The Bugle - Australia - Ireland - USA - Classic Live Bugles

Episode Date: February 20, 2024

Andy introduces some fine moments from live Bugles past - from the debuts of Alice Fraser, Tom Ballard and Josh Gondelman, to David O'Doherty's brilliant Irish history guide.Get tickets to the forthcoming live show: https://www.thebuglepodcast.com/liveSend thoughts and questions for Andy at [e-mail]. Click follow to make sure you get every episode and please drop us a nice review or rating wherever you choose.This episode was presented and written by:Andy ZaltzmanAlice FraserTom BallardDavid O'DohertyJosh GondelmanAnd produced by Chris Skinner and Laura Turner Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world. Hello, I'm Andy Zaltzman, this is Bugle issue 4291, sub-episode A, for brackets, The Bugle is, brackets, about to go on a live tour. So this week we celebrate the best of the Bugle Live. Over the next 25 minutes or so, we will give you some of the greatest, funniest, satiriest bits of the Bugle Live that the universe has ever known. Yes, we live in a world of exaggeration. We are, as I said, about to embark on a UK tour. Dates are online.

Also about to come out of my face. On the 1st of March we are in Glasgow with Josie Long live and Anuvab Powell via the wonders of the internet. Anuvab also joins us for the 3rd March show in Norwich. We will have Felicity Ward live. Following that we have shows on the 9th

of March in Cambridge, the 10th of March in Birmingham, the 16th of March at the Warwick Arts Centre, the 24th of March in Leeds the 10th of March in Birmingham, the 16th of March at the Warwick Arts Centre, the 24th of March in Leeds, the 28th in Edinburgh, and the 30th at the Lowry in Salford, with some of your all-time favourite Bugle co-hosts. Details and ticket links via thebuglepodcast.com. So, for our Best of the Bugle Live, let's start with our first ever live Bugle show.

Now, we may very well be a global satiricast, but we like to keep things local when we hit the road. So here I am with Alice Fraser and Tom Ballard back in 2017 for Bugle Issue 4026, imaginatively entitled Live in Australia. We've had some phenomenal action in Australia of late. Alice? Yes, we have.

We've had this Easter egg mayhem on the Gold Coast, which is where they dumped some Easter eggs out of a helicopter onto a stadium full of children who then promptly attempted to kill themselves and each other. But no-one's telling which of the kids were anti-fascists, so we're not sure how to feel. I mean, the important thing to remember is the real meaning of Easter, which is to train children for the brutal kill-or-be-killed world

we're about to leave them. I think it's good. This generation is getting too many messages that they're special precious flowers. Nothing teaches you that you're below average, like an elbow to the nose from the parent of your school bully. This was insane. This was a helicopter dropping 30,000 chocolate eggs

Onto a school oval 15,000 people turned up to the event And as soon as the drop came They just flooded in and started elbowing Pregnant women and children Were knocked over in the course of Scrambling for the eggs Jesus was quoted as saying

Yes, this is exactly what I had in mind You have nailed my message, humans. I mean, do the children know you can just buy chocolate eggs in the supermarket from like three days after Christmas and you don't have to slit the throat of your enemy in a fight to the death so you can smash some sickly sweet Cadbury's into your

first world child face? There was footage, people were filming the whole thing and you could hear the children screaming things like, stop pushing. I need to get out. Why did they drop them all in one place? And from one particularly well-informed nine-year-old Mummy, why is the Easter Bunny acting like Bashar al-Assad? But in the spirit of the season

everyone who was knocked down did rise again three days later so that was good. Fake news! Fake news, people! But in the spirit of the season, everyone who was knocked down did rise again three days later. So that was good. One parent was quoted as... Fake news. Fake news, people. One parent was quoted as saying, I think every kid went home disappointed. This was the worst event I've ever been to,

which is a real kick in the teeth to the crucifixion, I think. But it was organised by a church. Like, a church organised this. So they have all this money. Should we give it to the poor in the spirit of the season? No, no. Let's get a f***ing helicopter and napalm chocolate on children. That's insane.

People got really hurt. Would you be taking your kids there, Andy? Get involved in the chocolate drop? Well, as a lapsed Jew with infidel children. Who are in tonight. Hello, infidels. Well, I mean, chocolate eggs. Theologically justified, of course, the chocolate egg.

Gets back to the very first Easter. The Gospel according to St. Alvin. Jesus, you know, up there on the cross, getting a bit cranky with his dad. Yak, yak, yak, bit of a Barney. He thinks to himself, I'm Jesus f***ing Christ, I don't know how to f***ing take this. I'm going to miracle my way out of it.

But because of the heat and exhaustion and the dehydration, he wasn't quite on top of his game. So instead of miracling himself a jetpack and a massive set of wings, he accidentally miracled his testicles into chocolate eggs. That's why we eat Easter eggs to this day. I think it's fact on the bingo. You can cross that one off, everyone. Facts are there.

There was another phenomenal story, which I believe might represent not just the high point of Australia as a nation, but maybe the high point of entire human civilization. A man sued... Was it some kind of park or something? He ran into a wall... So he was in an art gallery.

Oh, an art gallery, whilst indulging in a race against a virtual Cathy Freeman. Yeah, he's suing the art gallery for not padding the wall. He's also suing the Roadrunner movies for teaching him to believe that running into a wall full speed was, if anything, a temporary inconvenience. And he's suing imaginary

Cathy Freeman for luring him into the race. It's science works, isn't it? Yeah, science works, which is kind of amazing. You should take your kids, actually. You can find out about the magic of science. Why does it run into a wall? Science does not work. I think humanity should have learned that by now.

You hate Jesus and science? Jesus. I believe that the virtual Kathy Freeman is suing ScienceWorks for forcing her to race against a c***. Something for everyone.

Sorry. Hang on. Hang on. Hang on. Sorry. I've just got to... Brilliant. One thing you cannot be faulted on Zoltan Your timing

Should I tell you my announcements about Domestic violence and Islam Why not Tom I was just thinking We're about 40 was it 42 minutes into the show Domestic violence and Islam time. First rule of comedy.

You start with the second strongest joke, finish with the strongest joke, and after 42 minutes, you do stuff about domestic violence and Islam. Sounds good to me. Well, this week, the Australian media was in outrage. A Facebook video showing members

of an extreme Islamic group seem to be excusing domestic violence under Islamic law. It was a video featuring members of the Australian women's branch of Hizb ut-Tahrir. Hizb ut-Tahrir? I don't even know her. I stand by that. The woman in the video

claimed that Islam condones a symbolic version of domestic violence in which a man may hit his wife with a small stick or twisted scarf so as not to cause her pain. Turns out someone swapped their Quran for Fifty Shades of Grey, I believe. Members of the government condemned the video in the strongest of terms, calling it abhorrent. Minister for Women, Michaelia Cash, said that in Australia,

there is no place for violence against women. That sort of thing happens in offshore detention centres. Men should never hit women except in the designated areas. I'm not laughing because it's true. Okay. Hizb ut-Tahrir have since rejected any notion they endorse domestic violence, describing it as an abomination

that Islam rejects in the strongest of terms. But, of course, all these people are saying that it should be condemned by moderate Muslims. As you know, there are three types of Muslims, moderate, medium, and spicy. And, of course, lots of people in the Muslim community did condemn the video but we just like them to do it slower and sexier for us.

Put on a little sexy costume. Condemn it harder, Daddy. That was an old Dolly Parton song. The truth is, white Australians have been releasing videos claiming that women are inferior to men for years on almost a weekly basis. It's called The Footy Show.

You've got to tune in. Of course, not all Muslims are perfect. One of them was in One Direction. That is the first One Direction joke in the history of the Bugle. So there we are. That's what happens when you book someone who joke in the history of the Bugle. So there we are. Tom Battle. That's what happens when you book someone who's under the age of 30.

It'll never happen again, I apologise. I'll do more Dolly Parton. Yes. Remember the demographic. I want ageing country music fans. That's where the money is, right? music fans, that's where the money is, right? Moving back across the hemispheres now to our first

live show in Dublin in Ireland. I was joined on stage by Alice Fraser and David O'Doherty as well as producer Chris, who had attempted to get to Ireland on a child's passport. I mean, in mitigation it was his own child's passport, it wasn't just a random child's passport

that he'd stolen. Anyway, I'll ask him about it someday. Anyway, here we are with David O'Doherty's official guide to Ireland. Ireland was founded by footballer Stephen Ireland in 3000 BC. Ireland's indigenous

people were the leprechauns or leprechauns, or leprechauns, as nobody's ever called them. But they died out, tragically, owing to the fact that they were all male. And never existed. Nothing kills a people off quicker than never having actually existed. Your next major character in Irish history, Andy, is St. Patrick, the patron saint of strangers taking a shit behind the wheelie bin in your front garden. And that is how he is commemorated for one day around the world.

St. Patrick got rid of all the snakes, and so thorough was he, he got rid of any archaeological evidence that there might ever have been snakes on the island. Around the first millennium saw the arrival of the Vikings. And they're so unlike any Scandinavian people I've ever met today. It's like one day they must have woken up and gone, hey, you know, let's not rape and pillage anymore.

Let's invent social democracy and Ikea and Lego and aha. Then nothing happened in Irish history for 600 years till the arrival of Oliver Cromwell in 1649. And he... He absolutely wrecked the place. Although seen as a moderniser in Britain still seen as that today in Ireland

he is seen as a genocidal f***head. Potato, potato. Who caused a population drop-off that some expert put as high as 83%! 83% of the Irish population! Thanks, Cromwell, you barrel of rancid wangers. Excuse me if I occasionally visit the British House of Parliament where there is a statue of you to take a shit just in front of it.

Cromwell was eventually defeated by Conor McGregor at the Battle of Crumlin. In 18 proper 12. With his rallying cry, you'll do nothing, you f***ing prick. But McGregor was in turn defeated by Queen Victoria at a bout in Las Vegas where he had motivated her by criticising her

family, her nation and her religion. Queen Victoria loved Ireland and left us with her greatest legacy. The shop Victoria's Secret on Grafton Street. Short for Victoria's Secret was that she wished she'd done more to prevent the Irish famine 1845

to 1849. This is like shooting fish in a barrel in front of these people. Ireland has always loved a craze, from line dancing to yo-yos, from tamagotchis to Catholicism. But they tend to come and go. They say you only play this town twice in your career, said the Pope in Dublin on his recent visit. Once on the way up.

It's great to be back. And the eleven people in the crowd jiggled their rosary beads and shook their little bags. Although nominally a republic, Ireland is still a mystical place ruled over by Enya. I've never met Enya, but apparently you can recreate the feeling of meeting her if you put your peen slash lady peen in a Dyson Airblade.

If you feel something crazy in the air listening to this podcast, that's Irish presidential election mania. For some reason, a reason nobody can quite remember, Ireland has a Taoiseach or Prime Minister and a President. The President is a non-political role, the idea of which is that you do the gigs the Prime Minister doesn't have time to do, such as shaking hands at the rugby and apologising for institutional atrocities the Prime Minister has committed. The runners and riders have assembled for this once every seven years event,

and what a group! There's the seven years event. And what a group. There's the incumbent, Michael D. Higgins. A tiny wizard poet who negotiated the tricky events of the last seven years with aplomb. He hosted the Queen's first ever visit to Ireland without giving her a wedgie. Queen's first ever visit to Ireland without giving her a wedgie and commemorated the centenar of the 1916 Rising without mentioning that he'd love to give the Queen

a wedgie. Job done. So he should get to do it for another seven years and everyone wants him to, with the exception of five people. The five other candidates who are running for his job. There's no reason to mention the other candidates because you'll never hear of any of them again.

Suffice to say that most of them, three out of five, have been dragons on Ireland's Dragon's Den. And they look like they're only running for president for a prank they lost with one of the lads at the golf club. The other two are ladies and they hate science. Michael D. Higgins will definitely win and he'll have another sweet seven years in front of him where his main job will be to commemorate

the centenary of the War of Independence in 2019 without giving the Queen a wedgie and the centenary of the War of Independence in 2019 without giving the Queen a wedgie, and the centenary of the Civil War in 2022 without saying he wants to give Michael Collins slash Eamon de Valera a wedgie. See, it's 100 years and we're still not over it. Oh, Ireland. Yay!

Well, I hope you've enjoyed that bit. Whatever you're doing now, remember to go to the Bugle website to buy your tickets for the forthcoming live tour. I did mention that earlier on, I think. I didn't know if you skipped the intro, but I'm mentioning it now amongst the guests we will have on tour live or via the wonders of the internet include

neil delamere nato green josh gonraman rialina james nakise and of course the wonderful alice fraser we also have a couple of live shows in london in june at the leicester square theatre including nato green live in london for the first time and nish kumar as well back to the best of the bugle live now and our tour of the usa in 2019 which featured a fantastic debut appearance at our brooklyn show by josh gondelman alongside alice fraser he and i tried to explain some american news including why president trump was meeting kim jong-un happy days let's move on. America News Now. Josh, your president, your spiritual leader, your guru and your personal inspiration, Donald Trump,

he's making a peaceful world right now. He's meeting Kim in a new summit. Are you excited about that? I think the fewer people he's talking to at one time, the better. As long as he's talking to Kim 101, he's not tweeting, he's not watching Fox News, there's only so many

bad ideas that he could be thrusting into the world and being pummeled with himself. I guess I'm for it. I think any time he can be in, the fewer people in a room with him, the better. That's an interesting way of looking at it. Yeah.

Alice, how's the, is there much excitement about the summit back in London? I mean, people are pretty thrilled. Trump's gone out to meet Kim Jong-un to swap hair tips and bitch about why no one really gets them. out to meet Kim Jong-un to swap hair tips and bitch about why no one really gets them. He tweeted about his relationship with Kim Jong-un and he spoke about it saying,

it's a very interesting thing to say, but I've developed a very, very good relationship. We'll see what that means. But he's never had a relationship with anyone from this country and hasn't had lots of relationships anywhere. He reiterated that he was in no rush to press for North Korea's denuclearisation. He said, I don't want to rush anyone, I just don't want testing. As long as there's no testing, we're happy. And he said, carrying on, that Kim Jong-un said, if we trust him, we definitely don't need to use protection. Family show, family show on us, family show.

Family show on us. Family show. I feel like Trump has never had an STD test. I do. I feel like he's just like, that's the lady's responsibility. Like, for sure. That's his stance.

Has he had any test? No. Not in school. Not's his stance. Has he had any test? No! Not in school, not at the doctor. Not of his own physical strength. Just his dicky little ankle that got him out of Vietnam. Perhaps the most exciting element of this summit is that Vietnam has deported a Kim Jong-un impersonator. Or, if you will, a Kim-personator. I will.

Who had staged... A chap called Howard X from Hong Kong had staged a fake summit with Russell White, who is a professional Trumpressionist from America. And do you not think this is the way forward for all global politics? Because, you know, people vote for these sort of figureheads, but they're generally massive c***s. And if you replace them with someone who looks like them, so we think like that, they might actually get something.

I think this is the future of democracy, to be honest. Is deporting impressionists? Well, I say we give it a shot with Alec Baldwin, to be honest. Is deporting impressionists? Well. I say we give it a shot with Alec Baldwin, see what sticks. The wall, Josh. Yeah. I mean, I was here back in 2016.

There was a lot of talk about Mexico building a wall and paying every penny of it. I think it's fair to say it hasn't entirely panned out that way. I don't think so. I will say Mexico has paid

for all of the wall that's been built. That's one way to look at it, right? No wall, no payment. I feel like he's kept his promise. He's winning politics by dividing by zero um any thoughts on the election next year josh on the like oh the 2020 election yeah yeah i'm i'm honestly kind of uh looking forward to know people people make a big deal out of how many candidates are now in the democratic primary

but i'm really looking forward to no republican primary that's the that's the upside right is like it's just going to be trump like if ben sass tries to run against him he'll just be like no and then all the other republicans will be like he said no it's got to be now so there's not going to be a republican primary so at least uh the spectrum is going to be like, hey, maybe we help some people get health care, to like, let's help everybody get health care. Whereas when there's a Republican primary, it's like, how many people can I inject

with the syringe I found on the street? I'm rich. Legally, I should be allowed to stab. That's market forces Yeah That's what I call my syringe There's some very exciting New York news As you may have heard New York Has been forced to return

5.3 million dollars to the government after admitting to fraudulently billing damage charges after hurricane sandy the 2012 celebrity storm that um clocked up a 71 billion dollar tab after getting wind crazy all over the east coast including a whopping 32 billion after a crazy night out in in new york so what uh apparently the city falsely claimed that 132 department of transportation vehicles were damaged when in fact they weren't um many of them had already been taken out of service but i mean this is this is this is just how economics works, isn't it? This is just getting creative, Josh. Yeah.

Just moving numbers. It's also an incredibly, like, New Yorkers love to brag about how much they suffer on a daily basis. So this is the most New York thing imaginable. Just like, Hurricane Sandy, oh yeah, ruined every car. FEMA came, they said it made Katrina look like a chihuahua pissing in a ficus. Greatest city in the world.

Yeah, New York is the city that never sleeps because it stole a bunch of money and has an uneasy conscience. Also, it stole its roommate's Adderall. The US attorney Jeffrey berman said when people lie to fema about the cause of property damage in order to reap a windfall it compromises our ability to provide financial assistance and then he followed up with i probably shouldn't have said windfall what a disaster. I mean, sorry. I am devastated by a tornado of regret. I mean, blow me down, let's wash that from the record. Oh boy, wasn't that just the biggest Freudian property damage and loss of lives.

Alice Fraser. There you go. That concludes your best of the Bugle Live show. To see how good the Bugle Live is now, come to those shows in March. All of them. 1st of March, Glasgow. 3rd, Norwich.

9th, Cambridge. 10th, Birmingham. Norwich, 9th Cambridge, 10th Birmingham, 16th Warwick Arts Centre, 24th Leeds, 28th Edinburgh, and the 30th of March at the Lowry in Salford. And London on the 7th and 8th of June. Go to thebuglepodcast.com to buy your live tickets to subscribe to the show and indulge in all the wondrous offerings from the Bugle Stable. Until next week, when we will have a regular bugle featuring Josh Gonderman, goodbye!