Fringe wrap

These are the last few shows I'll be talking about from the Edinburgh fringe.

Charlotte Young tells stories about the clandestine missions given to her by a mysterious instructor and her attempts to track him down.  She was half of the crew who gave us the Richard Dawkins show earlier in the week.  Intelligent, well developed and very funny.  Charlotte's multi-media presentation style was perhaps better suited to television than stage, but we all had a great time at her show, Audi, Vide, Tace.

Go see her if you get the chance.

We took the Scoundrel to see Matthew Highton, and Matthew recommended we see a couple of other performers.  The first of these was Paul Foot.  Paul's comedy was unconventional; the first 20 minutes of his hour show were dedicated to a single joke (he took time), which was one of the best jokes I heard at the festival.  While the remaining material was not as strong, the audience seemed split between the horrified and the overjoyed with his performance.  I particularly like the time and effort Mr Foot put into berating audience members who heckled.

Go see him if you have discount tickets, but don't expect a standard stand-up show.

The last show Matthew recommended, and the last we saw at the festival, was Dr Brown's show Because which took absurdest comedy to its illogical extreme.  At least a dozen audience members left during the show, but we were never going to be amongst them.  Between starting food fights with the front row to having volunteers rub him down with baby oil, Dr Brown specialised in taking an awkward situation and pushing it one step further.  We were rolling on the floor with laughter and would certainly see him again.

Go.  Go, but don't wear your best clothes unless you want them to smell of banana, cornflakes and other less savory stuff.

Okay, festival behind us.  I promise there is an Edinburgh wrap-up coming, along with the first couple of Berlin posts.

A day in Glasgow

Before we headed out I snapped a photo of this handsome guy at the end of Market St.  He's a there to commemorate the members of the Blackwatch.

The Scoundrel and I got the train to Glasgow.  I took a number of photos from the train of the Scottish country side.  Some of them turned out, some did not.

Immediately upon leaving Glasgow Queen St station we were greeted with a square filled to bursting point with statues.  I just gave up, and didn't photograph any of them.  It was such a nice day, and we had so much city to see, it just seemed a waste of time.

We set out West and, taking my mothers advice, stopped to smell the roses.  Or in the Scoundrel's case, check out the local talent.

It was sad we only had one day in Glasgow, because we saw so many things which made us say "gosh, look at that," but didn't have the opportunity to explore it all.

The Kelvin Grove museum was our destination for the afternoon, and as we reached the door the Scoundrel told me they had "better have dinosaurs, or it's not a real museum."  I didn't know, but they did have a statue of a clergyman imitating Conan.

And this small dog.

And some armour.  I took a lot of photos of the armour.

There were dinosaurs, as it turned out, but they didn't get anyone as excited as the armour.

Amazing artifacts filled the cases, like this knight's helm designed in the terrifying image of a demon skull.

Things got a bit silly.

When we left Kelvin Grove, we went in search of some Scotch.  I had a specific mission; to drink a scotch which is older that I am.  The Scoundrel was on the less specific but no less difficult mission to drink some damn fine Scotch.

Glasgow was another beautiful Scottish city, and has continued the nation's straight record for stealing our hearts.

I have a couple of final Edinburgh posts to put up, but we've left Scotland behind now.  I'm writing this from the breakfast table in Berlin.  We were all very sad to leave Scotland, but the next adventure awaits.

A quick taste of festival

I have a full update coming to give details of the trip the Scoundrel and I took to Glasgow.  In the mean time:

We saw a show called There's only one Lord Byron, because I had heard there was a good Lord Byron show on.  As it turned out, this wasn't it.  Something didn't quite work in this production which had everything going for it: good writing, top subject matter, hot babes.  Perhaps, in the face of all the amazing free stuff we've seen so far, the £ 10 asking price seemed a bit rough.  Petty, but that's what it came down to.

Go if you have free tickets.

Next review: haggis pie.

This was a great idea when drunk.  Sadly, we were not drunk and the haggis pie threatened to destroy us from the inside out.

Get it if you have had at least eight beers.

Tripod are performing Tripod versus the dragon, and we went along on Wednesday night.  The show is different for Tripod in that it follows a single story rather than being a series of comedy songs.  While I wasn't falling out of my chair with laughter (a lot of the material is quite serious and sad) I was entertained throughout.  The addition of Elana Stone as a fourth cast member has brought the already formidable level of musical talent to a whole other plane.  They admitted after the show that it's still developing; we all bought albums anyway.

Go for whatever they're asking.

More festival

It's been a while since I updated on shows we've seen:

Richard Dawkins does not exist and we can prove it: a show very much in its gestation, the creators confessed to us afterwards they're still struggling a little with the maths and running to time.  Great show though by two talented performers.

A slacker's guide to Western theater was a good show to see in the morning.  It didn't require an excess of brain power and was reasonably entertaining without making us think.  Possibly requires a background in theater or being a wanker to get some of the jokes.  Worth going if you can get discount tickets.

Joey Page's marvellous human museum was a surprise gem.  We got our tickets for free because some pretty women tricked us, and we're glad they did.  Joey's high-energy, self-depreciating and slightly weird style of stand up had the whole audience eating from his hand.  Worth the full price of admission.

A nifty history of evil was put on by Australian comedian John Robertson who I had never heard of and am now ashamed I had never heard of.  His free show had an audience rolling in their seats.  The only true evil was that we weren't paying to see him perform.  You wouldn't get him to entertain your children, but I don't have children so it wasn't an issue.

The club v whiskey; round one.

Yesterday afternoon the Scoundrel arrived.  We gave him a quick look around the city.  He was quite keen to meet Dr Livingstone.

Then the three of us joined an organised pub crawl, which was exactly as awful as it sounds.

At some stage in the evening it became unclear who was leading whom astray.

Our tour-guide, Craig (The Cregg), did the good name of New Europe proud, leading the charge with poor decisions being the evening's theme.

At some stage The Reviewer joined us, as the appeal of a night of wanton wickedness is fairly universal.

The Cregg was carrying the Scoundrel for a short while, until he got tired.

So they swapped.

The arrival of a third member in Edinburgh ensures things will stay interesting for the next few days.

I'll add some details about today's exploits soon, but the dryer has almost finished and I'll be able to put a shirt on.  I can only wear a singlet in a bar for so long.

The Scoundrel arrives

Scottish history and some consumerism

Yesterday the Liar took off to do his festival thing, and I escaped to the far side of Princes street, where the madness of the festival was dialed down.  I went in search of the National Portrait Gallery, which was closed.  I did experience some small success by returning to Wellington Coffee for their incredible view

and coffee with a piece of banana cake.  The rest of the morning was spent in search of size 13 plimsolls, which then became a search for size 12 plimsolls I could 'squeeze into' when it became apparent that nobody would stock 13s.  Almost nobody stocks 12s either.

Thankfully it was a very nice day, and I enjoyed wandering about the city.

After a roast-capsicum sandwich from Larder, I spent about four hours wandering the National History Museum.  The first thing visitors see on level one is a statue of St Andrew, patron saint of Scotland.

Everything in the museum is worth seeing, from the mask worn by a reformist priest

to the maiden, a proto-guillotine used to behead some of the people seen in the Stirling update (Archibald Campbell and his father were both executed using this maiden).

The Scottish have a real love of two-handed swords.  In addition to the famous claymore, giant ceremonial swords were popular with Scottish lords as symbols of power and for important events like knighting and execution.  The one on display in the museum put me in mind of a fictional sword I read about. (Don't click that link if you haven't read A Game of Thrones yet)

Also on display was a lot more Robert the Bruce artifacts.

And, for the musos, a bunch of old instruments as used by medieval Scottish pub bands.

There is also a special exhibition running of the Lewis Chessmen.  The Scandinavian game pieces, carved from whale-teeth and walrus-tusk, are fascinating, particularly their detailed and individual faces.  My favourite pieces were the Warders (replaced in today's chess by rooks).

All of the kings looked strangely worried to me.  Possibly a scathing piece of political satire by the piece's designer.

The museum had heaps of these pieces on display in an exhibition which explored Scotland and Norway's complex, intermingled past.

In addition to the chessmen, the exhibition included some of the museum's other viking artifacts.

There were also pieces from some other games on display, like an early version of backgammon.

And naturally, there were lots of guys in tartan in the Jacobite sections.  This fellow was enormous.

I particularly enjoyed all of the sections on viking history.  There was even a horde of viking ring-money on display.

I found a photo of a handsome chap named Major James Fraser of Castle Leather.

who was displayed alongside a pile of Scottish pistols

and basket-hilted broadswords.

I caught another photo of William Chambers, because my first one was not very good.

I caught up with the Liar and we ventured out for a quiet beer.  On the way we were offered two-for-one tickets to see Nathan Cassidy, who is quite funny and let the Liar draw a penis on his face.

While rolling from gig to gig we met Alex, who's here reviewing and interviewing for three weeks magazine, which I had never heard of but she assures me is a big deal.  Over the course of the night her face became a waxy study of forced-smiling fear.

The Liar and I are just about to head out and see one of the other comedians we saw last night, Daniel Smith, in his five-pound show.