Welcome to our new moderator

[dave shelley]

Don't forget Julian Cleary.  Re the chicken and egg thing with Jasper Carrot and Billy Connolly, I'm almost certain I'd heard of Billy Connolly in the late eighties whereas Jasper Carrot was much later.  I been lucky enough to see both and both are incredibly funny men.

[Risso]

Don't forget Julian Cleary.  Re the chicken and egg thing with Jasper Carrot and Billy Connolly, I'm almost certain I'd heard of Billy Connolly in the late eighties whereas Jasper Carrot was much later.  I been lucky enough to see both and both are incredibly funny men.

Billy Connolly late 80s and Carrott after that?  Were you living in a cave for most of the 1970s and 80s Dave?!

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

When British television began its slow, not entirely successful repudiation of racial stereotyping and mother-in-law jokes in the mid-1970s, approaching a more personal, anecdotal style of stand-up comedy, producers initially overlooked the emerging Billy Connolly, even after his seminal 1975 appearance on Parkinson.

“Billy was doing his stuff, obviously. But he couldn’t get on television much because of the swearing,” Jasper Carrott points out. “So in those days, into the late Seventies and early Eighties, I had the raconteur field largely to myself”.

https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/jasper-carrott-interview-comedy-will-always-be-minefield-82715

[Mister E]

Don't forget Julian Cleary.  Re the chicken and egg thing with Jasper Carrot and Billy Connolly, I'm almost certain I'd heard of Billy Connolly in the late eighties whereas Jasper Carrot was much later.  I been lucky enough to see both and both are incredibly funny men.

I bought "Carrott in Notts" in 1976, Dave. He was at the height of his powers then.

[dave shelley]

Don't forget Julian Cleary.  Re the chicken and egg thing with Jasper Carrot and Billy Connolly, I'm almost certain I'd heard of Billy Connolly in the late eighties whereas Jasper Carrot was much later.  I been lucky enough to see both and both are incredibly funny men.

Billy Connolly late 80s and Carrott after that?  Were you living in a cave for most of the 1970s and 80s Dave?!

Fuck that!  As I was typing, the year 1968 was in my head and between brain and iPad it morphed to eighties.  Even I'm not that thick to type that deliberately.  I dunno though, that's what happens when you try to type and peel an avocado at the same time.

[Jon Crofts]

Carrot was brilliant live, saw him a few times and despite him being a nose he knew his and their place in the pecking order of things.

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

Three noses I like...Jasper Carrott, Barry Fry, Tom Ross...after that I'm struggling.

[Neil Hawkes]

Was Carrot the first truly TV age observational comic or did Billy Connolly beat him to the punch? Or were there others before them?

Connolly was around first but from what I remember he was better known as a singer than a comic. They were certainly the pub rock to the early alternative comedians punk. 

What about Dave Allen?

[thick_mike]

I think it’s safe to say Carrot and Connolly are considerably funnier than Croft.

[dave.woodhall]

Was Carrot the first truly TV age observational comic or did Billy Connolly beat him to the punch? Or were there others before them?

Connolly was around first but from what I remember he was better known as a singer than a comic. They were certainly the pub rock to the early alternative comedians punk. 

What about Dave Allen?

New York Dolls.

[Risso]

I used to have the deep misfortune to do the accounts for Bernard Manning, the fat, racist, unfunny twat.

[dave.woodhall]

I used to have the deep misfortune to do the accounts for Bernard Manning, the fat, racist, unfunny twat.

I have a theory about Bernard Manning that he wasn't as racist (certainly no more so than the typical seventies northerner) and certainly not as daft as he made out. The end was nigh for his style of working men's clubs comedy and the talented ones found new ways of working. Some became quiz show hosts, others actors, while the less talented spent a lot of time in Where Are They Now? columns bemoaning the fact that there's no place for proper comedy on TV anymore. Manning was never going to be able to host a quiz show or join Coronation Street, so he deliberately set out to make himself unbookable on TV, becoming a free speech martyr and gaining a new audience. Lee Hurst has done the same, but he's a twat. 

[Risso]

Nah, he was genuinely racist and unpleasant.

[TopDeck113]

When I was a student in the 80s and visiting a mate who went to Salford, I had the misfortune to spend a Saturday night in the "World Famous" Embassy Club. 

A smarter man than me would have extrapolated the various acts' material and the make up of the audience and concluded that the world of Brexit and Trump was simply matter of time.

[Risso]

When I was a student in the 80s and visiting a mate who went to Salford, I had the misfortune to spend a Saturday night in the "World Famous" Embassy Club. 

A smarter man than me would have extrapolated the various acts' material and the make up of the audience and concluded that the world of Brexit and Trump was simply matter of time.

We had a couple of work nights out there.  Luckily by the time that Bernard jnr had taken it over, they actually had some decent, non-racist acts on.