My Obama Set

So, although I've still been doing my weekly set at the Brainwash, I've neglected blogging these past couple weeks so that I could devote more attention to the fact that our country is asserting it's will to progress past these hellish 8 years that we've (surprisingly) endured.

Recently, I have been toying with the idea of doing my 5 minute sets on a single topic. If you look at your comedy albums (we all have a few, don't we?), they are broken up like a music album: 5-10 minute chunks, all with a clever name that alludes to either the premise or the punchline. Very rarely will you ever see an hour-long show filled with one liners or single laugh jokes. Instead, they are crafted stories that have many punchlines, ideally stacking one laugh on top of another until the crowd is rolling in their seats.

This is tough to do. Really tough. Especially for a short set, since if the joke isn't going the way you want it to, it's that much harder to bail and get to the next one. Nonetheless, open mics are made for screwing up and learning, so I've been pushing forward in acquiring this necessary skill. My set last Thursday was, easily enough, all Obama. Having one main topic made transitions easy and seamless, and there was plenty of material to go around.

It came off well, and I would say that I got as many laughs as I normally do so I was pretty happy with the experience. I probably won't do that every week, though. The thing I'm most afraid of is having too many jokes that seem forced because I'm constraining the subject matter. Instead, I'm looking through my current jokes and trying to group them together when I can. I then try to jot down a few more ideas, funny or not, that relate to it and see if anything comes to mind. It's going okay, but I've also been trying to evolve and improve my best material. I've managed to combine the two activities by taking my best jokes, partnering them with related jokes, and hoping that a couple of great ones will help carry the rest. We'll see how that goes.

Better, but a long way to go.

So, I went on stage at Club Deluxe last Monday as part of their comedy showcase. My jokes went okay, they got some laughs, but they only revealed to me how amateur I still am. The comedians who came after me had tight sets that got laugh after laugh. Mine got a few chuckles, but I just couldn't keep the crowd at the feverish pitch that comedians strive for. Granted, I'm still new at this whole thing, but it really put in perspective where I'm at in my development. On the other hand, going on stage before so many comedians who are between my level and the level of a professional is really helping me understand where I need to go next. 

In my set on Monday, I brought out some of my best jokes, and many of them went okay, but they really didn't get the response I was hoping for. It could be that my timing is still off, or that I'm not building enough tension before the releasing punchline. Either way, I took away a slightly better understanding of what makes them funny or unfunny than when I walked in. For example, I botched the punchline of the Tupperware joke by literally one word, and it made all the difference. And for some reason my Sports joke drew as much sympathy as laughs (notice the "awww"). I'm still digesting the lessons of that night, but it at least went well enough that the host personally mentioned to me how much I've been improving and that he was still happy that I was able to bring in a small crowd of drinking, cover-paying customers.  :P

Here it is, let me know what you think.