Jiggery Pokery Cabaret - week 4

Sometimes it's difficult to convey the raw emotions of how a show went when you're writing it up a couple days later, but sometimes that's probably for the best. It wasn't that Wednesday's 4th offering was bad, no - far from it, it was excellent for the most part, but I can't help but feel it was a little flat. I think the main reason behind this was simply because it was almost too polished - the best bits of the Jiggery Pokery run has been where random things have happened, those little nuggets of unexpected madness. From an outsiders point of view, week 4 was by far the best the show has looked - everything went to plan. That's a good thing, of course, so I'm not sure why I'm feeling negative about it. Maybe it's because I'm no longer excited by it? Maybe I'm just tired and not looking at the very many positives. The Damsons, with myself on drums, opened the show, before David Trent returned for the second week in a row. David's a great comedian, I really, really enjoy his act, hence why I asked him back. He's so deadpan it doesn't always click with the audiences, but he's persistent and I really enjoyed his set again - the audience didn't seem to get it as much this week, but they were respectful enough. We then had Jude Simpson; a stand-up poet who, to be frank, has a CV that suggests she's above this level of event, she's a proper professional. Her act was superb, without question the cleanest comedian we've had, again the audience weren't exactly rolling about with laughter but I think, actually, that might have just been the audience because Jude is a class act and I almost feel guilty for not putting her on a bigger stage, which is what she deserves. Acoustic music came in the shape of Paul Goodwin, who is probably the best songwriter Cambridge has at the moment, he's criminally overlooked sometimes - his deep soul searching is a rare treat, he's downbeat, but the audience seemed to have got great joy out of his material, why he hasn't got beyond this city of ours baffles me. Then we (The Damsons) played a full set to end the evening. To be honest I didn't really enjoy it, the gaps in between songs were far too long and I felt restless, musically we were tight but I think at times we lost the audience. We're a better band than our performance (baring in mind performance is only 50% music) suggested, a much better band. Next week is the final Jiggery Pokery, it's also the biggest bill we've ever had, and the Christmas special. I've got a feeling we'll go out on a real high.

JIGGERY POKERY CABARET WEEK 4 - LINE UP
Kevin Wright - intro
The Damsons - 1 song
David Trent - guest stand-up
Jude Simpson - guest stand-up
Paul Goodwin - 3 songs
Name That Tune (with Hodge from The Damsons)
The Damsons - full set