Posts Tagged ‘IMCAs’

I know you’ve all been eagerly watching your computer screens to find out who managed to stamp out the competition and take home the amazing prizes at the Irish Music Comedy Awards 2012, so here we are! You can now breathe a sigh of relief knowing your antagonising wait is over

Firstly, the runners-up. Congratulations to the hilarious ……………………… FLOOZY & BLUESY! Who took home the fantastic prize of a recording session at Pboy studios

And, finally, HUGE congratulations go to the winner of the evening …………………….. URSULA BURNS!! Who had the judges enraptured with her originality and musical comedy talents and received €500 cash and performance slots at the UK musical comedy awards 2013 and the Kerry comedy festival 2012

In case you missed their winning performances tonight, here’s some they prepared earlier for you to enjoy!          Floozy & Blusey              Ursula Burns

“Comedy, music and prizes! Oh, my! Comedy, music and prizes!”

Clearly all the excited jibber jabber around thecomedyscoop.com about the upcoming IMCA’s has my brain in musical overdrive!  So I simply can’t resist the urge to take a little waltz down my own musical comedy memory lane. Oh, before I begin, it’s pretty obvious that I’m quite familiar with the finalists in the first ever Irish Musical Comedy Awards. So, in the interests of not playing favourites, I’m ignoring all of them here! Don’t worry though I’ll be happy to share my thoughts on how they get on in the Laughter Lounge on the 25^th after the winner has been chosen by the judges.

So, who popped my musical comedy cherry you ask? (I swear I heard ye asking!) Well it was none other than the keyboard wielding David O’Doherty! For me it was love at first clangy chord and I remember leaving the gig (where he was the opening act for Tommy Tiernan no less!) thinking my college mates would love him. I was right and our love for the D.O.D. and his unique brand of “very low energy musical whimsy” hasn’t faltered since. A man of many talents, David hasn’t just spent his days gigging, oh no! He has also managed to write a few books and appear on our tv screens, but for me, I think his finest moments are on stage singing in his endearing, disgruntled way about everyday troubles in songs like Orange/ Text song.  So it was a joy for me to watch him headline in Vicar Street last October (I was incredibly envious of his personalised cape!) and I’ve since been looking forward to hearing what makes it onto his ‘My Beefs 2012’. Maybe I’ll find out at one of these gigs, I can only assume you all be joining me… Read the rest of this entry »

So it seems I got bored waiting for ‘humpday’ to end last Wednesday and found myself popping in to 4Dame Lane in the hopes of finding a few giggles and I must say I’m glad I did! A lovely chalk board outside reminded me the comedy would start at 8.30pm so, being just a few minutes early, I wandered in to buy myself a pre gig drink. However, half an hour later I was starting to wonder if I really had the right place! Admittedly I’m not a big fan of the whole ‘ah sure comedy gigs always start late’ mindset, but I’m sure, even by less time conscious folks standards, not opening doors until 50 minutes after advertised and starting the gig 45 minutes late, is not considered a great start! Thankfully Hugh O’Connor, the MC for the night, kicked things off in a very entertaining fashion and the lateness was soon forgiven!

I really enjoyed Hugh’s opening set which managed to cover funerals, old peoples’ complaints and the strange practise of animal husbandry in a surprisingly jovial way. He seemed quite relaxed on stage and had a great rapport with the audience throughout the night. I had no trouble believing he really would correct the bad grammer in rap songs at a party and found his use of Valentines material hilarious regardless of its lack of relevance! As an MC Hugh was everything you could hope for, funny, likeable and very good at keeping the audience’s energy up for each of the night’s acts.

The first of those acts was a Quiet Pint regular, Matt Smyth, who was also very well received by the audience. Matt’s set was an interesting mix, leaping from strange phobias (my favourite had to be ‘Opiophobia’ which Matt explained as the fear doctors have of prescribing needed medication?? Emmm, career change maybe?) to his current unusual day job, living with his parents and his concept of ‘success’. I enjoyed the randomness and the audience and I all found ourselves laughing aloud on more than one occasion! Read the rest of this entry »