BREVIEW: Katherine Ryan – Glitter Room @ Symphony Hall 02.02.18

Katherine Ryan – Glitter Room @ Symphony Hall 02.02.18

Words by Ed King

We filed slowly, languidly into the hall. The auditorium was vast… But not silent, which is an immediate win for a Birmingham crowd.

I love my home city, but it can be a tough cookie for any touring artist – from the Insane Clown Posse to Ani DiFranco, you just can’t be sure when it come to a Birmingham gig. And I have never seen comedy at the Symphony Hall; a huge room, indeed a ‘vast auditorium’, one a friend astutely described as “the 1980’s trying to do the 1950’s”

But if tonight isn’t sold out, then it’s a damn near close. All I can count are the empty chairs stuck in traffic or cursing an AWOL babysitter. Booking Joe Lycett as support was a bold local move too. So bold it could have even backfired, as Lycett takes to the intimidating plateau that is the Symphony Hall stage (without a orchestra on it at least) and makes it as cosy as your living room. Cosier, in fact, like the living room of a good friend but one who won’t expect you to clean up afterwards. Or a total stranger’s when you’ve drunk too much to care.

Taking us to the interval and in some case to our seats, as with the unlucky couple that arrive a little late (once the show had started, once the stand up comedy show had started, once the stand up comedy show had started in front of thousands of people that can see you’re in the wrong aisle) Lycett confidently segues from jokes of civic humour to the best use for an Amazon Alexa. Extreme, funny, and extremely funny, the now Kings Heathen is about to embark on his I’m About to Lose Control and I think Joe Lycett (nice) tour, kicking off the day before Valentines. Definitely one to watch out for, and then watch. If you can. It’s pretty much sold out too.

Katherine Ryan – Glitter Room / UK TourSauntering onto the big and empty Symphony Hall stage, “it’s a long walk…”, Katherine Ryan looks resplendent in pink silk (I think) with red frills. Or her Vagina Trousers, as we are quickly informed. So there’s an image that will never leave my mind. Assured, tempered by a tour that’s been running since September, and all the qualities that a stand up Faust would be picking his scabs to sign, seal and deliver, Ryan opens with jokes about relationships, the ending of relationships, and moving six thousand miles away with your fingers crossed – an oddly narcissistic approach to putting your emotional cards on the table. Immediately engaging, Ryan turns what could have been trite into fresh and personal material, inviting us into walk though the weird worlds we all inhabit (even if some of us aren’t totally aware of our terrain). Honest, the fun side of frustrated, and cut to perfection; I will never look at a dolphin in quite the same way again.

From jibes about her “ineffectual butler” daughter, be it stalking Anna Kendrick or learning the difference between “day wine and night wine”, to an accentuated recount of when her family came over from the “trashy part” of Canada to see her small London freehold, Ryan has a firm grip on her delivery. Its gut wrenching; at one point I honestly feel the cartilage between my ribs ask me to stop. But by the time my favourite line of the night is uttered, namely that the Frank Sinatra standard ‘My Way’ is the “anthem of a cunt”, it’s clear there is to be little respite. And I will love that sentence until the day that I die.

But Ryan’s wrath is anything than just pure self deprecation, as everyone from her school gate peers – the bake sale obsessed Julie (who I swear is a more fertile version of my step mother) to the Lycra obsessed husband who would get “hate fucked” back in his box, get an astute poke in the ribs. And if you’ve ever spent “two Christmases” traversing a bitter and empty motorway…

Celebrity culture is also in range, as public domain miscreants – from R Kelly to the misogynists of musical theatre – receive a taste of the lash. But don’t worry, an escape to any would be sexual predator is offered; just “don’t fuck vulnerable women”, as the chant that never was (but should have been) rings around the back rows of the West End.

There is even a little time for some proxy president poking, filtered through the plight of “the world’s most unlucky gold digger” Melania Trump. And despite the clear attack at the abject horror that currently sits in The White House, this once again over used subject is the conduit for another piece of acerbic genius – namely that the maligned First Lady is only “one line of coke and an aggressive hand job” away from inheritance and freedom. We can but hope. Or perhaps even help, to a point. I know a guy with some cracking Colombian flake…

Katherine Ryan’s Glitter Room is on tour across the UK until the 24th March 2018. For more on Katherine Ryan, including full tour dates and online ticket sales, visit www.katherineryan.co.uk

For more on Joe Lycett, visit www.joelycettcomedy.co.uk

For more from Live Nation UK, including further event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.livenation.co.uk

For more from both the Symphony and Town Halls, including further event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.thsh.co.uk

BREVIEW: Ed Byrne – Spoiler Alert @ Town Hall 27.01.18

Ed Byrne – Spoiler Alert @ Town Hall 27.01.18

Words by Helen Knott

Ed Byrne warms up the healthy Town Hall audience with some amusing quips about the building work in Birmingham city centre. He takes the slightly generic line, “It will be lovely when it’s finished” and runs with it, extending it into a much funnier, and more topical joke. “You see all those signs for Carillion and think, ‘Oh fuck. It’s never going to be finished…”

Audience duly warmed up, Byrne launches into the gig proper. Called Spoiler Alert, he describes the catalyst for the show as being his concern about, “how spoiled we are, as people, as individuals, as consumers.” A lot of the material centres around Byrne’s concern that his two children are themselves spoiled. They go to a nicer school than he did, have better toys… “I’m raising two posh, English, boys.”

The examples Byrne uses to illustrate how spoilt his children are aren’t particularly horrifying. His children are able to watch specialised children’s TV channels, so they don’t have to wait until Saturday morning to watch cartoons. They ask for elderflower cordial and enjoy eating pesto. They aren’t particularly overwhelmed by an expensive trip to Lapland to meet Santa, because they saw him in Westfield shopping centre the Christmas before.

This is funniest when Byrne confides, “It’s all I have in me not to hate my own children”. And that he once considered letting his youngest child touch an electric fence as a “learning opportunity”. These kinds of thoughts quite likely pass through a lot of parents’ minds when their children are being difficult, but they’re rarely voiced publicly. It’s a little close to the mark for a number of audience members, who shift uncomfortably in their seats, as is a joke about wanking while camping and the section when he ruminates on the effect that getting divorced would have on his career (“a rich seam to mine”). It’s a gentile crowd, and I’m not sure that they’ve seen much of Byrne’s wanking material on the BBC.

It’s hard to take Byrne (a successful comedian with a big house and a nice car) seriously when he talks about how spoilt his children and the general population are. He starts the show by dissing the disappointing free snacks that he receives in tour venues. He complains about the – no doubt lucrative – corporate gigs that he plays. He criticises his tour manager for booking him into an arena in Derby, which he has no chance of selling out. There’s more than a whiff of “first world problems” about all this. I’m sure than Byrne must be making these comments purposely hypercritical to show that no one is above being spoilt; he’s too clever to lack self-awareness. But if we’re meant to be laughing at him as a character, he should ham it up a bit. In reality, it’s so cloaked under his cheery persona that you don’t really notice the absurdity of what he’s saying.

Byrne teeters on the edge of something interesting when talking about the way that we consume news. Instead of reading to challenge our opinions, Byrne argues that we seek news that is “tailored to our beliefs”. This probably is more prevalent than it used to be, with social media echo chambers trapping us into only ever reading views allied to our own. But Byrne’s example that we now only read newspapers that tally with our beliefs doesn’t completely ring true – there have been left and right wing newspapers in Britain for years; this isn’t a modern phenomenon. Still, spending some time teasing out how, in this regard, people are more spoilt than they used to be, and the impact it has on our political landscape, could have made for a compelling end to the show. Instead, Byrne quickly moves on and the point is lost between a weird rant about how semi-skimmed milk is indulgent and an unfunny anecdote about an author friend.

In essence, much of Spoiler Alert is a variation on the trope pedaled by grandparents the world over. Basically: “young people don’t know they’re born these days!” This would be fine if Byrne was exploring the topic in a particularly thought-provoking, novel or, crucially, funny way. Comedy doesn’t always have to be making a point and to have the aim of providing an entertaining Saturday evening for a roomful of people is completely valid. On the whole, Byrne achieves this objective, but too often the jokes and anecdotes meander without packing a punch.

For more on Ed Byrne, visit www.edbyrne.com

For more from Town Hall, including full event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.thsh.co.uk

BPREVIEW: Katherine Ryan – Glitter Room @ Symphony Hall 02.02.18

Katherine Ryan – Glitter Room @ Symphony Hall 02.02.18

Words by Ed King

On Friday 2nd February, Katherine Ryan brings her Glitter Room Tour to Birmingham’s Symphony Hall – with Joe Lycett as the stand up support act. 

Katherine Ryan’s Glitter Room is scheduled for 8pm at the Symphony Hall, with tickets priced at £24.50 (+bf) as presented by Live Nation UK. For direct show information, including venue details and online ticket sales, click here.

Queen of the acerbic broad smile, Katherine Ryan has been poking the ribs of our populous since settling in Britain about a decade ago – winning the Nivea sponsored Funny Women Award in 2008.

Katherine Ryan – Glitter Room @ Symphony Hall 02.02.18Born, raised and educated in Ontario, Ryan initially moved to the UK to help the restaurant chain Hooters set up in Nottingham – sticking around in Albion longer than expected, picking up some solid bookings as a comedian and setting into the tight lipped day to day of England. Now a self described “typical British mum – a young, uneducated immigrant”, Ryan has become a familiar face in Britain as a TV presenter, regular guest on TV panel shows, and part of the festival stand up circuit.

With a self deprecating, child (adulation) bashing, velvet glove punch approach to her material, Katherine Ryan is not likely to appear at a Pontins family cabaret anytime soon (I once saw both mother and daughter on stage for a skit… not your standard red coat fodder). Likewise, I can’t imagine there’s too much sleep being lost in the Ryan household when Waitrose run out of Chai Latte mix.

But for those anti-millennials who enjoy a sticking a good two fingers up at the tacit/absurd sides of society, you might find yourself in the right room with Katherine Ryan.

Although her latest tour, Glitter Room (named after her daughter’s bedroom) sees Ryan shift from the ‘waspish put-down to a more positive celebration of her life’ – with a little room left for Trump bashing and jabs at Baby Machine Julie. Personally, I’m fingers crossed for another attack of the Beyoncés. But a boy can dream.

Katherine Ryan – on Conan, February 2017

Katherine Ryan brings her Glitter Room Tour to Birmingham’s Symphony Hall on Friday 2nd February, with Joe Lycett as the support stand up act. For direct show information, including venue details and online ticket sales, visit www.thsh.co.uk/event/katherine-ryan 

For more on Katherine Ryan, visit www.katherineryan.co.uk

For more on Joe Lycett, visit www.joelycettcomedy.co.uk

For more from Live Nation UK, including further event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.livenation.co.uk

For more from both the Symphony and Town Halls, including further event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.thsh.co.uk

BPREVIEW: Ed Byrne @ Town Hall 27.01.18

Ed Byrne @ Town Hall 27.01.18

Words by Helen Knott

Comedian Ed Byrne brings his Spoiler Alert show to Birmingham’s Town Hall on 27th January, in the first week of a UK tour that stretches into June.

Spoiler Alert is scheduled for 8pm at the Town Hall, with and tickets priced at £27 (+bf). For direct show information, including venue details and online ticket sales, click here.

Ed Byrne has been a comedian for around 20 years now, pretty much his entire adult life. He’s had hit tours, DVDs and has sold out numerous runs at the Edinburgh Fringe.

Byrne has also established a successful TV career, not just through his numerous appearances on comedy shows such as Mock the Week, Have I Got News for You and Live at the Apollo, but also in factual genres. Indeed, Byrne seems to have reached the enviable position of being able to create TV series about subjects he’s personally interested in, such as Dara & Ed’s Great Big Adventure in Central America and its successor Road to Mandalay – road trips that feature friend and fellow comedian, Dara Ó Briain.

Byrne is undoubtedly in comedy’s Premier League, with publications like the Sunday Times declaring that his work ‘could stand proudly next to any Izzard, Bailey, Carr or Skinner stadium-filler’. He certainly tends to mine similar ground to these comedians, though arguably without the quirks that make their voices truly unique.

Spoiler Alert was debuted and developed at last year’s Edinburgh Fringe, as Byrne traces his shift from a working class young Dubliner to a middle class countryside-dweller. He looks at the impact this change has had on his children’s upbringing compared to his own, and asks the audience “are we right to be fed up, or are we spoiled?”

It may sound like common territory for a mainstream comedian’s set, but with Byrne‘s effortless, laid back delivery (and those 20 years of comedy experience) he’s sure to bring an easy charm to a well-considered and fun evening of genial entertainment.

Ed Byrne on weddings – Live at the Apollo

Ed Byrne brings his Spoiler Alert show to Town Hall on Saturday 27th January. For direct show information, including venue details and online ticket sales, visit www.thsh.co.uk/event/ed-byrne-spoiler-alert 

For more on Ed Byrne, visit www.edbyrne.com

For more from both the Town Hall and Symphony Hall, including full event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.thsh.co.uk