Manchester Comedy Festival- Joe Lycett

The Tiger Lounge

21st  October 2009

4 stars

So it’s another cold, Manchester evening, what better way to warm up than a spot of locally-grown comedy?

I arrive at the venue, Tiger Lounge, and find it to be a jazzy underground bar, not your traditional student haunt, but nice all the same. I sit myself in the corner where there are tables so I can make notes, only to find that the viewing from any of the tabled areas was pretty poor, not a great start.

Joe Lycett was the man charged with impressing me for the night, but maybe it was me who should have feared him?

Joe quickly gained rapport with the crowd, asking our opinions on his fleece and calling anybody who didn’t like it a ‘cunt’, much to the crowd’s delight. He then asked for all the students from University of Manchester to shout out, then all the ones from Manchester Metropolitain, heckling the one person to shout out, calling him a ‘thick twat’ (again to the predominantly University of Manchester crowd’s amusement.)

As soon as the main body of Joe’s set began it became apparent that his show was all about reviews. I was faced with the prospect of reviewing a show about reviews – confusing and difficult to say the least. Then, to my horror, Joe gave me a shout out, not by name, but simply that he was aware of my presence as a member of Student Direct.  Then he proceeded to joke that he was going to make my life as hard as possible by making his show about our paper itself, so that, essentially, I was reviewing this paper.

Joe stayed true to his word and spoke about this paper, giving three (un)lucky readers a name check: Christine Nip, Rob Newick and Tom Dylan were all used as fuel for fast and furious jokes that weren’t exactly flattering. So readers, beware of what you write into the vox box, for you may just become another joke in Joe’s lightening banter!

Despite insulting some of our readers, Joe was always very funny, the audience loved him and I know I was in stitches. He made it clear to all present why he won the ‘Chortle Student Comedy Award 2009’ and made it patently obvious that he is a rising star. Some may not like him, especially those who don’t take kindly to the offensive language used, but fortunately for him I am not one of those people. I enjoyed his material and he made sure that I didn’t regret missing Michael McIntyre, who was playing just down the road.

Joe deserves 4/5 stars. I can’t give him 5 because he isn’t the fully polished article yet, but as he said so himself “If you didn’t enjoy the show, you’re wrong!”