Saturday 20th August:- I think the best place to start a run of shows at the Edinburgh Fringe is in Venezuela. Yep, I've been stuck in the capital Caracas for 36 hours because our airline has overbooked an international flight (yes, overbooked. Like a restaurant). "Bullett and Gunn's Massive Pop Explosion" is going to arrive a day late. I tell Brett, who decides to cobble together a one-off solo show - "Brett Gunn's Stupid Little Pop Guff" for the first spot. To avoid him feeling jealous, I neglect to tell him that the airline put me up in a $300 per night hotel with jacuzzi and 17 main meals all available on self-service. I ate everything. It was like the pig taking over the sty (I found the roasted peppers stuffed with tuna a little undercooked for my palatte but the Champagne enema made up for it.
Sunday 21st August - I rock up 2 hours before the gig, totally jetlagged to hell, having spent the plane journey to Scotland sitting next to some big shot promoter, who seems impressed that I am able to form coherent sentences and tells me she'll come see our gig. Through bleary eyes I insist, "That's great but don't come today. We'll be awful today". She agrees. I meet the staff at our venue, The Jekyll and Hyde pub, who all know me as "that idiot who missed his plane". Me and Brett get out on the streets to distribute some flyers I designed and printed up very cheaply. I'm pleased with what I've done -- it's an image of me furiously blowing my brains out with a revolver, whilst Brett stands gornlessly next to me, oblivious that he is also about to be full of lead. Punters on the street seem a little bemused. The gig goes OK but we only do about 25 minutes. We walk back to where we're staying - my mate Laurie's house - and drink very cheap Venezuelan rum. Laurie, who is in marketing, returns and tells me my flyers are "total shite". He very kindly redesigns the lot and prints them for us in colour.
Monday 22nd August
Hungover and jetlagged - what a combo. I wake up on the floor with Laurie..'s cats sniffing at me dubiously as though I..'m a bit of old food. Somehow I drag myself up and off we go flyering again, this time with well produced colour flyers. We have a huge Scottish breakfast at the local cafe and then press on with the gig. As I walk on stage I notice the bigshot prpomoter from the plane. Five minutes later, I look up and she..'s scarpered. With the pressure off, I start to get into my stride and the gig ends really well. On the first day, we collected £20 in voluntary contributions. Today, we got £45 - a good sign. Another strange thing also happened... as a musical double act with a reputation for being somewhat crude, we tend to find that young people, especially men, tend to find us funniest. So it was a bizarre sight when a sixty-something Scottish couple came bounding up to us to stick £15 in the pot. "Aye, we loved the show, boys!" they said, talking over each other. Turns out they know my Uncle Bryn and came down to our gig out of tangential interest. "Do you think Bryn would like the show?" I asked Derek, Annabelle..'s wife. His face darkened comically, "Nooo, son, he..'d freak right ooot!". And then he laughed very heartily and offered to take me and Brett for pizza. Cheers guys!
Tuesday 23rd August
Flushed with a little success, well fed on pizzas, and with a full gammet of merchandising material - flyers, t-shirts, photos, and free CDs of our sketch material - we blitz today..'s gig and do a full 40 minutes. This comedy lark is easy. We stay up til 4am and write a few new bits of material but spend most of the time laughing uncontrollably about a joke we thought up about Bruce Forsythe.
Wednesday 24th and Thursday 25th
On a roll! A couple of mates turn up from Birmingham. They have seen some our our very poor, very early gigs. These were the days when we were so bad we would get threats. They are totally bewildered that we are doing so well. They buy us loads of cheap wine and we celebrate like rock stars. In a fit of positivity we ask a newbie comic if he'd like to do a spot during our gig and he agrees.
Friday 26th
The bubble bursts. I'm exhausted. I havent slept in a proper bed since before my Venezuela trip and Brett has had the sofa for the week. I barely mumble my way through the gig. Brett, fortunately, takes up the slack, but with double acts if one of you is looking like a drop-out it..'s simply not salvagable. We decide to cut the gig short... but I forget we have the newbie comic still to come. The gig limps onward and as I rattle my pint glass for collections (just £15 today) I see no less than three people with writing pads leaving the venue... the dreaded reviewers. Three in one day, at the worst gig. I am very dejected and we have an extra gig this evening at The Beehive. At times like this there is only one thing to do... eat loads of cakes! Me and Brett stuff our faces with strawberry cakes, vanilla slices, caramel creams and coffee. As we go on for the Beehive gig, we..'re totally wired -- and it dawns on us we are appearing in front of a crowd of very drunken young men from Northern Ireland. I call one of them Scottish, which he seems to take badly but when i enquire earnestly in a posh English accent "what..'s the difference anyway?" he starts laughing and the gig beds in. Within two minites we are conducting a full singing session using lyrics by rap legends NWA and they are lauding Brett for looking like Cameron from Ferris Bueller..'s Day Off. Brett climbs on the tables and denounces Bruce Forsythe and the gig ends in a mass of paper aeroplanes, flying lager and applause. A really good gig and a pleasure to work with such a positive crowd.
Saturday 27th
A good crowd for our last gig and we do a decent set. To celebrate we go to see Jerry Sadowitz at the Assembly Rooms with some friends who were up for the day.