Six hours later the Rimmel gloves helped me ask some on the holidays for this one.
Welcome to Git Shirti, the podcast that likes to look at the little things in life which
never fail to irritate.
Each episode we ask our special guest to talk about what gets them shirty at home, work
and going out.
Then our off the cuff surprise question could take the chat anywhere.
Each guest also designs their own mate a measure shirt which we then make, so we talk about
that too.
Funny that, us being tailors.
Welcome to episode 4 of the second season of the Git Shirti podcast.
If you haven’t listened before, we are delighted to have you with us.
Then why not go back and listen to a few of the previous episodes.
We’ve had guests like Adam Bucston, the one and only little Alex Horn, fellow podcaster
and actor Mike Fenton Stevens and star of stage and screen Sarah Boyle.
Today though you find this in conversation with writer, presenter and stage and TV magician
Paul Zenon.
Paul has been an entertainer for over 40 years, starting off in blackpool working in magic
shops and it really doesn’t look old enough to have had a career that long, must be something
in the magic that he does.
We met up with Paul in his hometown of Brighton, so it was another trip out for the podcast
which was nice.
We talked about his career, TV shows and of course what makes in Git all shirty.
Here we go then, one guest, two mics, only two tailors this time and a host of irritations.
Let’s get shirty.
Paul welcome to the Git Shirti podcast.
Thank you.
So good to be here in my house.
Yeah, well it is.
Thank you for letting us invade your house.
More than welcome.
It is nice to be down in Brighton actually, don’t spend enough time here really.
Sure.
And I have used to be back in the day.
Trafalgar Street, you know what I mean?
Trafalgar Street, yes.
I was indeed back in the day, many moons ago which is in fact when we first met, was around
that time.
I said that like we meet each other all the time.
Oh you know.
And then the long drinking career started.
It was the last time.
1959.
Yeah, that was the last time.
So that was the one time before now that we met, but it was.
Yeah, but.
And then the Prince Albert pub, famous pub.
Yeah, it’s got the the bank see on the side of it with the kissing policeman.
So have you always been sort of a Brighton?
No, I’ve been here a long time, since 87.
All right.
I got here just before the hurricane.
And but I’m now the oldest person in Brighton officially.
Is that that’s now your official title?
Yeah, actually, I said that have you always been Brighton, but I haven’t sort of read up
as well.
You obviously spent time growing up in Blackpool.
So imagine you’ve worked in?
Yeah, absolutely.
It’s called House of Secrets.
And so one eight, one eight, the promenade telephone, Blackpool 2, I’ve nine, no two.
Wow.
And I work there for I think it’s about five summer seasons, you know, through the school
holidays from being about, I was about 13 years old, something like that.
Did you have magic before you worked there or was it working there that made you go?
It was a bit about it.
I was already into magic, but I was really into the kind of jokes and novelties kind of
stuff.
What was your favourite?
Well, I’ve done fun enough.
Last year I just did a show all about the guy who invented X-rays, specs and sea
monitors.
Right.
But originally it was just anything practical, joke-wise, you know.
And Blackpool had all these kind of, I suppose you call it novelty shops or trick shops where
you could buy anything from a model of Blackpool Tower made out of sea shells or one of those
pens with a lady in a bikini.
Yeah.
Tip it upside down and it drops off.
Good playground currency.
Yeah, really awesome.
So I was into all that and then you know, Blackpool had, there’s Paul Clive’s magic shop
on the North Pier, that was the first place I went.
There was Murray’s magic mart, which was run by an old guy who was an Australian
escapologist who’d been pretty famous in his day and it worked in like some of 92 different
countries.
Wow.
And so I met him when I was about 11, ended up doing some odd jobs at his house and looking
through his scrapbooks and that was really kind of magical, you know.
But then this new place opened the house of secrets and it was run by a guy called Bill Thompson
and he looked like Tom Baker when he was doing Doctor Who.
Right.
He was a magician scouser and he became sort of my friend and mentor, you know, so I kind
of learnt the trade while working in the shop.
And so in the evenings I was doing kind of shows in guest houses, being bees and rest of
it and then working about 11 hours a day in the shop because of the illuminations it used
to stay up until kind of 10 or 11 at night.
So that was the real training ground.
So I’ve still got a lot of connections with Blackpool, I’ve been working on a thing called
Show Town which is a museum but that always makes you think of kind of dusty old cases and
fossils and things.
Yeah.
It’s very much a kind of sort of interactive family thing.
Yeah, I used to go because I sort of lived in various places around there when I was young
girls sort of before the age of 10.
So it used to be our day trip place or the game.
Sure.
Just getting a car drive down to the illuminations.
Yeah.
All of that.
I bought some Blackpool illuminations the other year.
That’s do you know what I think.
But yeah, I’d just been working on the Show Town thing and I’d stopped off the way back and
I saw some actual big lights on eBay or other things.
And so I bought them and it was like the reverse of the spinal tap thing.
I didn’t realise how big they were.
I’d seen the photographs of them next to each other so there’s no sense of scale.
And it did have the measurements which I should have kind of read but I kind of went in.
I don’t mean anything.
I’ll be able to get you up from Gillford with a van.
That was only just big enough.
But so I’ve just got rid of two of them.
I’m not really.
One of them was a and a low half sign looks like a Hawaiian thing.
So I’m making a teaky bar at the moment.
I thought, oh, that’d be perfect for that.
I realised that it would basically touch both walls and it wouldn’t be the bar.
I wouldn’t be able to see out the window.
So I’ve moved a couple of those on but yeah, I’ve thought you’ve been blackpools.
I’ve come and thread through my life really.
It’s a common being in the awkwardity of it.
I do.
I went like, yeah, I always had really fun memories of it.
It was always as a kid it was a magical place.
There was no sort of, I suppose, back then there were bits of it that perhaps weren’t as
magical as others but it was just lights.
Yeah, chips.
Well, it looked like the bright lights.
I was from a small industrial village about 50 miles away.
That was the place where you could see the people you’d seen on the telly.
It’s got three peers there, each of which had a theatre at the end.
And you’ve got the ground theatre, you’ve got the winter gardens, the opera house.
So there’s probably over 10,000 seats in venues in blackpool.
So you’re going to see Freddie Star and Daniela Roo and the Grumbleweeds and all that sort
of stuff.
And fully enough last year I ended up doing a little tour called Legends of Variety and the
Grumbleweeds on that along with Bernie Clifton.
Yeah, of all of them.
Of made in one.
Yeah, I love Lou Blowk actually.
I did a kid series with him in 1991 I think it was.
That was a lot of fun so we were kind of chewing the fat about that.
I was a need to Harris on it and I ended up doing Panto with last year.
But it was called Legends of Variety and it was organised by, you know, Freddie Parrot face
Davis.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, the Bola Hat.
Yeah, it was sort of down over his eyes.
I think it was a whole burger thing.
Yeah, yeah.
And yeah, I used to do that.
I’m a typical, you know, amuletweet was the character name.
Well, he was the producer of this show and I’m seeing it on time as well.
He called me up about doing it and he said, it’s an out.
We can’t have you on the posters as a legend because you’re not old enough.
And so he ended up on the billing.
It was, you know, Legends of Variety and all the names there and then it was me and a guy
called John Courtney, one Brings Got Talent a couple of years ago.
And it had us as new stars of variety.
Right.
So I got age 59 at that point.
I was the new kid of rock.
You’ve suddenly just breaking through.
Yeah.
So you’ve played back for yourself.
Yeah, how did that feel going back?
Yeah, it was forming there.
Great, actually.
I did a show a few years back called Lincoln Rings, which was a bit of a…
The change, a bit of a departure for me, at Starwires because it was a play, a monologue,
and quite serious and quite sort of pointing.
And it was about growing up in Blackpool and it was about working in the House of Secrets
and my mentor, but also a story about Houdini.
And it was the Lincoln Rings thing referred to these overlapping parallel lives kind of thing.
And so I did that.
I did it up in Edinburgh, did it in the West End, did it have a few other places.
And I took it up to do the Magic Convention because Blackpool has this huge Magic Convention
every year.
It’s the biggest one in the world.
It’s 4,000 attendees, which is quite a surreal event, as you’d imagine.
And I did the Lincoln Rings show there because it was largely about this guy, Bill, who died
11 years ago now.
The whole audience, not the whole audience, but a lot of them knew him personally.
Yeah, and it’s quite a difficult show for me to do, so it’s quite personal.
And so I was kind of performing that there in a venue that was literally a couple hundred
yards from the actual House of Secrets where it was.
And as I’m getting towards this kind of particularly point of part of it, I’m just looking
out at that, you know, magicians being largely male.
I just see all these guys and a sea of white hankies coming out.
So that was a real kind of, felt like a homecoming, you know.
We’ve been talking about work a little bit here, so that sort of leads us onto the first
thing of the Get Shirtie, you know.
As I said to you before, you know, it’s a loose thing to hang the chat on really, but, you
know, it’s got to be ticked off.
So from a Get Shirtie point of view, so we’ve talked about a lot of things you’d love about
the job that you do.
Are there any Get Shirties from a work point of view?
Yeah, I think being introduced by the CEO or MD of a corporate gig, that’s always an interesting
one, I quite enjoy it in a weird sort of way, because it’s basically, it’s the person
that’s paying your fee who decides how they’ll introduce you and they’re not usually someone
who’s used to being on stage.
And so, you know, they’ll quite often they’ll start off with your name, and then you can see
it registering their head, they’ve got nowhere to go from that point of view.
So we’ve got the entertainment now, it’s Paul’s in and it’s going to be a lovely chat,
and I’m sure we’ll be coming on at any point now.
So quite a lot of the time, I mean, corporate events have been the sort of bread and butter
for me, you know, that’s what’s made the money.
They’re to comedy clubs or festivals or anything like that.
So, I can’t read knock them that way, but they always tend to be in a venue that’s not made
for entertainment with usually no stage or if you get a stage, it’s facing the wrong way.
The banqueting manager is the natural enemy of the performer, basically, so they’ll, you
know, quite often they’ll use the queue for you going on stage to do the clearing of the
main course.
So, just a minute, everybody needs to listen, because much noise is possible.
I’ve got it, if you got it.
So, as I’m walking on in Madinah, you’ve got two dozen waiters, also in almost matching
dishes, walking on it, which ones, hey, you know, you can build that into an illusion.
And you’ve got your own interest?
Well, I do, you know, but you quite often ignore it, you know, and you can’t argue with
them because they’re saying they’re paying it and they know best.
Yeah, there’s all sorts of things on corporate things where normally if you’ve got a hotel
sound system, the user got a handheld radio microphone, but no stand for it, and the
stand is quite important as a prop act.
And then they’ll, you know, you go, when was the battery last changed in that?
Oh, we just change it when it stops working.
Well, that’s going to be five minutes into my act, isn’t it?
There was a phase in the, I think it was sort of late eighties right through the nineties
where everyone decorated everything with helium balloons.
And so, they’d quite often tie them in, either in bunches on the table, weighted down, which
basically blocked everyone’s view of the stage, wherever you were in the room, or they’d
tie them individually to the back of chairs.
So I started carrying around a big pair of scissors like Decorator’s Scissors, and while
I’m in, I’m in for the music was playing, I just run around the room, cutting off so the,
the hotel managers hated me for the point of view, because I think it was the great room in
Grove N’ House on Park Lane, they ended up banning helium balloons there, and it’s because
it’s such a high ceiling and it, it was probably some joke of set em off if it wasn’t me, someone
else would let me go.
And the only way they could get them down was with an air rifle.
And because they’re like the foil balloons would still take a couple of days to come down
even with a hole in them, because they’re just quite a quiet, quite solid.
So that was another pain, but yeah, just corporate gigs in general.
And quite often they’ve got a free bar for several hours before you go on.
Yeah.
You’re at the end of the meal when everybody just wants to chat out there, make secretary
or whatever they don’t want to watch at the time, and they don’t know who you are.
But I did want for a cider years ago, and it was at the point where there was an old
intern in Towers, and they had a massive marquee, and it was the point, the point the conference
was they were telling them for the first time that 50% of the workforce were going to be
made redundant in the next six months, but didn’t tell them which 50%.
So basically they had the morning kind of conference part, so they’re all kind of, you
know, crying into the coffee.
Then they gave them free run of the park in the afternoon, and then from 4pm, a free
bar, and then myself and a comedian called Boosby Graffo with the entertainment in the evening.
And we arrived.
Hold on that thought, so we arrived.
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So we arrived about four o’clock.
And this one, the official free bar was supposed to start, but they’d actually been drinking
the stock.
One of those little plastic things for the foil top.
And there was this, what was it?
Crabapple flavour and all those.
It was like an anacidewon.
There was a blue and a red.
And the gimmick was that the bottom of it was almost like a Lego brick so you could stack
them.
Right.
And so we arrived and we could hear this chanting from a distance.
So it’s still going in Marquis.
And basically all the tables had these pyramids of these shot dresses about four feet high
on the tables.
And they were all kind of like, I don’t know, it was almost like a football stadium audience.
Right.
So the music played at this point, just some of them singing, some of them wailing, some
of them shouting, some of them lying on the floor.
And this is kind of 4/4/30 and we’re not until nine.
And so we kind of, we sat outside and waited and the empty of the company came up to us and
said, you know you’re down to do 40 minutes each.
You said, yeah, just do 20/25.
That’ll be fine.
Right.
Right.
Okay.
So we came out again.
And he went, yeah, just, you know, just do about 15 minutes.
That was great.
And so it was a, Boohle was on first and then he had to kind of hand over to me and I back
referenced him going, let me just let me know if he was going to say, so just before he’s
going on, the empty because that wasn’t last time we were ready to go, just do what you
can.
Oh, no.
And so we kind of went on, he died.
It was like watching a shot of someone rehearsing in an empty room, superimposed with an audience
who, you know, didn’t have any entertainment.
It was just, you know, so he didn’t connect.
It’s like being invisible when you’re on there.
You talk into a lot of people face them the other way.
And so he did, he’s, you know, whatever, 10 minutes and as he came off, I was about to go,
let me, don’t say my name.
Don’t say my name.
I really, you did it.
I didn’t want to know if they had been paid attention who he was who died that day.
Yeah.
But yeah, so that was, you know, fairly typical 90s corporate.
Corporate, yeah.
Yeah.
So there’s a community called Mandy Knight and she was arriving, kind of, sort of late to
do the second half at the comedy store.
And I think it was a midnight show that you said, okay, eight o’clock in midnight.
And so the audience were quite, you know, quite rowdry.
So yeah, so she came in.
There’s a massive dormant there called Mark.
And I mean, he’s just huge.
And on the way in, she said, I don’t like it.
It’s Mark.
And you just keep that guy there, particularly, you know, keeps having a go on the act before.
And just, just keep an eye on it.
Well, he is, you know, sure money.
And so she goes on.
Sure enough, this guy pipes up, shouts something.
So she’s walked on.
And she said afterwards, I could see Mark silhouette coming very slowly down the aisle.
And then he just kind of lent down to him and sort of, you know, elbow on the shoulder and
whispered something.
And then the guy just totally shot just kind of like, five.
And so she said afterwards, Mark, thanks for that.
That was great.
What did you say to him?
And Mark said, well, I didn’t say nothing, Mandy.
I just bit his ear.
[LAUGHTER]
Now that’s a heckle.
Oh, yeah.
There it is.
There it is.
[POP]
[POP]
So, work, tick, get sure he’s done.
What about the rest of the home?
So, work, rest and play.
So they’re being at home all the sort of when you’re on your time off.
I think, well, I think actually one that covers all the bases is the frustrations of travel.
Right.
So whether it’s for work, whether it’s for holidays or, you know, just for fun in general.
And just everything from the price and rail tickets to the, it’s a lack of logic in everything
on a book, you know, when I return tickets cheaper than a single one and all that sort of
nonsense.
And, if I’ve oddly enough, yesterday I had an interesting travel episode.
And it’s a bit of a weird tale behind this, but I hired a van.
I had a load of hassle, actually picking the van up and in the end I had to get a different
one.
And it was because they go to a third party company to check your address.
So basically I had paid for it online and it asks for your address in all that detail
where.
I had taken in my driving licence, which has got my address on and I had two other forms
of ID that had my address on.
And it was that computer says no.
And I said, well, are you saying that I don’t live where I live or what?
And they said, well, what was your previous address?
And that’s, I give them back.
I said, no, we’ve got that one on record.
I went for it and that was fine renting from there.
You’re okay.
Well, come and use that.
No, we can’t use that because that’s not your current address.
And it just went right around the circles.
And in the end, I said, so what are you saying that I don’t live there?
And no, but this third party company are convinced that you don’t.
And you’re going, we’re taking, above everything else there.
So in the end, they wouldn’t release the vehicle.
And so they ended up, I’m a member of a car club locally, but I wasn’t using that because
they got marriage charges.
I was going quite a long way.
And so they gave me that instead.
And that was fine.
And then I identical van and that’s a totally separate company apparently, the car club to
the rental car.
And so it went on like, so set off eventually, kind of an hour late, I’ve ensorted all this.
And I’d basically, I was trying, I’d plugged my phone in to use the sat nav, but I didn’t
have a clip to put it on.
So it’s just on the next to me.
And the map pitch on the actual screen on the dashboard suddenly cut out.
And I was about 15 minutes up the road from here.
And so I picked my phone up and just pressed it and it came back on.
Two minutes later, there’s blue flashing light behind me.
And it was unmarksed police car, I’ve actually found out.
And so it pulled me in.
And I’ve now got six points on my license at a 200 quid fine for using my phone.
And so I said, well, it would have been more dangerous not having the map or rest of it.
I said, just out of interest, if the phone had been on a clip in front of me, that would
have been okay.
Right.
Yes.
Oh, okay.
So it’s just purely that you picked it up.
I picked it up and he happened to be overtaking me and saw it in my hand.
And it was like, yeah.
A couple of seconds.
And also, you know, on the screen, and it’s just this lack of logic, you know?
So I’m trying to use the main dashboard screen and look at that and point at it, all the phone
on a clip.
But if I hold it up in the same position, that’s illegal.
And that’s not even me to get any circumstances to him, you know?
So that, you know, again, that lack logic thing.
And that’s a proper get share.
Yeah, that’s right.
And then what you didn’t realise, and I wished it as now, was what was in the back of the
van.
Right.
Because I was taking it.
I was taking a load of a load of taxi durmry, a couple of blackpool illuminations.
And just a load of widget.
Basically, I was taking it up to an auction near Oxford.
And I jumped the night before in the pub.
I jumped in the make.
Imagine getting stopped by the police with that one.
And I’ll show you afterwards.
But I took a photograph of the back of the van.
So it was just this giant row and antonope head, a full fox.
I can’t afford to be missed.
So on one hand, you’re going, “Yeah, so I’m not a poor load there.”
But at least if he had to look in the back, I could have got a routine out of it long term.
That is, I’m just annoyed.
A certain sense of irony is, well, I’m a jishn getting caught with something in his hand,
he shouldn’t have had in his hand.
He shouldn’t have.
It’s not fair, I’m a way, I’m a way.
You know what?
I haven’t told anybody publicly this before, but I once got picked pocketed in Prague.
And that was embarrassing.
Yeah.
The professional embarrassment of that.
Yeah.
So yeah, so that was all in the space of an hour.
But I think flying as well, I mean, I did have a routine years back as a TEDx talk.
And that was a bow, it was called security versus reason.
And it was basically a bow all the airport rules.
And you understand why they’re there, but a lot of them really don’t make sense.
And that’s what really frustrates me is the theatre of security,
well, natural security.
You know, have you got anything on you that can be used as a weapon?
And you go, well, intelligence, like, it belt buckle, you know,
like a rope, you know it, metal pen, but you can’t take those tweezers.
And that liquid better be in a clear bottle, because it’s in a clear bottle,
I can see that it’s a dangerous liquid rather than just a clear liquid.
Well, that was the thing I used to say about the, you know, the X-ray stuff has got to be put in a clear bag.
And you know, how crap is your X-ray machine?
That’s not an X-ray machine.
That’s just a box with a hole in it, isn’t it?
I mean, the sizes, which are apparently changing, thankfully, at last.
I mean, you know, not to mention the fact that there was no terrorist incident with liquid explosives at any point anyway.
Yeah, you know, apparently a foiled one, but that one’s never actually happened.
And they go, well, you know, why has it got me in small bottles when you can have a tote of that much?
Because, you know, you could mix them together, yeah, but you need a bigger receptacle for that.
What you mean like a litre plastic bag, if you give you for free.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So if you’re that, shake it out, or what you think?
You know, you’re very strong.
You remember the old Esther, a few stuff for filling for going to the States.
Yeah.
And the question’s on it, things like, have you now, are you now involved, or have ever been involved in espionage, sabotage, or genocide?
And you got to.
It’s a bit, bit of a loaded question when you’re going to wait a Disney Land with the kids.
Yeah, it’s good to get that in and go, oh, yeah.
Oh, they got me out.
Come here.
It’s all great. It’s going to be a bit of a mess.
Enjoy your holidays.
Thank you.
Oh, you’re a spy.
Yes.
We once did a, I think, we couldn’t use it in the end for a TV show, but we got it in Underground Station in London.
And I basically, it was one of the street magic specials.
And I basically had about two, two and a half thousand used tube tickets on me.
So I had them everywhere from kind of normal pockets tucked in the socks, tucked in a waistband everywhere.
So we did it as a hidden camera thing, and I just kind of want to put this one through when it comes back as, you know, not valid.
So eventually I try that a couple of times and call over the guy, the guard there.
And I say, so that’s not going through it.
I don’t sound a date that one.
I’ll write, sorry, it must be this one.
And I’ll bring out another, I’ll respect that three or four of them.
And I’ll just bring out these handfuls, just to say what point it does.
So by the end of it, I was like, knee deep in these things.
And in the end, they wouldn’t let us use it because it’s classed as private property and they don’t have a sense of humour.
[Sounds of a bell]
Have you got a favourite trick for TV and a favourite trick?
You know, what’s your favourite, you know?
Yeah, well, I kind of got, sort of resisted the magic question so far.
Sure, you’re going to get a barrage once we stop recording.
Or I can do them now.
You know, I’ll wine ask for any secrets.
But it’s interesting, most people go watch your favourite trick, but they don’t distinguish between TV and live.
Yeah, because there must be different things.
Don’t very big difference there.
Obviously, the stuff I do live, I’ve done on TV more than one occasion.
But the one that everybody seemed to talk about out of the street magic stuff.
And that’s what I go by, that becomes my favourite because it’s kind of remembered, was pulling a tax disc through a car window.
I remember that.
I’m not sure why it was so popular.
There’ll be people listening to this go, “What’s a tax disc?”
Of course, as you can do that, that’s why it’ll be dropped from 50 greatest magic tricks or whatever.
So, I’ll watch that, not so long ago.
There are so many versions of that over the years.
Do you have one?
Yeah, I had two of them on there at one point.
And they were both from the same special.
And I wondered why they chose the second one.
And then I found out that it’s because they had to pay less if they used two tricks.
Because they added up to less than 90 seconds or whatever it was.
But yeah, the tax disc thing, I think it’s because it’s easy to describe in a weird way.
Because you get some, like, some of like, he’s name should not be mentioned anymore.
David Copperfield, you get him, “Oh, he made the statue of liberty disappear.”
And so it does what it says on the tip.
It’s rather than, “Oh, we asked me to think of my mother’s birthday and then times it by 10.”
And then I turn the sponge ball into a rabbit and the rabbit coughed up a plane card and it had that number right now.
Or though I would watch that.
So, yeah, he pulled a tax disc through a wings quail and it seems to describe something.
And it’s relatively, you know, it’s something that we were all familiar with.
And for the life of me, I like to look at a trick and go, “All right, I think I can…
Oh, okay, that’s done right for that. I can think, “Well, you could palm this bit.”
But then how do you make the bit that’s in there disappear?
And you know, so there was so many components in that.
Well, it’s like, “I can’t even begin to get my head round.”
Well, do you remember that series, the mass magician?
Which actually we recorded a bit of a piss take about for the first Street Magic pilot, but didn’t use it.
And I was the Balaclavid magician.
And the catch phrase was, they say they’re doing this.
They’re really just doing that. It’s a piece of piss.
I’ll see, you know, definitely do that.
I want to watch all of that.
So, yeah, they nicked the tax disc idea.
They did it with a parking permit, some sort of tax disc in the States.
But it was an entirely different method.
It wasn’t the way I did it.
So, yeah, that was interesting.
How are the favourites of the live stuff?
That’s a difficult one because the…
I mean, I tend to use the same owners and closers because they’re the different…
difficult ones to kind of come up with.
You know, everything in between whether you’re doing a 20-minute act or an hour,
you can kind of vary the all the middle section.
But you still need that, you know, quick and fast opener.
And something more substantial for the closing.
And so, I tend to split between the two, but I still do the cut and restore microphone lead.
And the reason I like that, I think, for live is that when I cut through the cable with a pair of wire cutters,
I haven’t done any magic at that point other than this.
And also using something that’s already there on the stage.
So, there’s that moment, I think, with a lot of the audience where they go,
“As you actually just done that?”
Or, “Oh, not, you know, I used to use it later in the act.”
And I just thought, “I’ll try it at the beginning.”
It worked stronger.
So, yeah, that’s good.
Although, in the old days, I used to like using a radio microphone because it gives you more mobility.
But no one had them.
And now, I like using a cord of microphone, so I could do that.
So, no one has them.
So, you’re either always ahead of the curve.
Or just slightly.
I’ve joined about it with another magician of the day.
All of my live material is becoming defunct just by, you know, natural changes.
I used to do a trick that ended up with a lit cigarette at that stage.
You get what I like, that starts kind of out.
Although, I have got away with light in the cigarette on stage, pretty much every show.
I’ve got a lit, well, I won’t give it away now, but there’s a little thing I tell people.
I don’t know. I used to use a flick knife for a trick.
And, you know, with all the various incidents that have happened, you go,
“It’s not a good thing anyway, but also just the possession of a flick knife.”
Yeah, it’s strictly…
I suppose it probably wouldn’t work as well with the old flick cones.
No, no.
Although I did use one of those in the show I did last year, actually.
So, choke, choke, novelty.
I love my flick, can’t I?
Yeah.
I had all those, all those.
Oh, yeah.
I still have the…
Draws for them.
Yeah.
I’ve got an attic and a…
Not a spare room.
It’s…
It’s in danger of undergoing gravitational collapse.
The amount of crap I’ve got in there.
The magic trick.
Yeah.
So, the other trick I finish on is an magic trick and that’s the weird thing.
It’s more of a…
It’s a physics demonstration, but it’s…
It’s a juggler’s trick, really.
And that’s balancing…
It’s hard to describe in audio only.
It’s taken a pool or a snooker triangle from…
Right.
And balancing it on edge and standing a full pint of freshly poured beer inside it.
And then the top corner of the triangle is attached to a dog lead.
Right.
And then I’ll basically spin it round upside down and then change it to a horizontal circle.
And walk through the audience with it.
All right.
And at the end, someone lifts it off the triangle to prove it’s not stuck on there.
And I down it in one.
All right.
So, it’s…
But I think it is genuinely quite dangerous.
Yeah, yeah.
That’s the thing with it.
And so, that’s the…
You know, the reason I like doing live shows is because when you’re in the room with someone,
it’s got, you know, far greater impact, I feel like, I think…
I’ve got my hands…
I’ve got my hands…
Yeah.
I think I’ve seen that.
Yeah.
I’ve done it a few times on TV.
I did it on the comedy store, series, and live at Junglers.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, I’ve done it several times like that.
But I’ve been doing that for…
‘Cause, like, it’s gonna be 30 years, I think.
But, and it…
It’s one of those if I don’t do it, and people know the app…
Oh, why didn’t you do those?
I did that, yeah.
And if you do do it, oh, okay, you’re still doing that.
Yeah.
So, but yeah, that’s, you know…
Those are two live favourites.
We forgot the app.
Oh, no.
Do you know?
Don’t.
So…
Have we done…
Have we done…
Was the travel covering the work rest and play going out?
Was that…
From a get-shirty point of view, have you got a going out or is travel covering it?
Actually, going out, well, an extra one which will cover the travel as well…
Right.
…at more linking rings is just people being unselfconscious, and particularly with…
…regarding noise.
Right.
So, I mean, I don’t particularly like quiet, quiet pubs, but I want to be able to have a conversation.
Yeah.
So, I mean, that’s, you know, generally down to…
…yumbar stuff these days.
So, I’m going to…
I’m going to be like…
…the grumpy old guy, I am, but I still get the other day with someone who’s saying,
“I remember the days when the music in the pub was further punters.”
Yeah.
You know, not to entertain the bar staff as they were bored.
Yeah.
And sport screens, similarly, I mean, you know, not into sports anyway, but just kind of visual distractions.
I don’t need to be like a doctor’s waiting room, but just a level where you can talk to more than one person at once would be nice, you know.
But also, people on public transport, playing stuff on their phones, you know, tinny, horrible…
…having the conversation, or you’re…
…you know, what we’re stopping you from putting that to your ear.
Yeah, no, no.
…to have it, you know, that way.
You know, I’ve heard a theory about this.
Have we talked about this before?
I think I’ve dismissed it.
But yeah, you know, not a podcast, please.
So, the theory on that is, is because, essentially, it’s reality TV, that’s done that.
Because where phones were being used more in things like the apprentice and X-Factor’s, Judges’ Houses,
and they were, like, call your mum, call this person, and they have to get the other side of the conversation.
And they were put it on speaker phone.
Yeah.
So, suddenly on TV, all these people holding their phones, going, “Mah, guess what? Blah blah blah blah.”
Oh my God!
So, they stopped putting them to their ears, of course, that you see that on X-Factor and not…
Even allowing for that, you know, you’re kind of holding it, and distance horizontally, like, like, you’re about…
Yeah.
…just like you’re about to eat a riveeta.
You know, so…
Now, there’s a good slight hand turning your phone into a riveeta.
But, yeah, no, just put it to your ear.
Yeah.
Put it to your ear.
I don’t know why everybody else needs to hear.
Yeah.
And now, with Bluetooth speakers, as well, I mean, especially living on Brighton down the beach,
just that everyone’s taking their own equipment, the boom box, you know.
And it’s always crappy music.
I like quite a wide range of music.
But it seems to be the same people that are unself-conscious about playing it.
Yeah.
The ones with extremely bad taste.
Well, that’s probably… that probably is it.
Check me out, check out how good my taste is when it’s…
Well, what you need to do is an Adam Bucksdon, he said, on the podcast,
“If he’s in a pub and the music’s loud, where he’s sitting, he just unplugs the speaker.”
And that’s the other end of being unself-conscious, isn’t it?
I haven’t done that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Very politely plugged it back in.
I did that in Dubai, actually.
We were doing a comedy store tour thing out there.
And we went on a night off, so we went on the barge, that…
The ferry or whatever it is, that goes in.
So, it’s a sunset.
And you’ve got all the kind of minarets, and you’ve got the Islamic call to prayer.
It’s all really atmospheric.
And they’re blasting out Aber of this thing.
So, I just wait until they’re all just lucky and just yank the wires out of the speaker on it.
Public service, that’s all right.
Absolutely.
Stu, a minute ago, he said, “We forgot the hat, and we did forget the hat.”
Okay, so…
It’s leaving the dream come true.
You’ve probably got one.
Well, it’s leaving the shop.
That’s what it does.
Yeah, it’s leaving the shop.
We forget things.
So, I’ll do the explanation.
So, what it is is, we have a section, the last which I’ve mentioned to you,
which is a section called off the cup.
So, basically, we have a hat, a bowl of hat,
with lots of suggestions in of things to get surety about.
Right.
But it’s called off the cup, because that works with the get surety.
Yeah.
Then we can work out how to get that to somebody other than pulling out the hat.
We’re not very inventive like that.
So, now we’ve decided to keep the hat.
Because we’ve left the shop, we have left the hat.
So, one time we want somebody to actually pull something out of a hat
and for it to have the most relevance.
Because we should be in a clean shop.
We should be in a clean shop.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And the how cup of that has been, if it had been like…
What we should have done is put everyone in there as rabbit.
I’ve gone, “Oh, my God, I can’t do this.”
Can you imagine?
That’s about…
I often get asked to draw the raffle at charity events and stuff.
You ask me the magician to…
Yeah.
So, yeah, we can’t do that off the cuff out of the hat.
Well, we could improvise it and so I could pull out an invisible one out of your invisible hat.
Armadillos.
What we’ll do is we’ll cut to the shop of us dipping our hand into the hat.
Pulling out a piece of paper that says armadillos.
Yeah, so, yeah, you ran about wherever you want to run about.
We’ll cut this bit.
No, we pulled out.
We pulled out.
He was right.
He was right.
He’s amazing.
He’s the best.
Let’s get sure to phone cues.
Right, yeah, that’s a good one.
Yeah, it’s just quite relevant to the moment in that call weight.
And that’s not called weight, is it?
Yeah, they’re sort of…
You are 62 in the queue.
That’s it.
Yeah, well, I mean, at the moment, I’m trying to buy a place abroad.
And so as part of that, I’ve got to set up a Greek bank account.
Right.
And with the money laundering laws, law rest of it in recent years,
it’s just got far, far worse than it used to be apparently.
So over the past two, three weeks, I’ve probably spent…
Because I’ve got to get so many different things.
I’ve got something from HMRC.
I’ve got something from a bank over here.
I’ve got to get something from, you know, from the passport office.
And I’ve probably spent round about 12 or 14 hours,
just in queues on the phone out there,
because it’s the automated thing.
And now they’ve got the voice recognition that asks you roughly
what your enquiry is about.
And so, you know, it’s just looking for key words.
And she goes, “Right, it’s about my certificate of residency
or for the UK.”
And you go, “Oh, what do you like a letter of residency for overseas?”
And you go, “No.”
And you just record that one word out of that.
And so you go, “Oh, could you describe it again?”
And so you try to think of all these different ways of putting it.
And in the end, “Am I right?”
“No!”
[laughter]
“Yeah, you’re not really right.”
So, but yeah, it’s just, and then the music.
The music?
Oh, that’s exactly what I was about to say, the music.
In the old days, they’d play, it’d be still rubbish music.
But it’d be quite a long version of it.
And now, it’s normally a couple of hours.
Yeah, it’s just, it’s like water torture.
And the quality is really bad.
Yeah, as well.
Totally.
And you get just one little phrase of the music.
Yeah.
And then it’s background.
And the HMRC one is particularly bad.
Yeah.
Because when you finally get through, and it’s been an average hour and a quarter each time,
and I finally get through to someone, and you have to describe the whole thing and go,
“All right, I’ll just get someone who can deal with that.”
And they go to a different department.
And so then you have to go through all the same security questions again.
And then describe the thing again.
And then they tell me they can’t do anything about it.
Or in several cases with them, they’ve sorted it.
Or apparently sorted it.
They go, “That’s fine, so the hard copy should be with you within a week.”
Or whatever.
And then the next morning, while I’m still sleeping, bed, they’ve left a message and said,
“Oh, there’s a slight problem.
Can you call us back?”
And then they go, “Oh, she’s got to a whole thing again.”
Yeah, a whole thing again.
Meanwhile, in that hour and a quarter, besides the music loop, about every 30 seconds,
do you know it’s much quicker to go online to this?
Yes, I do.
That’s where I’ve got this number from.
Yeah.
Yeah. It’s the little silent pause between the music as well, that I hate.
The one that makes you go, “Oh, no, it’s not me.”
It’s not me.
Especially when you’re on hold, like we have to be on hold at work sometimes,
called the bank or something.
And so we’ll be trying to do stuff at the same time when it’s on loudspeaker.
And so you’re like, “Oh yeah, and of course we could always go and do that.”
Oh, no, anyway.
What we say is, sort of, yeah, it is.
I was describing it to my accountant the other day.
And he said, “Well, how do you think it is for us?”
In an accountant’s company, he said, “Everywhere,” because there’s that six rooms in the building.
Or at least one of them at all times.
At all times, and on that.
Yes.
Why do you have to give the your account number?
Maybe, “bub, bub, bub, bub, bub, bub, hash.”
Yeah.
And then give your account number when you get through.
Yeah.
What’s your account number?
I’ve already done that.
Yeah.
In mothers’ maiden name.
Yeah, just that.
What was the point of all that?
Yeah.
From your email.
The memorable information.
Give us the third, the third, fourth and eighth.
Yeah.
It’s simple and right.
I like the one where it’s called out in the other member of the…
No, they’ve been able to.
Anyway.
They’ve phone you about something.
Yeah.
The bank can go, “Hello, is that Mr…,” you know.
Mr. Zeyn, whatever.
Then go.
Can I just ask you a couple of security questions?
Are you, you’re phoning me?
I know it’s crazy.
Are you telling me, “Ed, I wonder who you are?”
Yeah.
Can you prove you’re the bank?
Yeah.
No, then what other?
Yeah.
Well, one of my industries…
Sort of favourite past times at work is when you get those cold calls where they can save
you money on your electricity or save you, you know, change your phone contract or all
those sorts of things.
And that sort of work in that role reversal back because they’ve called us, you know,
like, “I’ve got into full-blown selling them a suit mode.”
Yeah.
Well, obviously, you’ve called here, say you want to buy a suit.
So what’s a suit?
Is it that you would really like it to buy?
I don’t want to see.
Well, you must because you’ve called me and I can save you money on your suit.
Are you saying you don’t want to save money on a suit?
Or, you know, you’re wasting my time.
Thank you.
And they hang out.
It’s like, “Well, yeah, now you know, you know.”
I mean, I know they’ve got a job to do, but sometimes these people…
It’s a job that shouldn’t exist.
It is a job that shouldn’t exist.
So, do you remind me of… I was once in Curries and I was… they were doing some combo, this
is going way back.
So it was a DVD player and a small TV, so I was getting for the bedroom.
And they were combining the two things.
Yeah.
And it was a better price.
I’d seen the advert on the TV and so I forget what the model number was or the brand name,
but I knew what the price was on there.
So I wanted to Curries, there was a young lad working there.
He went, “Can I help you?”
I said, “Yeah, apparently you’ve got a combination DVD and…
that’s great TV and it’s… if you buy them together, it’s a cheap package.”
He said, “Oh, I don’t know about that.”
I said, “Well, yeah, it’s quite good, actually, because that on its own would be this much.”
And that would be…
If you buy the two, it’s…
“Can I help you with anything else?”
And he went, “No, thank you.”
Oh, bless you.
[Music]
I don’t know if it’s some common knowledge, but had you come up with Zenon?
Well, it is…
When I was doing A-levels, I was doing physics, chemistry and maths.
And I was doing a kind of space-age magic act to music at the time.
And so I was into…
Please tell me you’ve got some video of this.
[Laughter]
Definitely not, snow.
Definitely not.
I’ve got some photos, but…
This was… I put together cassette backing tape to work to, which was mainly Hawkewind.
And I was at Silver Machine by…
Hawkewind.
Hawkewind, did you support Hawkew?
Yeah, well, this…
I read.
So, what I was basically…
I was going under the name…
Which way around was it?
Yeah, I did Zenon with an X, just on its own, without the Paul bit.
And then they were playing Preston Guild Hall.
And so, one of the first bands I saw, actually.
And so I went along and I met them backstage.
And I told Nick Turner, I said, “I’m doing an act to your music and a bit of pink flying west of it.”
He said, “Oh, you should come and do a gig with us.”
And so, a few weeks later, I ended up doing a…
I don’t know, a tour, about three, three, four dates, including Hammersmith Odeon.
All right.
So, this was sort of 17 at the time.
All right.
And because they were…
A very major space rock, so I could only…
sort of thing.
I was going through various names.
And just science-wise at school, Zenon sounded…
So, initially it was then, because they had changed it to a Z.
And years later, it worked like this was 82 or something like 81.
86, I think, released an album called The Zenon Codex.
So, technically, I’ve got a Halkwyn album named After Me.
Unfortunately, they’ve done about 50 albums today,
and it’s without a doubt, the very worst ones.
(laughs)
Well, I did Hammersmith Odeon.
The…
I can say it was cassette back in.
And I’ve been going on stage with them
and doing an instrumental number at a couple of other gigs.
They do a long instrumental, I do my bit.
But on this one, they had Michael Moorcock,
a science fiction writer, was on doing a poem.
So, they said, “Well, can you come on and do it
to the cassette back in between the support band?”
And I was, “So, what will happen is,
there’s a Spanish heavy metal band called Baron Rocco.”
And so, they, it’s a Dale finish.
And then, as they go off, as you walk forwards,
the safety curtain will come down behind you,
you know, the big metal, the eye, as they call it.
And we’ll reset the Halkwyn band.
As you finish your bicks, I was doing about 89 minutes.
Then the curtain will go back up,
dry ice rolls forward and we’re in, as again, so fine.
So, I go and do my bit.
And as I finish, the cassette music runs out
and the curtain doesn’t go back up.
And the whole thing with the iron safety curtain
is it completely seals off backstage from the auditorium.
So, I’m there, and I’ve got nowhere to go.
And so, just there’s like 5,000 bikers and hippies.
And, you know, I just do.
I’ve got no microphone, because we’re getting to music back in.
I’ve got this table there.
So, yeah, I’ve just kind of stood there for a bit.
And then it looks like Eric Morgan at the end of the special…
-Jump up. -Jump up.
Jumped off the front of the stage and ran off up the aisle.
Oh, brilliant.
And ended up sleeping in my Maurice Marina coupé
under a stolen asbestos fire blanket.
On that note, that bombshell.
On that bombshell, we’ll say thank you so much
for allowing us in your home and allowing us to take up
so much of your time and to be so generous
with your time.
-No, it’s lovely. -Lovely, lovely talk about it.
Come on.
Come on.
Come on.
Come on.
Ta-da!
What a great chat with Paul there.
Once again, another guest who was so generous with their time and tea
and Paul makes good cuppa.
A massive thank you to him for his time, his racon turin,
and the beverages.
Thanks, as always, to Dad Hazard for the podcast tunes,
to Stuart Wilson for the editing, co-hosting and production.
But no thanks at all this time for Sam
because she did nothing.
Until… that as usual.
Until we speak, next time I’m your host, Stuart Harman,
and do try not to get too shirty.
(upbeat music)
Yeah, it’s got the, the Banksy on the side of it with the…
-The Kissing Policeman. -That’s right, yeah.
In fact, actually, I was in Britain last week
and my daughter said, “I’ve never seen a Banksy.”
I said, “Well, look, I can take you there.”
-There’s a story there. -Oh, is there?
There’s a Banksy because this is going back quite a few years.
But basically, someone offered to buy it.
This all came out afterwards.
And so one particular night, in fact, I was going back before that,
someone greeted over it, someone…
And these really clever blocs rolled up in a van
with, I think it was a plumbers, with a phone number on the side of it.
-Really? -With a CCTV camera,
sprayed across the Banksy and then threw the cans in the bin.
So they got the fingerprints, they’re addressed.
-It’s on number. -Yeah, they’re read…
Everything.
And so they only got fined about 80 quid,
because you can’t really find someone
unless you find the original graffiti artist,
which would have been Banksy.
-Yeah, yeah, yeah. -The graffiti in graffiti.
And so anyway, the barman there, Gets at the time,
started to clean it up and it all came off.
So on the heads of it, and so it ended up with me and him repainting it.
-Really? -So we repainted that Banksy
and then come back to where it started and someone offered to buy it.
And I think it was an American company,
and they wanted to lift it off and send it in auction.
And so the public landlord said, “Well, you can’t, you know,
it’s a landmark, you can’t do that.”
So what they did very sneakily one night,
they built a tiny shed round it overnight,
and they replaced it with an exact replica.
And so the one that is there now,
is actually a replica Banksy,
the one that got sold in the States was actually by me and Jess.
[laughter]
-Well, we’re from half a million, so you know.
-Well, I’d be putting that on my website,
and they’re half a million pounds selling artists.
-Yeah, I think one of the newspapers ran with it,
but it’s still not well known.
Everyone still stops there for it.
They’ve put perspex out there to stop the replica of the replica.
-The replica replica.
-Oh, I will look.
That’s a top story.
-There’s a comedian called Mandy Knight,
and she was a Maddazzer Boxer Chips.
I’ll say, can we edit that, but Maddazzer Boxer Chips.
[laughter]
-Just like the Frogs, or, yeah, let’s just look at it all together.
[laughter]
-We’ll say, yeah, I’ll say it all.
-I’ll be giving up on a new phrase.
-Yeah, if I’m not right.
-It is now.
[laughter]
-Yeah.
-I’ll be using that for now on.
-That will be your legacy, wouldn’t it?
-I’ll pickle myself.
-There you go.
-There you go.
-That’s Maddazzer Boxer Chips.
-Well, actually, all down the part,
I don’t like getting a Boxer Chips.
I want to wrap it in paper.
-I don’t want it in the box.
-That’s Maddazzer.
-That is Maddazzer.
-There you go.
-I’ll go back, and I’m quite like a bottle of shit.
[music]
-Let’s get shirted.
[beep]
-Tada!
[laughter]
-Dee.
[laughter]
-Well, he’s a magician.
So, we’ve just done a magic trick.
I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-I’m going to do a magic trick.
-Well, he’s a magician.
-Oh, now that was the Great Surprend day.
-No, no, it wasn’t.
-That was, yeah, it was the Great Surprend day.
-Fucking, the things I do for this peace in company.
-Oh, I’m still recording.
[laughter]
(laughs)
