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:: Thursday, May 01, 2008 ::

Branding

I was just skipping through the archives here looking for an old gig review when I stumbled across this one I wrote for a Richard Herring stand-up show in the back room on the Richmond Spring pub in Clifton in January 2005. Nothing unusual about that, until I noticed what I wrote about the support act.

"Russell Brand, who was pretty good, and whose observation that giving money to homeless people can be seen as using a scabby vending machine for karma was the highlight of the set. Very good. Slightly annoying voice."

Shit. I had no recollection of that until I reread it. I think Brand was pretty much unknown then. (He was already doing Big Brother's Big Mouth on E4 but I've never seen it so can't comment). Regardless, this was before his annoying voice became part of the public consciousness and before he found that he could pull in ridiculously large audiences of teenage girls by dreaming up ever more twee pet names for his genitalia.

I also liked him when I saw him at The Secret Policeman's Ball. Here most of his set revolved around dissecting the letters page from The Sun. It was well put together and flushed my preconceptions (or intermediate-perceptions?) about him. Although that is based on the assumption that it was a recent copy of The Sun, hopefully that day's, and not one he'd constructed out of months worth of clippings.

With that said, I have to confess to thinking he's a good stand-up, even if it makes me feel like I'm dumbing down to admit it. So why does he maintain his gossip magazine friendly, over-stylised façade and how does he think this will stand him as his audience grows up? It probably isn't something he need worry about quite yet but I'd like to think he will find a way of making the move from teen heartthrob to thinking person's political comedian ala Robert Newman rather than sink into self-parody ala Eddie Izzard. Time will tell.

Labels: Comedy

:: Dan 1.5.08 [Arc] [1 comments] [links to this post] ::
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Comments:

Oh, I feel the same way about not being really sure if I should admit to liking him. But he has me on the floor whenever I see him on the telly. So it goes.

# posted by  Natali : 1/5/08 5:15 PM

 

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