00:00and i'm not blaming anyone it's easy i'm a parent i'm guilty myself you know you put your kid in
00:04front of the tv and but you know once upon a time you know you sat and you sang and you told stories
00:09you told stories to each other and you know and that's so is that an element that you enjoy with
00:15the smaller shows because you do have an opportunity to take an element i enjoy this
00:19element that is completely essential for for my pursuing this this dream i had of being able to
00:26make a go of it writing songs it's completely essential you know with all these ear pieces
00:31and all the the lights and things you can you can convince anyone of anything you know i mean if
00:37you if you invest enough in it and pump enough like you know flashy technology into it you can
00:44convince anyone of anything including like that you've got talent or songs and to see someone like
00:49with a guitar set i love it i can't pass if i'm looking past a pub or a bar and i see an open
00:54mic night i have i have to go in and that for me is heaven do you know i mean to sit in the corner
00:59of a or irish pub in particular there's more they get more live music over there and just sit and hear
01:04people singing their singing their soul and even if they're doing covers actually but it's just that
01:09you know you know maybe they'll be getting like a percentage of the of the till but you know they're
01:15not there for the money you know they're there because they they need to be there they need to be
01:19singing they need to be singing their songs they need to be playing the guitar you know i mean
01:23because like the other six days a week they're i don't know whether whatever they're having to do
01:28you know i mean to pay the bills because it's it's hard these days for young kids i think you know you
01:35want to make a go of it music unless you've got unless you can crash at your parents or crash at
01:40mates you're gonna have to go out and graft and get yourself a you know a job in a data service center or
01:47you know gardening or i don't know what what's out there these days for people but
01:53it's hard it's hard and harder to just make a living playing your music it's definitely a labor
01:59of love i think for 95 of people and that's why the this is this this interview is about the edmund
02:05festival right yeah yeah yeah that's why the edmund festival is such is a thing to be cherished to
02:11celebrate because it is a platform it's like a megaphone and an international one yeah a young
02:18talent you know i mean it's not that i mean even though you got that so like mad variety and range
02:24of people it's not easy to get a shot at the edmund festival unless you're going to go on the street
02:27because i tried it i remember years ago i sent a cassette and my cv to like every venue in edinburgh
02:33when i was doing performance poetry and i didn't even get a no thank you thanks for the thanks for the
02:39offer but we're fully but i don't you know what i mean it was competitive out there you know yeah
02:44so you know going to edinburgh and seeing the festival now do you still feel that kind of sense
02:49of collective endeavor that there's still creative people there doing that i never performed it but
02:54also i've never even been now i think i tried to go once right yeah jock scott jock scott wrote a play
03:00a while back obviously before he died god rest his soul i mean old mate but maybe 2004 he wrote a play
03:08about uh two young musicians in red military jackets uh on a train and he took it to edinburgh
03:14performed it we were supposed to go and do the play up ourselves me and carl but um we missed it if
03:21something happened we missed a train or someone got arrested anyway we didn't make it and uh
03:27and um well he understood why because he knew what was going on but he never held it against us
03:33you know i mean but i was gutted to let him down that time and uh and uh it's just been a thing
03:41in in the back of my head it's one of these unchecked things and but i don't really want to go as a
03:45i mean i am going to perform but i'm performing because it's an opportunity for me to get there
03:50you know i mean and we get the hotel paid and all that so i'll be able to
03:53go out there and finally revel in that because for me like as a young man like 16 17 18 19 that's
04:01how i thought life was i thought it was just creative souls running amok singing and dancing
04:07and doing comedy for each other and obviously as you get older you realize that's right you know
04:12life's not quite like that but there's still a part of me that believes in that
04:17no idea of edinburgh and so i'm i'm gonna go i want to see it all i love it i've always loved all
04:22that i've always you know i mean to be honest that was my unfulfilled original dream really
04:30was to be a a stand-up performer that was what i that's what i set out to do you know like
04:36i just couldn't i got to a point i played so many empty empty rooms that i got so angry and frustrated
04:45that i just started screaming down the microphone instead and that turned into songs and that turned
04:51those are the limitations but originally performance poetry stand-up comedy that was like something
04:57that i'd i'm sort of obsessed with i think starting with tony hancock and then going through all of
05:03goldman simpson's stuff steptoe and then up to and including blackadder and a lot of the stuff that
05:10come since then as well you know steve coogan you know but this raw very british comedic i mean it's
05:23it's i don't know if a lot of english and scottish then if a lot of british people understand how
05:30how much of a cultural weight the british are in in comedy i don't you know i've sat in moscow hotel
05:37rooms you know i mean you've got mr bean on three different channels and benny hill and a benny and
05:43you know and a benny hill marathon come in you know yeah four in the morning and 12 days it's like
05:49it's something very obviously you know it's great american comedy there's great french comedy but you
05:55know it's yeah that's something a bit different it is it's and it's i don't know it's hard to explain
06:01maybe it's best not to analyze it but you know i mean so the the edinburgh thing doing a show
06:09essentially in a nightclub you know you and with with a crowd that that that know you so well it does
06:15give you the space to to be yourself to play some some music tell some songs tell some jokes to you
06:22know to form and whatever you know there's very little expectation on you
06:26no yeah and that's different from like a libertine show when people are like that give me the hits
06:33and you know like they want a bit of kind of chaos at the front it was sort of there is that element
06:38in the liberty show giving the hits but i think now we have there's a sort of a hardcore faction now that
06:45you see at gigs and they come all over they get some of them like they fly from japan and you know
06:51there's a hardcore faction now who basically they're seeing the same set again and again and again
06:56yeah all right yeah and if we throw in something different it's a rare treat and you can see it
07:02in their eyes because they always don't know but solo it's it's it's carte blanche for me and i don't
07:07have a set list and i don't i don't even i'll just go on the i'll get on the stage and see i'll sort of
07:13see who's there and what the vibe is whether or not they're kicking in with a liberty song but otherwise
07:18i'll just sometimes i'll just ad lib and and do songs that i haven't even quite not even quite sure of
07:25myself songs that i'm sort of working on at that time basically brand new songs
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