BudPod with Phil Wang & Pierre Novellie - S2e11 Fringepod 3 Djmemba

Episode Date: January 11, 2026

This week our buds take us through the true ‘Spirit of the Fringe’, the worst venues for stand-up and some woeful wackaging.KOJI Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's Bud Pod Part 11. My real name is Bevan. Imagine. Yeah. I did know a Bevan at uni. I do know a Bevan. It's B-E-V-A-N. Yeah, Bevan's boys.

Yeah, Bevan's boys. Those boys he would sleep with. It's not true. We'll start again. They were boys under 16 who would work in a mine instead of going to the army. Yes. Under 18?

This guy, Bevan. It was like a t-shirt party at uni where everyone wore white t-shirts and it was like last day of school so you signed everyone's t-shirts. I have no memory of this. I must have been hammered. It must have been about half two in the morning.

But apparently in this nightclub, I wrote on his t-shirt, 9-11-7-7 terror attacks at Rhyme of Bevan. On his t-shirt. Even smashed as a young name. As like a 19-year-old. You're still looking for rhymes. You're still looking for references.

I think I've mentioned 9-11 on nearly every year. episode have done so far. And it will stop. It will stop at some point. Well, never forget. Yeah. You really took that to heart.

I was thinking last night backstage just before my show about how much the comedy industry has changed with regards to having to do so much of your own work and it being more of a freelance thing and that routine you had a few years ago of like the point of this was no jobs. Now I have 11 jobs. You have 11 jobs because you're like editing any videos and stuff like that. And I do wonder if that's how Bin Laden felt when he just wanted to do the attacks of any He was like, I'm having to do these videos, I'm having to send the videos. The original influencers?

Yeah, it's like, I haven't to send these videos. B-influencer. Influencer Larden. That's where's his full name. When you watch those videos of him in the camo jacket sitting cross-legged doing this, the subtitles were wrong. It should have just been saying,

it's unreasonable to expect me to check my DMs every day. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That one friend who's flown into the Pentagon. He's having to do observational stuff and he's like, I used to just do this in my own living room and it was fine, and now I'm having to make sure I'm miced up and get it all the town. Bin Laden putting on a blonde wig he got off Amazon

to be his wife in a sketch. It's not what he signed up to Al-Qaeda for. In the 80s, it was different. You know, you're on the road. Yeah, you're on the road, you're on the road, yeah, yeah. You were playing the caves, you were playing the caves. You were playing the caves, you were going to Kenya. You were blowing up an embassy.

It was something living, you know. Not in your room? Yeah. Not in your fortified room. It was the only way he could get an audience in America. He broke America. He broke America. We should say we're exercising our right to bear cans.

Yeah, this is our second Tin Laden episode. The Bin Laden Tin Garden. There's a pub garden in Toro Bora now. We've only done one episode previously on Tins, and that was immediately post-Chessington World of Adventures for it. It's just shattered. And here we're emotionally exhausted because we've still got another week left of the French.

Yes, and it's the sort of, the final week is... You sort of do it in a bit of a day, I think. You get a bit demob happy in the final week and you just sort of barrel through it. Yeah. It's also, it's branded lager, so if you're watching, it's Monkey Barrel comedy Fringe Lager. Which is where we're recording,

and it's where you're doing a show. Yes, I've just finished my show, which is why I've got speckles of tit sweat. If I may coin a phrase. A horrible phrase? Yeah, this month... Titswet, sweat, speckles. Is the one time of the month

where I'm frantically rubbing myself down with blue tissue. Yes, that's what I was just doing in a cave. Like Bin Laden. Frantically getting the tissue they bring out for vomit and rubbing my tits with it. Yeah, the little effect. It's so different to being on tour.

So much of the fringe is just you frantically backstage as the audience coming in going, why won't I try? I can't go on stage. stage already wet, they won't respect me. It's like being in an aquarium. There is no air, it's just water and bubbles, that's all there is. Yeah.

It is like the entire spirit of the fringe is, we'll do it in the barn. Yes, it's... That's the point of the fringe is we'll do it in the barn. You can always tell when people are at their first fringe, because they're like, all the chairs were weird and uncomfortable, and there was mold everywhere. Yeah, you go, that's intentional.

You go, what was the show like? Yeah. That's what it's all like. I cannot believe, I feel. feel so tremendously privileged being in a venue that's got those like flip-down seats. And you go fixed seating, rostra. People want to sit here all year round. All the chairs are the same as each other.

That's mad. It's not like I'm on one bar store and the person next to me is like twice my height. Like a boss pulling some weird sort of like alpha move during a job interview. I'm having to talk to their shoes. That's when you interview to be an umpire. The guy interviewing you was in that chair. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what dating an umpire is like.

Yeah, hi-chairs. Yeah, it's... What's the maddest venue you've watched a show in or performed in at the Fringe? I was thinking, is there a way to look up what is the worst fringe venue? What is the worst? There is one that I'm not sure is still around,

but the Three Sisters on Cow Game, which is just this conglomerate, I guess, of just bars... It's a hostel as well. Is that what it is the rest of the year? So it's a hostel. a beer garden, a pub,

and a venue. I'm not really sure... It's unsustainably loud, and when really drunk people go out on a Saturday from 11 a.m., that's the place. It's so hard to explain the geography as well, because it's in a kind of a subterranean alleyway,

but it's also an outdoor beer garden. Yeah. But you're definitely below ground. But the venues are upstairs, but they look below ground, because they look like a tube tunnel. And also they are below ground compared to the upstairs of the upper roads. Edinburgh's such a fucking M.C.

It's insane. It's like a Warhammer 40K. I don't know how I can walk into Underbelly at ground level, go down three flights of stairs and emerge also at ground level. How's that happen? I once got to the road I needed to be on by climbing four floors through a nightclub and a Chinese restaurant and going out the front door of the restaurant,

and then I was also at street level. It's how I'd frantically make a city of... in a video game, if I was like, I just need to connect these two fucking bits. I don't care. It's like those shots of the shitty bits of King's Landing in Game of Thrones. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We don't go down to the midden lane.

Yeah, and you go, no one surely wants to deliver it. It's like Blightown in Dark Song. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. On a fantasy map, it's always called something like, beggars reach. The liar's taint. You've been handed down to Liar's Taint recently. I've heard tale of a certain man. Down in Witch's Tit, who's willing to sell the coin.

In The Three Sisters, a number of venues, some of them are very nice, some of them not so nice, but there was one that was called something like, it can't still be around. This was like 10 years ago. The staff room. And I think it was like a nine-seater. And it was just the size of a bathroom. The amount of chairs stressed me out. But what I found really funny was the microphone is in the corner,

but behind the microphone was just a table like this. And you go, get rid of the table. Who's this, like, we're already, space is it such a, like, there's no space. I once saw a friend of mine do a very good show in a sort of sports pub, and the bit that the show was happening in was a curtained-off bit of the pub that was still just busy and full. And the curtain, you didn't quite touch the floor. It was like a shower curtain had been drawn across a random bit of any weather

and then a stage and a show. And so people were constantly trying to see if they could sit in the show to order their meal. It was terrible. Three Sisters, that's where Liam Williams did one of his shows on the free fridge. It was in a room just down the hallway from that. And it's like a 200-capacity room.

Because it's this massive, like, zombie cavern. It's a place where in a D&D game you'd find skeletons with, like, coins in their rib cages and stuff. Yeah, I don't know what is the rest of the year. It can't be a bar. I think it's just a nightclub where... It's a thoroughfare. It's a thoroughfare. I think it's a nightclub where backpackers go and have like a kind of spooky time.

Maybe in winter it's really nice to go into this like body-worned smog cave. So many of the rooms are bizarre, and what makes me sad is sometimes, if I was doing like a five-minute gig, you know, five-minute spot at a compilation show, while backstage you see boxes of props that are for other people shows. And you're like, someone is doing a play here. Someone's doing a play that they've poured their heart into, and it's going to a maximum of nine people at that. They didn't quite know how the fringe worked,

and they borrowed money from their aunt, and they've built the props themselves. And your show's on at 8pm, and so you've never met them, but you can see, there's a big paper mashay wave. There's a big paper mashay shell. Something's happening in here, and a lot of hearts been put into it,

and it's eating shit every day. I really didn't know how the fringe worked the first time I went up. And this was as a uni student, and I was going up with an improv group. It was called, they were called, yeah, a uni improv called the Shrimps, which did for Sheffield Improv, but I don't know where the R comes in. Shrimp-Prov? It's Shimp.

The Shims. It was the Ships. People who simp for chimps. People who shush to the Ships. I'm trying to watch you. I'm trying to watch you eat a banana. Do you have to be so loud? Sorry. I don't know why he sounds like he's got a blocked nose.

Sorry. They just say sorry in sign language. Yeah. They fully understand the problem. I went along thinking it was like tea in the park or something like that I thought it was like...

Three days. BST? I thought it was like a high festival. And you perform to 10,000 people but you do, like, you run for two minutes. And you just have a little set, like in Glastonbury or something like that is what I thought it was. And then when I heard we were there for a month, I was like, that's not true.

Is it? You've gotten that wrong. Oh, we do that. We stick around to make it a holiday. Yeah, I was like, we were doing two weeks, so no momentum for us. But we went up, and when we checked into where we were at, which was Sweet Grass Market, which is a venue that's still going, and still going from Strength to Strength, but in like 2010 or whatever, we were in a, I don't know, 30-seater conference room.

And again, it was like, ah, there's been a big mistake, hasn't there? Because we're on the main stage, aren't we, to the 10,000 people in a large park somewhere, I believe? We're not here at the non-branded Marriott. And I didn't realize it was real until I saw the person we were sharing a room with checking into their venue space, who was the tap dancer Lionel Blair. What are you talking about?

Lionel Blair. You and Lionel Blair. We're room buddies. And we were uni improv. If I was him, I would have been furious to have been sharing a space with uni improv. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Again, there's been an accident.

There's been a... I'm sorry to the... Take off my cab. There's been a horrible accident, and you've made a mistake, haven't you? I've performed in a church. Church is always fine. I think churches are always crap acoustically

when you think they will be nice, but you go there's so high-ceilinged. They're meant for the organ. Yeah. Sometimes they're nice. Worcester's the main tour date that people do in Worcester Huntington Hall. Yes, that is nice.

I think he's very nice. It is nice. But for the most part, churches are not good acoustically. They're supposed to be a place to speak without a microphone. Yes. Anywhere that's designed to amplify non-amplified sound

is shit for talking. So, concert halls, churches, any old building, it's bad. There's just something about a venue like that, and I'm not sure if you have this as well, but when you deliver your punchlines, you tend to say them like this. That's what I do. And then I got off the bus.

Garlic bread. There's only... I only do that in the Catholic venues. Of course, yeah, yeah. In the Anglican venues, I deliver everything like an Anglican bag. Yes, yeah, yeah. When I remember garlic bread. The people who used to eat the garlic bread and they were skeptical of it.

And the Lord would say unto the, do you remember? Do you remember crisps? What do you mean do I remember crisps? Yes, Peter. We should clarify as well for anyone else who's a fan of naughty stand-up comedy and wants to maybe categorize it or explain it fast. we have invented the word jimba. J.

I think it's... DJ apostrophe member. Or is it D-A-J-J-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-M-A-M-A. Yeah, and member is M-E-M-M-B-A. Yes. Jemba. Yeah. And it's, you know,

Jemba D'emba donkey Jackets. Yeah, and all that. What? And it feels more like an Alzheimer's test than a standard routine. Do you remember how many fingers I was holding up a second ago? Do you remember who the Prime Minister is? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

The golden days of Jemba are gone. But at a time, it was the main way that people made money and acquired influence. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I wish you could do that. I wish I could say, do you remember this thing? Leave it there.

I'm too foreign. The group of people who I could Jemember is so narrow. Yeah. Jemmber mid-90s Johannesburg from an incredibly privileged position. Then he goes, yes. Yes. Yeah, I do.

Okay, good. Hold that thought. Okay, just hang on a second. Yeah. Do you remember when the Isle of Man got a McDonald's in 1999? Yeah, do that fella. Okay, okay, yes, we're working now. We've got two.

Do you remember watching Paramount comedy on Sky? Because you had Sky. Yeah. Things like this. Whereas I realized that from my position, you could just be sort of like, do you remember around the twist? And everyone goes, ha ha ha ha. And you go, no, no, tell a joke.

Tell a joke. You can't just do that. You can't just make people remember other jokes. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's cheating. Yeah. A chef doesn't come out and go, when was the last time you had McDonald's?

Yeah, I know, yeah. Well, goodbye. I remember a friend of mine being furious after doing like a new act competition years ago, being in, I was never semi-finals and only one person was going to go through to the final. And he lost out to an impressionist because the impressionist was like,

oh, you all know, Michael McIntyre, right? And everyone was like, yeah. And then he just did five minutes of Michael McIntyre stand up. And everyone was like, losing their minds. And then he was like, you're like, Rod Gilbert. And then he'd get the initial laugh of, doesn't it sound like Rod Gilbert?

But then five minutes was just Rod Gilbert telling a story about, Khan Bobble or whatever. Yeah. I love that. I love the injustice of that sort of shit. In the early days when you start. So infuriating.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I did a competition once, a stand-up competition where the first round, so the way it works, listeners, is you'll all enter, and there'll be different rounds. And like, it's either an audience.

vote or a judge's vote and, you know, the first round could be five minutes, then it's seven, then it's ten, or something like that. But this competition was so stringent and unusual. The first round was 90 seconds. Amused Moose? Well, yes. It's not happening anymore, so I think we're allowed to talk about it. It's Amused Moose. But I was so skeptical, I was like,

why would you... You won? You won the whole competition? I won the Big Moose in 2013. Did you win the Moose? I won the Moose. What does that mean? You win a moose. I've got a little moose statue. Oh, that's nice. I also, part of the prize was a meeting with two, the number two, and then entertain, two entertain, which was the DVD-making commercial arm of BBC Worldwide,

which, the year I won it, a dissolve. Because no one was buying DVDs in 2013. I got disqualified from that competition. What? Yeah, I got disqualified in... Because you entered so you think you're funny. Yes. Yeah!

I got disqualified in 2013. I got through to the semifinals. I got through to the final. we would have kicked together in the final and then suddenly the person who ran it, who ran it, rang me up and said, you didn't tell me you're in the final of so you think you're funny the previous year.

And I was like, well, not to blow my own trumpet, but yes, I was, you know, sort of thing she was going to go, that's amazing, well done. But she was like, yeah, you would have to get into, to be in the final of these competitions back in the day. You had to sign a contract that meant you were then like beholden to Universal Studios or whatever.

Yeah. For, if inexplicably, in the next final If you released your own DVD, they had first refusal. And you were like, I have four minutes of material. Yeah. There's no DVD that's coming out. I'm 20. Yeah. What is happening?

Yeah. So you were tied to universe. I was tied to it. So she was like, you cannot possibly be in the final. You cannot be tied to two entertain. Yeah. Which, again, I can't emphasize this enough. Dissolve. Because no one was making DVDs anymore. 90 seconds. 90 seconds.

That's an insane amount. That's what I thought. That's like the sort of first thing. impression you get and tape me out. Plus, he may as well just come down in a big lift and they pop a balloon. Yeah, but, but, I was skeptical. And then I went through the 90 seconds. And because it's 90 seconds, you can fit in a shitload of people on that evening.

Yeah. In this basement gig in London. And that's when I first met the comedian, Garrett Millerick. Oh. It was in the 92nd round of our amusement was 2013. Well, actually, no, I'd met him in a car share, but it was the first time we properly had sort of hung out. And I sort of, we were joking about her like, oh, the next one.

90 seconds, it must be... That's kind of silly around, just to weed out all the crazies. Yeah. That's some of the craziest shit I've ever seen in my life. Yeah, I saw some insane stuff. A guy... Like, people couldn't take the microphone out of the stand.

I saw a guy use his 90 seconds to use the worst possible slur, seven or eight times, from a position of not being able to use it, I will also add. Dunderhead. Dunderhead. Dunderhead. He called everyone in himself Dunderheads.

Hey, man, that's our word. We're wearing caps with D's on. Yeah. We're dancers, we're dantsers, we're dunders. That's ours. Yeah, just the most astonishingly mentally unbalanced people just all got up in a row and spent their 90 seconds doing and saying things that would ruin a politician's career.

I think it's quite unique to London. I did competitions in Sheffield when I lived there, and it was just more normal. Yeah, the nutter density of London is quite something. Yeah, I find it. If I'd get, if it did, like, gong shows in Manchester, it would get a bit weird. But London was the absolute weirdest. And I found as well, the vigilance they had, the level of mistrust they had around you

was like airport security levels. The people running it, because they were like, don't you fucking dare do it? Why are you taking off your belt? It was like trying to get into the Pentagon. Yeah, because I would do like, I'd do like an open mic night in London, and you'd go along and you'd sign up, and you're one of 25 people doing it.

And they'd say, you have four minutes of stage time, at minute three, I'll walk on stage. The Compao would walk onto the stage, and over the course of the next 30 seconds would slowly outstretch his hand until by the end he was touching your microphone. So no matter how well the set is going, you look like you've seized someone's microphone

at political rally, and you're going, by the way, he was recently found an Epstein, you know, that's how every gig ended. So the emcee would come on and try and take a microphone as if he was invisible. Yes, and you'd be like, you remember a good night, and everyone's words would get cut off,

like you're falling off a cliff in a cartoon where you're like... Yeah, it was like that. Psychotic. A terrible way to do anything. Absolutely. I just... It's something about that... Yeah, those competitions

that just attracted some of the craziest... I remember I did a round of the Total Student Contest. And there was a lady who... I mean, it was funny, but her act was putting on one of those big horse masks. She was wearing a leotard. She put on a big horse mask. and just danced to Man in the Mirror by Michael Jackson.

It's post-death. He's dead. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, he is dead all right. Yeah. Yeah, that was it? That was there. I quite like that.

Yeah, you've done something. I think she's got something with the form. I think she got through. Yeah, I remember this guy used to gig of all the time at Open Minds. He was like in his late 80s. Every single night he'd get up. And he'd always point at the front row and he'd go, there they are, the Society of the Folded Arms.

And how many wanted to go, What? And he opened with that all the time. I like it as a line. Yeah. But it was so like, he'd do it like this every time. Like, he'd do it like a merchant in a Final Fantasy game where they're sort of like, well, you better beware, this town smells as bad as a

Chocobo's behind, whatever, and it makes the main character go, and like take a step back. Makes the main character like a fucking loser. Yeah, what is that about? Why he's such a prude? What is that about? You're offended by the words Chocobos behind.

Chocobos behind. Choccobo sounds like a bad word. Chocobos is the big birds from the Final Fantasy series. They're like emus, right? Yeah, basically, yeah, yeah. And nothing smells as bad as there. Ching, behind!

You know, it like zooms in really up close on them. Horrible. All those interactions and a lot of those Final Fantasy games, they make me feel really, really angry the whole time. Yeah, the sort of games where you'd be so... you just hope a relative doesn't walk in. I'd rather someone call me wanking.

You have very bad luck with that. Insanely bad luck. It's really, really funny. I always found this if ever you're playing like Zelda, not to do too much of a Button Boy's crossover right now. But if you're playing something like Breath of the Wild or something like that, like you'd almost want someone to walk in as you're sort of like making your way up a mountain and being like, look at this amazing view I found that not every player has found.

And look at this discovery, the sheer scale of the world. Well, they catch you the second you solve a very difficult puzzle. Yes. And look at the physics they've employed. in the game, whereas instead I'd go to a town and they'd be sort of like, welcome to lollipop land to welcome you, we'll do the lollipop dance. And they go, boop, boop, boop. And they all just do this dance. And they go, you are 11 years old for enjoying this.

And you're like, shut up, shut up, shut up. It's getting louder and louder. But no matter how much I turn the TV down, it's like getting louder and louder and louder. Lollipop, and you're shut up. Shut, shut up, why are you saying lollipop like that? No adult says lollipop. I could be playing fucking Wolfenstein. Lollipop.

No, shut up. I watched my... My sister and my brother-in-law showed me this game where... I cannot remember what is it called. It's one of those things that is like Final Fantasy, but it's... Blades. Characters are called Blades. Is it Zeno Blade Chronicles?

Is it something like that? Yeah, maybe. You can be a blade. Right. And it's like a turn-based combat thing with a party of blades. But one of them is just like... It's the kind of thing you...

accuse someone of liking to offend them. Like, it's so... Yeah, you seem like a sort of person who'd enjoy blank. Yeah. Does you like this? Is this what you like? Yeah. And it's a rabbit woman. She's got like big rabbit paws and like big rabbit ears.

Yeah. And like... If you did a silly caricature of what you thought Kim Kardashian's body looked like, that's what her body looks like. Yeah. It's like massive tits and bum and tiny waist. The insane sexualization in JFPGs is so grossly uncomfortable. But also I'm sort of like, is it problematic for me to criticize that?

I don't know. I don't like how close it is to the lollipop land does. Right, yes, exactly. I think you need to pick if you're for adults or not. Whereas when they go like... When they're kids, wanna fuck. You're like, what? No, no.

Welcome to Marshmallow Village, where everyone is double F knocker. Like, just, oh, what? It's like this combination of like fucking elf and, you know, page three of the sun. Welcome to the Little Village where all the rabbits are huge tits. What do you mean? What do you mean? You know, what exact, very specific type of businessman is this for? Yes, yeah, yeah.

And it's as transparent as Quentin Tarantino is around feet. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We all know. And it's so much further than just something that is, you know, as Daria O'Brien, I think, he didn't coin the term, but he popularized it, I think, something for the dads. Yes.

So you could go, oh, I see, this is a kid's video game, lollipop land, fine. But they've made a few characters a little, you know, Yeah. Because the parents are... Like, sometimes you get a very adult joke snuck into kid shows. Yeah.

But it's so far beyond that that it looks a lot more like cartoon porn that they've also made quite babyish. Yeah. And that's what creeps me out. Yeah. Because we spoke before about the Captain Pugwash stuff, obviously. Yes, yeah, yeah.

Which apparently is mainly an urban myth. No, they did have... It was the fuck bosom, wasn't it? And the cum lord. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Here's a joke... Sex Peter.

They had sex Peter Someone called Sex Peter It's so soft Peter But yeah Which was supposed to be the man on board the ship Responsible for the sextant For navigation The sex Peter

It's a very very neutral term There was a midshipman Who was just constantly mid-shit And for some reason that's sexual He's not in the modern navy He's called the Turtlingman Here's a joke I came up with today I was hanging out with Paul the Tour

the tour manager, Paul. Yes, yeah, yeah. And Sam Lake. Uh-huh. And we're all hanging out. And the joke I came up with was... And I was trying to think of who I could sell this to. I think, I can't use...

You know, you come up with a good joke. And you think, but I can't use this. Yeah. I thought maybe you could use this. Maybe. What are you going with this? The other day, I got it. So this is the job.

I always really would be sort of like, service Indian guy walks into it. I'm like, what I do? Glenn will like this. Yeah, Glenn will do this. On tour, not a camera. Sickenhead, sick and a head stuff. So you say, the other day I got a hand job off a close-up magician.

Is this your come? Is that good? It's really scary. Yeah, okay, good, yeah. That's a scary joke. That's good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good.

Audience should be scared, yeah. Yeah, it's actually a terrifying image. Like, I had this horrible image years ago. of, um, it was, it was a, it was a bully, just shoveling handfuls of turds down like your trousers going, why are you shitting yourself? Why shitting yourself? It's that, you go, that's so aggressive that it's scary, isn't it?

Handfuls. I don't like that. Yeah, from her bag. Yeah, from his. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't like that at all. No, no, no, no. I'm absolutely smashing my way through the Sringel Lager.

Yeah, do you want another one? I will have another one. It's only 4%. What do you mean only? What do you have? Well, so many lagers, when you see them on taps and stuff, John Robbins has done this to me from Ellis and John years ago, he would always talk about how most lagers are like 5 or 6% or between the two.

And the difference between having like a 3% IPA, a 5.5% Lager is huge. Oh, yeah, it's enormous, yeah. Have you ever had... Have you ever been an absinthe-man? I drank it at uni when people would buy it as a joke. Never had it. It just tastes like mouthwash.

Yeah, I just don't see it. the, I'm like, if you enjoy it, there's a problem. I think all that stuff about, like, there were all these urban myths about it, like, oh, you drink absinthe, you hallucinate, and you see the green fairy and all this kind of stuff. And it had this big reputation, I think, in sort of La Belle Epoch, Paris,

like, 18-Haris. It's just strong booze. It's just the only strong booze they had. Yeah, I think, as well, I was like, you're, right, I know you're having hallucinations, but also you were drinking from the Parisian waters. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I always found that funny about, about, like, the curse of Tutank-Karmun. Yeah.

The curse of Tutankhamun, where they're sort of like, you know, all these people who died after finding Tutankhamun's tomb, and they're like, why did all of these white British guys who drank from the Nile all fart themselves to death shortly after that can't be Tukal. They went to the tomb and they shit themselves inside out. Like, Big Jellies. It must be the curse.

They kept sipping from the Nile directly. What could it have been? They just went to the places with the most diseases and mosquitoes and no plumbing. and somehow they shit themselves to death. I can how it's fatter over here? Very nice. Very nice.

Oh, in terms of misheard lyrics or changed lyrics? Yes. All day to day, walking around my sister's flat singing, pink slimy grubs, I'm going to keep on eating all these big slimy grubs. What animal are you in this? I mean, me, but I'm... You're you, but you're having big grubs.

I couldn't identify grub if I saw one. They're just... I know which do grubs, but like... I've never seen a grub. Like a lava. Mm. That's what they looked like. I had Lucy in the sky of diamonds one ages ago.

Just one line of... Picture yourself, motor, boating Joan Rivers. I've got one for a depressing weather spoons. Oh, yeah? I'm gonna keep on drinking in this old... on this old grimy pub, I'm going to keep on a drink. Yeah, in this former cinema.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, a cinema that looks like it was in Bioshock. That's the weather trees, yeah, yeah. It looks, yeah, it looks like they've turned a villain's lair from an 80s sci-fi film into a pub. Yeah, I don't mind it at all. High ceilings. I've never had absin't. I'm trying to think of what reactions to alcohol have been my strongest in my life.

and I was saying this to someone the other day that I Did you ever have Lambrieney? It was like a cheap version of wine You can still probably get it in off-licenses Isn't it like 9% or something quite low? Yeah, I think so But then there was a knock-off version

Lambreni is knock-off wine But there was a knock-off version of Lambini Which I had at uni once And I think it had two bottles I remember watching Princess Mononokey upside down as in my bum was on the sofa and my head was on the floor and I was watching the studio Ghibli film

and then my next memory is the guitar hero guitar was in my hands and I was trying to play guitar hero upside down. I've no memory of this and then I woke up on the kitchen table in our kitchen. Oh, God. Right?

I've since had wine. I love wine. Yeah. That experience of this cheap tasting Cassini wine was so bad that since then I've not been able to have cider. Wow.

Yeah, that's the flavor I can't have. The wine was so bad it made you hate cider. That's... Yeah, and I haven't drunk cider to this day. It was so acidic. The smell makes me like really, like, really almost wretch. I had that with white wine for a while. I think it's anything acidic,

because you're essentially just drinking what your vomit's gonna be like later. It's so acidic. You're pre-vommiting, yeah, yeah, yeah. Quick pre-vommit before we go out. Yeah. Well, speaking of pre-vomit, we should do some correspondence. Yes.

Mail, letter, post, message, email, notes, text, dispatches, SMS, and randoms, correspondence. Mm-hmm. So, it's some wackaging from Phil. Okay. I'm crawling back of you. Wang. He'll get on any way he can. Now in a second, this text message is wearing a false mustache.

This email comes right off. Yeah. Watching from Phil. Hi, Pierre and Glenn. Prey is redacted for a new glorious era of colonization and anti-murder podcasting, called colonization, of course. I recently learned that there is a scheduled

private pet air charter that allows the owners and dogs to sit in the cabin and offers, quote, social media experiences on board. So I'm guessing that's photo ops for you and your pet. Yeah, I will say if you take an easy jet flight or a whiz air flight to the right location,

you'll get quite a lot of social media experiences on board. But it will be you panicked filming a fist fight in the aisle. So, intrigued by the ungodly amount of money pissed up the wall by this canine class of travel, I looked up the airline. And it's called AirBark. Oh, man. I haven't really tried for that. Yeah, imagine if they were like, it's German wings.

They're still called German wings. It's called German wings. It's called German wings. They're trying to dog away the whole suicidal crash. Airbark. Can we do better than that? Airbark doesn't mean anything, does it? It's not...

Is that about air bud? Is that like air bar... You go, what's that a pun on? Is it? There's no... Dog wings. Dog flight. Okay.

There's got to be something. Dog flight. Air kennel. British Airspace, if you had the dog's fade. That's a condition of boarding. They check. The experience included getting a spa treatment for the dog in flight, but not the owner.

A shoe served on a platter by the flight attendants. What? I guess for the dog to chew. Or for the owner to have a wank over. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a particularly sexy shoe. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They just want to let her heel.

And some tights for you, sir, to wank into? What? What? What for the dog? A guy with a big bib and a knife and fork. Bring out the shoe. Yeah, and did they bring it out, and you go, what's this got to do with a dog?

We go, not the dog, we just assumed if you're doing this, you're already mental. We just assumed you wanted other mental things. They bring it out and they go, is this for the dog? And they go, dog. Yeah, yeah. Oh, no. It shouldn't really be a dog here. No, no, that's a mistake.

And culminates in allowing the dog to visit the cockpit in flight over the Atlantic to meet the pilot and take a selfie with them. Who gains? Tragedy today as Barcair was brought down by an Excel bully taking control of the plane. Just biting the altometer and just... Yeah, yeah. Apparently the dog had a box cutter on it. The dog had actually spent several months at a training camp.

Yeah, it's like Lyca. Terrorist Leica. The first dog to do a terror attack. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, Laika the Terra dog. If you're working in the North Tower and you look out and you're like, there's a plane flying towards... And there's a dock in the car.

Is that a dog? Oh, that's fun. Yeah. It's just air bud with planes. Ain't nothing in the rules that says a dark air can't fly a plane into the world trades. It only says here we can't let humans hijack the plane. I don't know why they wrote the law like that. It should have just said, hijacking's not a lot.

But for some reason, it's humans cannot hijack the plane. With United 93, they were like, well, passengers must have overcome the pilot. It must have overcome the terrorist to fly the plane into a jet. No, no, no, it just turns out. That's what happens when a dog tries to fly a plate at will crash into a field. If it went on for long enough, you'd have, you know, like, terriers are very good for hunting rats.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Dashund, that's German for badgerhound. They're just for hunting badgers. Poodles are French hunting dogs for ducks and water. That's why they have curly hairs because they're waterproof. What? That's all true. Wow, I always thought it'd be so funny imagining a poodle in a wild.

I was like, oh, they're so bred that they couldn't possibly exist. It's just for waterfowl hunting, yeah. Because they've got curly, waterproof hair. And of course, terror dogs. They're very good at taking rucksacks out to places. They're very good of flying planes. A dog to visit the cockpit in flight over the Atlantic to meet the pilot and take a selfie with them.

I read one review from a blogger that said all the dogs came back shaking from the cockpit experience. What happened? Because it was proof to the dogs that they weren't just in a tube. They don't know where they are. They don't know they're transported. Oh, man, I had this when you and I were on the plane to our good friends,

Alex Amari. Obviously, Alex of having previously co-hosted Budpottsley. Yes, Alex Keeley, the community. When they got married last summer. And we took this minuscule plane from Glasgow to the place we were going to. It was sort of in the Highlands and Islands, and it was a size of plane that I have flown

in before because I Love Man. I love Man, yeah. But from all the passenger seats, you could still see out the cockpit window. Yeah, because they don't close the door. The pilot is the one who basically gives the air safety checks and stuff like that. Yeah, so it immediately

acquires a level of seriousness it's never had before. Yes, because the guy in charge of the plane is turning around and saying, do your fucking seatbelt up. Yeah, yeah. But because they leave the cockpit door open, you can see out the front. And I'd never had this before when while landing, I've never seen the

plane land from first-person perspective before. And you really don't realize until you're in that situation, how much the plane is moving about just before it lands. And it's really scary. And also, as it goes into land, the entire cockpit is the ground. Like, through the window. Yes. There's not like, oh,

you land at quite a soft angle. There's always a bitter sky horizon. Yeah. Yeah, you're getting a... It's just tarmac and green. And you go, we're going to go in at a fucking 90-degree angle and die. Yeah, you'll get in the full experience of what it would look like just before crashing. It was But we got to meet the pilot.

We did get to meet the pilot. Yeah. Yeah, he was a dog. To my abject horror, not only did one-way flight cost over $8,000 for a one-way flight. That's the put-off the terrorism, I guess, if it's one way.

But they use twee-whackaging on their website. Then to make matters worse, the FAQ is written from the dog's perspective. Okay, I hate wagging, but on this occasion, I'm like, in for a penny and for a pound. You can't have normal packaging on this, can you? You can't be like, this is for the dog's benefit.

Yeah, that's true. Well, so convoluted are some of the twee answers they have to provide a human-speak section directly below to translate it. Below are some of the highlights of the K-9 customer service from their website, which of course is written by Amelia, the C-9 Flying Officer. Ho, ho, ho, ho.

So... K-9-11. We've got to start this conspiracy with you going to be in 1990. In 1993 was just dogs took over. It was all done by dogs. K911 is very good stuff. It's the last week of the fringe, but we're still firing. We're still sharp.

Are carriers or crates required? For humans, maybe. For dogs, definitely not. If you're more comfortable than a carrier, you're welcome to bring one. Blah, blah, blah. If you think you can fly the plane, we'll talk to the pilot and see what we can do. What's this for? You're just wasting our time.

Give me rules or don't give me rules? Yeah, I'm booking this, I'm a person. Yeah. What's happening? The boxes for adults thing is bullshit. There's something that you encounter a lot in playgrounds around the UK that you think is wackaging but isn't, which is all children must be accompanied by an adult.

And when you first read it, you go, oh, very funny, yeah, all children must be a company. You know, like, oh, no, no, all adults must be accompanied by a child, sorry. So when you read that, you're like, oh, very funny, because adults aren't responsible. And you go, oh, yes, I forgot, adults aren't responsive. Yes, certain adults. Yeah. It's imperative, yeah, yeah. Oh, I'm sorry.

Oh, you weren't joking. That was... Red Tweed, it's not Tweet. It's one of those Pido-only signs. Will you require any training for dogs prior to flying? Humans aren't required to train to board a plane, although they probably should be. Flying with us is similar to hanging in a dog park,

a dog-friendly cafe, or a friend's house. Fucking hell. Yeah, well, I can't crash screaming to the earth and a ball of fire at my friend's house. That's a big difference I can think of. Are there any minimum age requirements for humans to book a flight? Your human must be at least 18 years old, gross. What documentation?

I imagine they must get so many like nine-year-old kids of billionaires trying to book. Oh, on their own, yeah. Richy-rich. Richy-rich. Absolutely richy-rich behavior. What about leashes? Ugh, the L-word. That's what it says.

Probably thinking of at least one worse L-word. I don't know what. Much like seatbelt rules in any standard flight, we must remain on leash while on the time. Be very funny to watch a terrier leap into a jet engine while it was idle. Yeah. But is there a point? Well, halfway through the flight,

a little electronic image of a dog collar goes, and it just turns off and you go, oh, I guess, yeah, you can off you go. Feel free to roam around and I guess fuck the other passengers. God's sake. On the tarmac, yes, during taxi, you can take off and landing, yeah. What can we bring on board? Are there luggage limitations? Isn't bringing you enough?

Humans are so needy. Yeah. Do you want accommodation at the other end or not? Yeah, I'm not going to bring any change of clothes. I've got my dog and I'm going to New York. Yeah, that should be the biggest red flag for security is a person turns up with no luggage whatsoever, nothing to go to.

Like, anything in your pockets you want to put through security? No, just me. No, just me and seven dogs. Yeah. Can we go to the cockpit? Yeah. You know what, yeah. Are these dogs storing drugs

Because they're all barking at themselves They're barking into each other In the sort of infinite circle of concern We also got some tat from Joe Okay Hello Pierre and Glenn On a recent trip to York with my three brothers We took an ambled down a tourist street

Very busy tourist street The place was blatantly trying to rip off diagonali But anyway Yeah, there's a lot of that in the UK Yeah, I think I know which one I think I know which street One of the shops had the largest gathering of tat I've ever seen in the wild

outside of shops like B&M or the Grange where Hope Goes to Die. Does it look like it's giving directions in either side? Ooh, it's... It's... It's like almost a signpost, because if so, I've seen it, and I've got a picture of it. No, really? Oh, okay.

It is a sort of wooden signpost. So it's tat like... Saw it, dot, dot, dot, dot, liked it, told Grand and Grandad got it. What does that mean? I don't know. If you see anything suspicious on TFL, London and underground. Saw it, say it, bought it for Nan and Grandad.

Saw it, liked it, grandad got it. Sorry, can you check on the conductor? I think they're having a stroke. A wooden sign you can buy. I'm sorry, my give-a-shit fairy just died. What are we doing? My give a shit fairy just... But what relation is that to you?

Right, so you could only give a shit because a fairy gave you the power to give a shit. Yeah. And now it's dead. So you no longer have empathy. Could you get another one? Yeah. Boobes, proof that men can concentrate on two things at once. That's not really how plurals work.

No. I can concentrate on sand on a beach. Doesn't mean I'm concentrating on eight trillion things at once, does it? That's what it should say. Yeah. Sand. Same if men can focus on more than one trillion things at once. Every go, but what's that for? Yeah.

It's for what all the other ones are for. The other sandy man in your life. You know the man who always looks out to see, threatening to go in at night. Give him the sign. Yeah. Sorry. Did I just roll my eyes out loud? Which sounds like...

That's what it sounds like. Eyes rolling. Had this in... It said... The Alex Amari wedding. You weren't on the Stagdo in Dublin. Where the place we were staying at had this sign that said,

did I just roll my eyes out loud? But it was in the kitchen, just on its own. unfathomably weird. Chilling. And no context, just in the kitchen, did I just roll my eyes out loud? Sorry, is there someone there? Yeah, yeah.

Awful shit. Thank you for sending us that. Yeah. Well, now's time to go to the eye-rolling chamber of the Patreon. Yeah, the slip into the VIP chamber. Let's go there.

Thank you very much for listening, guys, to this fringe episode. If you're still around, also Koji, to all the Budpots who've come to see our shows. Yeah, so grateful and very nice to... to have you have you there. And you've all been really normal,

which has been really nice. Yes, yeah. You're having the same revelation Phil had, which is how incredibly civilized and lovely all the people of listeners are. Despite the terrible things we say. Dark, awful things. Yes.

Send in your worm moments and your trick-a-lose and your tats. I'm so glad people are getting involved as trick-a-lose. Yes, trick-a-lou is great. It's really, it's setting the nation alight. Pointless pranks that mean nothing when no one wins. Even you don't get. gained from. Yeah, perfect. That's what we'd like. Thank you. Thank you very much for listening. And Koji. Koji.