Wednesday 21st October 2009 @ St Georges, Bristol
As part of the Bristol Festival of Ideas

Vic Reeves is a big draw; anything with his name attached will get people watching, listening and, hopefully with the release of his new book, reading too. The Vast Book of World Knowledge is a tome of surreal drawings and annotations all about the weird and wonderful world that swirls around between Reeves’ ears (imagine Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything but as seen through one of those grotesque, skewed circus mirrors) and tonight we are going to delve into that universe.

However, the publicity leading up to this event has been ambiguous and as I take my seat in the grand surroundings of St Georges, I don’t know if I’m about to watch some stand-up, a lecture, or somewhere in between. Things aren’t made any clearer on stage either as projected onto a large screen is the illustrated skeleton of an antelope…! It feels like the stage is set for the most bizarre biology lesson you’ve ever had.

After a supremely awkward introduction from a mysterious, middle-aged man, tonight’s star comes bounding out onstage, half running, half dancing, and waves to the throng who are clapping and cheering enthusiastically. They both take a seat and it soon becomes clear that this event is a casual, public interview. Mr. Mystery starts by putting some questions to Reeves about his early life and the crowd chuckle along to anecdotes about him doodling on his sister’s face as a child, him wanting to go to art school and his time in the Darlington factories.

Just as a structure for the evening starts to emerge though, Reeves gets bored with the questions and events devolve into a surreal lecture about the world and everything in it. Starting with the antelope diagram and examining several others, Reeves abstractly talks us through some very peculiar but laugh-out-loud funny clippings from his book; we are led down the path of the surreal with chats about radiation resistant stallions, the beauty of dog turds, shoes of the future and celebrity caravans. It’s clear he enjoys making himself laugh and revels in sharing his surreal perspective on the world. Occasionally our compère tries to reign Reeves in and ask him a serious question but it’s too late, Reeves is off the leash but this is where he is at his best, free-styling about the weird and the wonderful.

The night ends with an anticlimactic Q&A session with the audience – the questions either too serious or too silly to be of any interest – but by the end of our hour with Vic Reeves we have delved into his universe and though we are no closer to understanding it, we’ve all had a good titter.

Matt Whittle