the subsequent poppular boybands of which JUICE is not aware). There was a dangerous level of swooning taking place.

But female appreciation to one-side, the Jollyboat delivered a brilliant, entertaining and exciting set of comedy songs, the pace of which was repeatedly spoilt by loud applause-breaks from the audience. In fact, JUICE has rarely seen so many applause-breaks during one set. The Jollyboat will surely be big stars very soon, and JUICE hopes we can book them a couple more times before they leave our price-range.

All-in-all it was a lovely show which the audience seemed to thoroughly enjoy. In the pub after the show we got some brilliant feedback from audience members who professed to really enjoy the event. One family of four said they were a little unsure it would be able to really entertain all of them, given the age-gap between twenty-somethings and their parents. Yet they were pleasantly surprised and eager to come back for more JUICE in the future! Huzzah!

We’ve enjoyed all the Cocktails & Comedy shows this year and can’t wait to return to Number 15 in 2013 for Part V and hopefully more throughout the year! And while we’ve got you here, don’t forget that next Monday 3rd December is our anniversarry show called the JUICE-A-Nanny, celebrating 8 Years of JUICE! Join us at Joxer Brady’s from 8pm!

Friday 23rd November 2012

Well, Dear Reader, JUICE is in the middle of a busy week. Last night was our first live radio show on 87.7 Stafford FM. It’s the first time the format of the new radio show with co-hosts Neil Reading & Rob Halden is getting an airing before the masses. Which is strange to say because, in theory, internet radio has a virtually global reach, whilst we’re getting excited about being on the dusty old wireless restricted to Stafford and the surrounding areas. But it really does have a completely different and exciting feel. It’s like going from North Norfolk Digital to Radio Norwich.

Neil and Rob have been working together for close to a decade, and there is a palpable chemistry to their radio partnership*. Things really kick into high-gear during their TV Reviews when discussing TV shows they’re particularly passionate or opinionated about. We’re obviously biased, but there really is no other radio programme like it. We defy anyone to find a radio show that is exclusively about comedy (seriously, if you do find one let us know).

Earlier this week JUICE received a number of Tweets from Canadians who were very excited about a forthcoming show. The Canadians kept talking about the upcoming West Indies Vs. Africa Comedy Show that JUICE Comedy was putting together, and how excited they were about it. Numerous Tweets later it, turned out there is an imposter-version of JUICE Comedy over in Canada hosting some bizarre intercontinental comedy battle. However, we did throw our considerable support behind Team West Indies, who unfortunately lost out to Team Africa in a contest of we-have-no-fucking-clue-what. The moral of the story is, you should all Follow Us On Twitter.

Tonight is a big night for us, as Cocktails & Comedy Part IV takes place at No. 15. Through some considerable begging, stealing and conning we’ve managed to book the truely excellent Jollyboat as our Headline Act for the night. Part of the deal involves Rob Halden putting them up for the night, as the lads are trekking down to that-there London for some gigs in the Big Smoke. We’re also very excited to have Rich Wall taking over as MC and Host for this show. Rich is a comedian that JUICE really should have done more with over the years, and it’s our own fault for not exploiting his talents further.

You can check out the latest JUICE Tube video made for the event right here.

As of this writing, there’s a very small number of tickets left for the gig. Contact Rob Halden on Facebook for more details.

JUICE is also gearing up for the 8th Annual JUICE-A-Nanny on December 3rd, a celebration of our anniversarry or birthday in the comedy world. Every year we invite our favourite comedians to perform for us and share some booze and cake. We also have the presentation of the JUICE Comedy Awards which we use to recognise some top comedy talent. It’s all very hush-hush up until the big day, but we can exclusively reveal that, much like last year, there will be TWO awards given out this year!

We think you should also check out this Podcast recorded by comedians Paul Savage, Tom Allsopp & Rob Halden which is, for some reason, called The Imaginauts. It is very, very pointless.

*This means gay

JUICE Chat with Rich Wall

“It felt like being asked to play football at Wembley, whilst eating an ice-cream, whilst waking up from a nap.”

JUICE: How would you describe your type of comedy/performance?

Rich: Someone recently described me being like “having an annoying younger sibling grin at you because they think they’ve done something witty and clever”. That’s not what I was attempting, but I’ll take it.

At first I waned to do comedy that changed what people thought about important things. Judging by the material I came out with, I obviously thought that the Chuckle Brothers and things that happened on the bus were immensely important.

JUICE: How did you get started in stand-up and why? What was your first gig like?

Rich: I started by sitting in audiences, hanging on the every word of comics, either thinking “this person is amazing, I could never possibly be that funny and inspiring”, or “this person is a tragic mental, if they can get paid for comedy, so can I”. Eventually one of my friends booked me into a gig, and I have since gone some way towards emulating both of the above examples.

JUICE: What do you take with you to a gig? What’s in your gig-bag?

Rich: Hair product. And to think my grandfather mined coal from the Earth.

JUICE: If you had to estimate, roughly how many miles do you think you’ve done over the years?

Rich: I wouldn’t want to estimate. Mostly because I would feel compelled to then sit with a calculator, several old diaries and a pen, and refine my estimate, until well past the time when it stopped being an understandable curiosity. But it’s enough to warrant owning shares in motorway pasties.

JUICE: What’s been your most memorable gig to date, for either good or bad reasons?

Rich: There are a few. I compéred XS Malarkey in Manchester for the first time over the summer, which is a very special gig indeed. It felt like being asked to play football at Wembley, whilst eating an ice-cream, whilst waking up from a nap. Partly in that I was very surprised to find it happening.

My worst gig ever was at Sheffield Hallam Uni. 150 drunken students blathered away, ignoring the sad acoustic guitar player that was on before me. Then the MC walked on, was roundly booed by the crowd, and then said: “Our next act is a comedian, apparently…” (turns and hands mic to me) “Here you go, Rich”. Two minutes of angry swearing followed. They didn’t even listen.

JUICE: Where’s your favourite place to perform?

Rich: Stockport. It’s a small town, in the shadow of a bigger town, where everyone in the audience seems to like rock music and cider. I feel very much at home (I am from Wolverhampton).

JUICE: Which comedians have influenced you over the years? Who are your comedy heroes?

Rich: When I turned 19 someone lent me a Bill Hicks DVD, and I got a bit obsessive about it for a while. I must have been insufferable to be around.

There’s a couple of Canadian guys called Glenn Wool and Craig Campbell who make me want to walk around pretending in my own head that I am also Canadian. They are that heroically funny.

JUICE: Who are your favourite acts on the comedy circuit right now?

Rich: Johnny “Showaddy-Waddy” Sorrow. He’s not only a lovely man, his act is impossible to properly describe to anyone who hasn’t seen him. He is like Vietnam. You weren’t there, man. You weren’t there. I also, I love what Martin “BigPig” Mor does. When I grow up, I want to be like him.

You can see Rich Wall as the MC for Cocktails & Comedy Part IV on Friday 23rd November. Visit his website for more fun-fact about Rich!

Monday 12th November, 2012

Well, dear reader, any pretense of this being a Friday blog has gone right out the window recently. We’ll always try and deliver a weekly blog to you, but it’s looking more and more like the day is forever malleable.

Seven days ago we held the last New Act / New Material Show of the year. “The last? But what about December?” I hear you cry. More on that a little later. Last week’s show contained a few old favourites and some brand new faces to JUICE. Jack Kirwan and Aaron Twitchen have been on the list of ‘acts-we-must-get-on’ for a while now, and it was great to finally bring them to JUICE. Jack unfortunately drew the short straw and went on first, tackling a rather quiet and muted audience. Aaron was as lively as ever, and several ladies in the audience told the J-blog that he was their favourite of the night.

First-timers that really impressed JUICE included Ed Easton and Liam Withnail. Ed’s off-beat performance has theatrical, sketch-like aspects to it, which were both engaging and also a welcome change of pace from the more regular stand-ups. Withnail brought some unique observations about life in Edinburgh and has the assured swagger of the Front Man from a band. With any luck we’ll be able to welcome both these acts back to future JUICE shows.

The New Act / New Material Show marked the first time that Tom Allsopp has ever MC’ed a comedy gig. It’s a completely different skill-set to being a regular stand-up, but Tom tackled it with aplomb. His story-telling felt natural and intimate as well as being really funny. Luckily for Tom, our lovely JUICE audience were neither chatty nor heckling, so it was a nice gig to make his bones on.

We also had a returning Kiri Pritchard-McLean who, despite being on the bill last month, delivered a brand new set of material, just as fun as last time. Kiri has confessed that she’s got lots of new material she wants to play with, so hopefully we’ll get her down more often, as she is one of our very favourite acts. And one of JUICE’s Founders, Rob Halden, road-tested some new material which was polarising at best. After breaking the audience in with his regular routine, Rob began a series of slow, angry rants at the audience. Popular or not, there were at the very least different.

The final section of the show revealed what JUICE has felt for a while now, and that is our start time for this show needs to change. By the time the last third of the show kicks off, audience members have either gone to home to get up for work the next morning, or if they’ve stuck around, they’re too tired to get enthusiastic about the comics. After discussing things with the Joxer Brady’s Management, we’ve decided to push back the star time to 8 pm so that we can have an excited and energised audience throughout.

So that was the final New Act / New Material Show of 2012, but on Monday 3rd December you can look forward to the Annual JUICE-A-Nanny! Celebrating JUICE Comedy’s birthday/anniversarry, we gather together some of our favourite comics for a shindig and a knees-up! Already confirmed for this year’s JUICE-A-Nanny are Billy MacGuire, Jo Ettrick Hogg, Phil Pagett, Harriet Dyer, WudWud, Darren Harriott and Paul Savage! We’re waiting to hear back from some more exciting acts (including Craig Deeley!) to see if their schedules can fit us in! So mark it in your calenders, Monday 3rd December 8pm JUICE-A-Nanny celebrating 8 Years of JUICE!

And while you’ve got your calenders handy, dear readers, tickets are available NOW for Cocktails & Comedy Part IV at Number 15 on Friday 23rd November! Just three weeks away! You can get tickets from Number 15 itself, or you can track down Rob Halden in Joxer Brady’s and get them from him. Priced at £5 for a show being headlined by the excellent Jollyboat! These musical-pirate-sketch-comedy-maniacs have wowed the Edinburgh Festival two years in a row with their 5 Star Shows which not only picked up a reccomendation from The Independent (yeah, that’s right, The Inde-fucking-pendent!) but also won them the Best Musical Comedy Award 2011! These lads are hilarious and they’re just one part of a show that also features Freddie Farrell, Tom Allsopp, Rich Wall and Freddy Quinn! You’d be mad to miss out on this comedy!

That’s all for this week’s J-blog, we’re back on some random day in the next week, hopefully Friday but frankly you just can’t rely on us.

T-shirts & Expansions

Big thanks to CODENAME_U81K for our sexy new logo! Head on over to The Goosefactory for art, designs and t-shirts from this awesome Stafford artist!

Speaking of t-shirts, we’re working hard to get some JUICE shirts available to buy before Cocktails & Comedy Part IV in a couple of weeks. The shirts themselves have all been designed by CODENAME_U81K and a number of limited editions are currently worn by JUICE staff & associates. Quite a few of you JUICERS out there have expressed an interest in buying a shirt, and it’d be great to be able to see them on people around Stafford and at the gigs. We’re looking at keeping the costs down so we can sell them to you as cheap as possible. Why? Because we’re not in the selling-clothes business, we’re in the Badass Comedy business, and we’d LOVE to see our audiences wearing our shirts! Get in touch and let us know if you want one of the first shirts to roll off the presses!

Tickets are on sale NOW for Cocktails & Comedy Part IV, priced at £5they’re available from the venue itself, Number 15 on Greengate Street, or you can contact Rob Halden and get them from him. In addition to having Freddie Farrell, Freddie Quinn and Jollyboart on a show hosted by Rich Wall, we can now exclusively reveal that Tom Allsopp has been added to the bill! Tom is an excellent comedian who recently Headlined our show at The Gatehouse Theatre. It all takes place on Friday 23rd November and it’s going to be a fantastic show!

Monday night sees our monthly New Act / New Material Show return to Joxer Brady’s! This month we’ve got a number of comedians we’ve been dying to get on the show for a while now, including Aaron Twitchen and Jack Kirwan. We’re also going to be graced with new material by JUICE Breakout Act Of 2011 Kiri Pritchard-McLean and one of the Founders of JUICE, Rob Halden. We’re really proud of how long we’ve been running this show and supporting comedians who are either starting out in their careers or looking for a performance space to test out new material. It’s always an excellent night out and the show is absolutely FREE to all who want to come.

Earlier in the week JUICE took a trip to the local towns of Cannock & Hednesford, on the search for a venue with which we can expand to. As he’s based in the area, Tom Allsopp acted as our guide and showed us around. The idea at this time is to set up a similar New Act / New Material Show to run concurrently with our one in Stafford. The ideal set-up would be to run the show on the same night as the Stafford show, First Monday Of The Month. That way we can offer comedians two gigs in front of two audiences, on the same night, just 15 minutes apart. This can make all the different to comics who are travelling from all over the country to get some stage time. Stay tuned to the J-Blog for further updates on this!