Bloodstock, Camden, Kirkcaldy - Socks do variety

After a quiet month for the Socks, we crammed quite the variety of gigs into a week, giving ourselves a mini Edinburgh Fringe experience to boot.

Last Saturday saw the Socks playing the New Blood stage at Bloodstock, a Heavy Metal festival in Derbyshire. And very heavy metal it is too, the sort where the vocalists scream constantly and the guitars don't stop for breath. Quite how comedy was going to go down there was hard to predict. But what do you know, being the middle of three acts, doing just 20 minutes, we went down brilliantly.

We gave them I'm A Sock, Halloween, Michael Jackson, Walk On The Wild Side and Sweary Poppins, all self-teched by me from my ipod taped to the set, and that was twenty minutes flown by in a blink. Smashing crowd.

The on Wednesday and Thursday the Socks played The Bill Murray pub as part of The Camden Fringe (thanks to Louisa Gummer for the photo). Advance sales were slow, though I have to say I enjoyed having the Red61 ticket sales to check every day, giving me a small taste of the Edinburgh experience that we're missing this year. When it came to it though, Wednesday had about 30 in, and Thursday looked dangerously close to a sellout (the room only holds 50). At time of writing I only know the advance sales and can't see the door sales, but they were both cracking gigs, getting us a 4 star review and being a perfect end to the Socks Do Shakespeare spring tour.

Then on Friday it was off to Kirkcaldy. A booking that I'd agreed to, initially hoping I'd surround it with classes in libraries up there and maybe make a week of it, it ended up with me flying, hiring a car, and staying over in a B&B, all to play a 10 minute slot (shortest slot of the year I think) in a variety show. So not a very profitable gig, but an enjoyable one.

And an interesting one. A young magician called Liam Black had organised it, and put together quite the most diverse bill I've ever been on. The Socks followed a childrens Pipe Band. Liam himself did fifty-year-old gags, some of which hadn't gone through a 21st century filter but the audience seemed to like them, and he did a lot of trad magic tricks, which again the coothy audience warmed to. There was a mind reader, a singer from a kids show called The Singing Kettle which I hadn't heard of but which was apparently massive in Scotland back in the day, and there was Dean Park, who's been in panto for 40 years and who tells The Comedians style of 1960s jokes (luckily racism free) in a cracking professional style, opening and closing with a cheesy song.

My favourite act was stand up David Kay, an actual circuit comic with a unique dry style which only some of the audience got, and with whom I went for a drink afterwards, learning a lot about the working of Scottish TV comedy (he;s had a few TV things, including a sitcom pilot made by the Absolutely guys). 

To round off my whistle stop Scottish tour, I made it into Edinburgh on Saturday morning before anyone was awake (well, from 10 - 11.30, so before any comedians were up) and got to feel a tiny bit of the Edinburgh vibe I've been missing. I smelled the Edinburgh smell! Also revisited our haunts of Bristo Square, seeing its remodelled look, Worlds End Close where we've stayed for two years, up the Royal Mile, down the Mound, past the Assembly Rooms, through Princes St Gardens, up The Vennel where we stayed two years ago, and away. And do you know what, I felt almost like I'd done Edinburgh, without having to form out six thousand quid for the privilege.

In the airport I started writing ideas, and even some bad gags, for what might turn out to be next year's show. I'm starting with Art as the subject, but that could change (art was to be the subject for 2015's show, before it morphed into Minging Detectives, so anything could happen). Best gag so far? "I discovered I could do modern art when I was tracing maps of the Middle East. I couldn’t do a trace of Beirut, I couldn’t do a trace of Egypt, but I could do a good Trace o’Yemen." So, a lot of work to do yet, eh.

The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre do a tiny bit more Shakespeare in Halifax, Wolverhampton, Nottingham and Goole this autumn, returning with a brand new show in 2018. Stay tuned.