The Luke and Pete Show - I’ll Be Your Clown

Episode Date: May 18, 2026

Luke and Pete check in on the state of the nation to find Starmer being deeply unserious while the King’s having to suck up to Trump.On a cheerier note, Luke’s been to a musical about Céline Dion followed by afternoon tea at the Ritz. Get your jackets on.Plus, math rock and performative music enjoyment are under the microscope. And if you’re a harpist, be sure to get in touch.Send us your latest stories, questions and comments here: [e-mail] Luke and Pete Show is the sometimes ridiculous, always funny podcast with Luke Moore and Pete Donaldson: two men who have time on their hands and a good idea of how to waste it. Subscribe to get your comedy podcast fix every Monday and Thursday. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, it's the Lucan Beach Show. Hello, Mother. Hello, Mother. Yes, we're back again. We're doing this once more for you, the people who are out there, just enjoying their lives. And... Are they enjoying their lives if they're listening to this? I don't know.

I think some of the things we've spoken about, some of the afflictions we've spoken about, and, you know, the things we've happened to our persons recently. I think it's catholicies. Oh, someone's always got it worse than you. That's what I'm doing. Someone's always going to, yeah, exactly. That's right, I'm getting involved. Yeah. Funny.

I, what do you make of this? This will separate the wheat from the chaff. What do you make of this? I mean, obviously, we're recording this in advance because of various pressures on our time, by which I mean you're going on holiday. But what? You're busy as well.

You always do this. When you're aware, it's not your problem. When I'm aware, big problems. I am not out there. Yeah, I know you are. So it might be out of date by the time he comes around. What do you make of this stuff where they're talking about whether they're going to have an inquiry about Stama and Mandelson?

Where am I as in like... Because to me, it seems bananas that Stammer's just not falling on his sword here. Hmm. Well, because I think he's kind of been... I think he's probably been buoyed by having a pretty good Iran conflict and now he feels like... By not getting involved in. by not getting involved in the terrible war.

Yeah, but it's like fucking Boris or Farage were in charge. Jesus Christ, we'd be conscripted by now. I told you if Farage is in trouble because of the Falklands thing, isn't he? He is. He's in an absolute mess. And so, yeah, I can't see him falling on his sword. Like, that would sort of betray some kind of human emotion. I think he's too, he's too grey to do something that interesting.

Yeah, it would create too many headlines. Yeah, yeah. Because the reason I'm saying that, by the way, just to put a final point on it, is because he either did know that Manderson failed the vetting or he didn't. Either way, it's bad. It just feels like it just, what do you mean? I said, yeah, well, if you don't know about it, if you failed, if you didn't know that he failed the vet vetting, how can you possibly... Well, you should know.

That's your, yeah, but that's your, that's a system that you just presume as a busy prime minister. But it's been, it's been alleged that he forced, um, he forced, there was a force, forcing of an overruling of it. Yeah. Well, I mean, I guess that's kind of, that's kind of what they've got at ascertain. I just think, I just think it's not really serious that you can be working in politics and

not know that Mandersers are a total wronging. Like, this is not serious, it's not a serious position. Yeah, but I think, but I think he saw, I think he, it wasn't, who else was he, um, considering for that role? It was something, someone mad. George Osborne. George Osborne, on it? So like, that's, like, I think he just

gets a bit wowed by charisma a little bit. I think he goes, well, I'm probably a job why you've got to be quite charismatic. It's probably quite interesting to hear someone like that, isn't it, really? Is George Osborne charismatic? I suppose so. For that level, for him, I suppose. For Starma, yeah. Yeah, you do wonder whether he's been taking in with other stuff as well, but...

It just seems astonishingly bad. Yeah. Yeah. I just think he thinks he can't style it out, but he's got no style so he can't. how much I've been lied to. It's like, fucking hell. Like, if, I just, I just don't feel, sometimes maybe I'm unfairly kind of equate the situation with the situation I'm in. And I just feel like if I didn't know anything about what was going on at stack,

like, I do nothing about it. And every so often I had to front up to all people. Well, yeah, you're the mannison in the situation. I reconcede that. Right. But like, like, every so often I have to front up to the public about, yeah, I mean, sorry about one of my colleagues, like, dalliances regularly. with a known paedophile,

but I just didn't know what was going on. It's not, it's not serious. It's not serious. No, it's a good point. But I mean, yeah, I just think that, yeah, it's not ideal. Who's next though? Do you know what I mean?

It just seems like it wasted, it just wasted, yeah, exactly, there's no candidates out there, really. You just do sort of look at it and go, right, okay, it's been two years now. Yeah, I think he's done some all right, stuff I think his work in, like the, much maligned trip to China

was he got quite a lot of concessions, quite a lot of interesting stuff in there. But can he sell it? Can he sell it to the people? Has anybody heard about it? No, no one knows. He's bad at it. He's just not a politician.

Oh, God. Like what? If he'd have had to have properly campaign, he wouldn't be prime minister. He'd be properly have to work at this. I thought he'd be a really bad campaigner, but a really good prime minister. Yeah.

I thought it would be like decisive and solid and just get shit done and just be like, look, obviously you guys, just fucking calm down. I'm an adult here. We're doing this. This is the right thing to do. Stop fucking around. And he's not any of that. Like even like the big stuff, I thought he'd do.

I even thought he'd go, right, we're going back into the common market or the customs union because of course we are, because obviously otherwise our economy is totally fucked. Now grow up, get over it. Or even like, speak now both sides of his mouth with America. Like, you can, there's a way of sort of saying, look, we are politically and financially isolated because of the fucking Brexit vote. We've got no fucking money. So, yeah, I do have to go cap in hand to Donald Trump. I have to look like a fucking penis.

But I'll be your penis. I'll be your fucking clown, right? I'm the one who's got to take the fucking arrows. So don't fucking worry about it. There's a way of explaining that to the British people. I've got a letter here for you from between. There's a way of doing that. It's literally out of talking to my two-year-old.

Maybe we should just every, every night, just, you know, settle our children down. I've got a date bar here for you from the supermarket. How's that trip going, by the way? Because he's obviously out there at this moment in time. Oh, no idea. No clue. King to us in a white house ceremony. I imagine he's fuming about having a guy.

Let's be fair. Let's be absolutely fair. It's a last week. I mean, the guys, I mean, whatever you think of the king, he's had serious health problems. Yeah. right? He's been waiting a long old time to do this gig. Yeah.

And he's got to go to suck up to Trump and, yeah. Yeah, it's just, I understand. I mean, the thing is, what I find curious about it is that, so the US isn't part of the Commonwealth, right? So there's no obvious reason why he even needs to go. It's just been arranged, right? Because I think they want to curry favour with Trump. But that shit is just so short-sighted.

It's unbelievable. But you would honestly get more change. out of Trump by just telling him to fuck off. Yeah. Because he'd go, oh, this guy means business, you know? Yeah, yeah. Throughout his, you know, short tenure, certainly a second thing. People who tell him to piss off generally come out better.

I mean, like, you've got Tom Daly bombing around the British ambassador's residence for this trip. Like, I don't think Tom Daly's relevant right now to the British people. I don't know. I don't know why he's there. What's Tom Daly doing? What are there? I don't know. I don't know. the ambassador's

you know just a little lad running around did some diving back in there oh so he's doing some knitting with the king on the US state is it he's doing some knitting with the king alright that's weird sexy

sexy twink Tom Dale he's doing some knitting with the king is he still a sexy twink? He's still a sexy twink isn't it there was a there was a battle of the yeah there was this big wrestler at the one of the rest of the show's I saw

and he's basically it's a big gay brunch it's a show that has a lot of gay and LGBT plus wrestlers and stuff and there's this big guy called Paro and he's like a big gear wrestler and basically they had a match where just loads of twinks get fed to him my goodness feed me twigs feed me twinks and he's ah

brilliant love it does it matter that you're gay if you want to be a wrestler do you have to have a separate gay wrestling event no but I think it's a very you know massive, you know, sort of slightly toxic I think it's one of the gayest sports anyway. But it is this, yeah, but like not outwardly, like, if you look,

if you went around the crowd at any WrestleMania and sort of went, we'll head the boys, do we? Or the girls? You wouldn't get many people who felt comfortable to respond because it's that kind of environment, it's a bit like, you know, it's a bit like football, in it. But, um, but yeah, they have like this, you know, not division, but like they have a show

every year where they basically just, um, highlight some of the more, um, you know, some of the... Is it more flamboyant? Yeah, yeah. A more flamboyant version of wrestling. Drag. What can this look like?

It's just drag queens putting people through fucking tables. It's good stuff. It's really solid. It was really funny that they did do like a twink, a twink match at one point. And then, like, the last twink was a guy called Nick Gage, who is worth her Google. He's a very violent man.

Very violent straight wrestling. just comes out all these kind of like blonde boys come out and do their wrestling and then nick gage who's a horrible man who he wrestled he wrestling he wrestled on the gay event did he yeah he was yeah it was just really funny he just kind of it was just completely unexpected he just turned he just turned out um he's like uh he's basically he's died a couple of times like getting fucking light tubes through his through his uh arries and stuff really yeah he's like he was putting in a he was in some backyard wrestling um event um and this was all on this was all like filmed like for a paper view and he wanted to get like he was bleeding really heavily from the um armpit

of a light tube went through his armpit and uh he was going to go go let me get back out of there and stuff and he just died in the um helicopter was taking him away from he was like really trying to get back in the ring um yeah he also got busted for arm robber just read he did yeah he's a friday yeah but imagine him in a big twink what's he doing there a big twink wrestling man it's just funny just loves a gig G. Loves this 50 quid. Hot dog and a handshake. Speaking of gay events, I went to see Titanic.

Titanic. What's that now? Titanic. So it's a West End musical. I see, right. Okay. Based around the music of Celine Dion, which I... Come on.

Which I appreciate sounds dreadful. But... On. It doesn't sound dreadful, Luke. But the way it's done is really funny because essentially it's set up as a this woman plays like a banana's version of Celine Dion who insists to everyone that she was present on the Titanic when Jack and Rose were trying to fall in love.

Right, nice, okay. And she keeps getting the way of them falling in love all the time. So they'll cut to like a flashback scene of Jack and Rose meeting each other. Yeah. But it's done through the memory of a bananas, Celine Dion. Brilliant. So like, it's a really funny idea.

So basically they'll be, you know, they'll be about to you know kiss for the first time or whatever yeah and then like seline deal will like interject and then before you know like the Ouija from the Mario Brothers is in it and it's like a weird dream sequence flashback scene where everything's inaccurate

and then they sing like a Celine Dian and song over the top of it's really fun it is one of the gayest things I've ever seen it's really funny and really camp but interestingly enough when I went to go and see it took my mum for a 70th birthday and we also took her to

have afternoon tea at the Ritz, which is just down the road. And obviously the Ritz are famous for their kind of, you know, their policy of punctuality. Right, okay. But the production ran late because someone was taken ill in the audience. Right. So there was a pause of like half an hour. So I had to nip out into the, into the foyer and call the Ritz and say, look, this is a situation. Can we have a slightly like a book in?

And they were like, absolutely not. Oh. And just to remind of it, it's jacket and ties in the dining room, thanks very much. Goodbye. And so we got to leave early. Did you take, I'm going to say a bad attitude to the Ritz? No, I don't care. To be honest, I'd have a Titanic by then.

I didn't care about it. I didn't really want to watch my heart will go on at the end anyway. Yeah. I don't think you know how much I love the music of Celine Dion. So this is absolutely right. You should go to it. It's really good. I'm being flipping now.

I would have, I would have absolutely watched to the end, of course. My sister got, got us some more tickets just so we could watch the rest of it, so we'll do that at some point. But,

but it was, yeah, it was really funny. Like, it was, yeah, it's like, it's pretty, it's pretty out there. It's not what you expect it to be,

right, basically. Yeah. It's like, if you, if you saw the poster and stuff, you'd know it's some kind of comedy, but it's,

it's basically a retelling of James Cameron's Titanic through an adult, Celine the, on memory. Nice. Big fan of that. Yeah, big fan of that. And then the thing that reminded me of it was in the in the entrance area to the Ritz,

there was a guy playing the harp. Right. And you mentioned harps the other day. And that must be the hardest instrument to play. It must be. I don't know, man. Is it like... What do you mean? You can't play...

Um, you can only play so many chords. You've only got so many things. You can't play, like, two strings. Is it like playing a piano, but with strings? Yeah. So, so there's no, like, you know, you're not using, you're using, you've basically got two hands on a piano. You can't really, you can't really, or, you can't really, you? You can only, you know, six, six, uh, you're never going to, you, you, I'm probably going to do.

You can do ten strings at once, right, like that. You can do ten strings at once, right? at once. That's too many. But like so I don't think there's, I think it's, I think it's probably be easy than the piano. No way. No, I can't believe you're saying that. Come on. Easy than a piano. I think it would be. Because why is it more difficult? Because it's a, it's a weird instrument. The tuning probably is the real

sod. Well, no, because the tune is just going to be, if it's just like a piano but upright with strings, it's the tuning is going to be the same. You're just going to have, because with the piano, you've got obviously the black keys as well. I don't know how that works in a harp. I've never once even touched a harp. They're not black. Well, I know that.

I went to a hotel in the middle of New Mexico, in the middle of New Mexico. And there was a goff, like full sort of boy Georgie kind of makeup, goff doing some harp. And you're good? Yeah, she was great, but it was just, it was just a confusing place to sort of see in the middle of Norway. just, you know, driving from Abilene,

or Abilene, or Abilene, she's worth it. And she's a bachelor of passion away. Maybe she's born with it. Maybe. Who is she worth it? Is that Laurie out? I don't know.

Maybe. Because I'm worth it. I can't remember. Because I'm worth it, yeah. Yeah, she was to get back in there. And it is incredible, but it is, there's just a lot of ringing out, in there. You know what I mean?

You don't sort of ring out quite so much with a piano. You've got foot pedals as well on the piano. I guess you probably have foot pedals with, Yeah, I'd love to hear from a harpist. He wants to be the official harpist in the Luke and Peach. There's a harpist on YouTube that's quite well known, and she basically reviews, like, guitar pedals that she puts her harps through and stuff. Oh, that's quite cool.

He's very good, yeah. Yeah, my friend Blair, who did that Bristol Song Circle thing I talked about, he's obsessed with pedals. He's, like, favorite YouTube channels, these guys are just talking about guitar pedals. And he's been to, like, a guy's business out in the US, which he just makes, like, pedals in his garage and talks to him, about transistors for like half an hour. He's really into it.

But speaking of that, have you seen that band who have having a bit of a moment called Angeen de Poitrine? Yes, yeah. It'll surprise no one to hear that I heard it on Six Music when I was driving back from...

Do you get the most out of it if you just listened to it on the radio? Probably not. Oh, me, visually they're very arresting and obviously, you know, seeing how they're playing a lot of... What do you make of it? It's...

It's that sort of music, you know, different fucking time signatures you know, one-man band. I mean, loop pedals, by the very nature, annoy this shit on me anyway. At least they're making that kind of stuff interesting. It's really hard to play along to loop pedals. Yes, yeah.

Because it's hard to explain, but I've been in situations before where dramas have been trying to play along to loops, and it's really hard to stay in time. Yeah, because you have to get it cock on to, you know, where, you're shortening, like, the last note or lengthening the last... But it's basically math rock, isn't it, they're playing?

Yeah, but it's more, it is, but it's just more interesting than that because they're just constantly changing up their time signatures. Yeah, but that's what Mathrock is, right? Is it? I thought Mathrop is just very, very, I thought it was still like the normal time signatures. No, Mathrop is like structurally, structurally different and changes time signatures. But they play the time signatures the same all the way through, don't they in Mathra? I don't know.

Yeah, it's very impressive. And the fact that they do them absolutely kicked in makeup and we're, fake noses on the stuff. Yeah. It's incredible and they've, you know, they've got everyone's attention, certainly.

But it's just amazing that... How did they become famous or is it through like social media? I don't know. That's got to be social media, doesn't it? I just can't imagine, I just can't believe that they sort of,

somebody doing this sort of act has sort of found them way into sort of, you know, into such a sort of popular, you know, becoming so popular so quickly, doing that really arch,

really interesting kind of cod jazz, guitar stuff is great. Yeah, what I find, what I find really interesting about it as a phenomenon. And you could say, I'll give you an example that may not be that helpful, but I'll try to explain what I mean. But you could say this about later radiohead and now the smile, which is obviously Greenwood and York's kind of other project.

It's like, it's not music, by its very nature, it's not music that is popular. People do not find it generally enough to buy it in big numbers, going, watch it in big numbers, enjoy it, right? It's just not. It's just simple as that. But obviously, in your congruement's case, there's going to be a huge following because Radiohead had a massive,

and they can push to the very limit of what their audience will accept. And then they've got such a reputation that with the smile, people will check them out. With Anjean de Poitrin and things like the smile, it's kind of interesting because whatever you think of it,

don't mind me to slag it off, because I think they're pretty interesting, and I think the microtonal aspect of it, which is a bit of bearding, but I can get into that as well if you want, is fascinating, but there's definitely an undercurrent of like Emperor's New Clothes about it.

Yeah, but isn't everything that's sort of successful and popular? I mean, the thing is... Because a lot of popular stuff is very obvious to understand why it's popular. Right, yeah. Well, this is popular

because they've got funny costumes on and they've happened to make a song with a five-time signatures in that have, that are, it's actually quite listenable. Do you know what I mean? It's the listenable end of that kind of jazz kind of guitar stuff, in it? Well, to me, I just feel like another way of putting it is, can you imagine in the late 90s quite literally millions of people choosing to put on OK computer on their CD player at home?

The answer is yes, right? Yes, you can imagine that, right? Because, you know, it's quite interesting music in places, but it's also very, very listenable, very catchy. For pop it, yeah, for pop it is very good. With Angie and de Poitra-I don't even know I'm saying this right, by the way, I've never actually. actually heard it be Sadat Laude. But with Angein de Poitri, if you say you say it, not me.

Do you honestly think people are choosing to listen to them a lot at home, like on their own? Because what I'm trying to get at it is, what's, how performative is it to be a fan of theirs? Well, I think it's, it's, but a performative is it to be a jazz enthusiast, you know what I mean? It's like, you would sit at home, you'd sort of go,

fuck, yeah. It's one of those ones that you genuinely, it commands your attention, it demands to be heard and you really have to concentrate to sort of get the most out of it and jazz music isn't popular is it in a general kind of set? No, but what I like about them

is that there'll be some people who are doing pretty much the same act without the costumes without the success and they'll be wankers because those people usually are and they'll be so annoyed that Angine de Potuino have they called

have managed to have managed to do it managed to make a sense inexplicably I think it's broadly It's particularly a successful product of stuff that's actually quite arch. I think it's broadly good behaviour. I like that they're around. I like that people are into them. But I do find it interesting, the outsized attention they're getting based on the actual relative popularity they have.

Because if you look at their most listened to songs, right, they're on Spotify as an example. Yeah. In the grand scheme of things, it ain't that many. Like, their most popular song on Spotify has got seven million plays, right? There are beta band album tracks that I've got more than that on Spotify. Now, I know they've been around longer, but it's... They've been around way longer, though, no. But Spotify's not been around that much longer.

No, but I bet you the YouTube is absolutely killing it. Yeah, probably is, yeah. That speaks to something else entirely, doesn't it? That's another kind of discussion because, obviously, they're a very YouTube-friendly band because of what they look like. I'm not taking anything away from it. I think it's interesting. It's not broader the kind of music I would listen to,

but I think if I guess what I'm trying to get at is if I was 25 I would be telling you that I loved them yeah yeah but you've grown out of needing my my acceptance in some areas everything's fine in some areas in some ways not always but in some ways would you go and see him live would you no god can you imagine the people stink of beer farts wouldn't it

imagine the people who'll be around but the absolute by the way I think they're amazing and they'll all be saying the same thing They're going, oh, these fucking people. Yeah. He's like Kirk Cabang, I fucking hate these. I hate our fans. But they're amazing musicians.

You have to be reiterated. Like, how you play it. I mean, the guitar in particular, because drummers, you know, can tit about with different timesignitions, but like, just... He's playing a double-necked microtonal guitar in weird times. Oh, yeah, yeah, they've got different frets.

Yeah, it's microtonels. He's got, like, three times a amount of fret. Yeah. And it still sounded. accept, it still sounds acceptable to like Western ears as well. It's, it's, it's, yeah. If you watch, um, if you watch, um, if you watch a video of them performing live, they are, they are fucking amazing, like amazing.

They must be classically trained. They must be. Yeah. And, um, but, but the, the, the, the, the extreme example of what I'm talking about. I can't quite remember his name. He's a Japanese guy who does that snare drum shows on, on, right. It's always shared in my time. Have you seen it?

No. So as a bloke, Japanese guy, long hair. Um, he's got like a, uh, a trestle table, one snare drum with two sticks. Yeah. And he smashes the snare drum, turns the table, and throws himself on the floor, screams and whales,

and it's a performance. Yes. Oh yeah, I think I've seen that. It's surrounded by like probably 50 to 100 bearded blocs pretending it's amazing. Yeah. And it'll be on the South Bank doing a show

every, you know, curated by Robert Smith or something. Meltdown, yeah. Yeah. But that's the extreme example of what I'm talking about, I guess. But anyway, good luck to them. I think it's an interesting thing. At least it's like interesting music, right? Yeah.

Look, out of all of the stuff that people can listen to, definitely more interesting and, you know, more power to their latex noses. And the aesthetic is a bit of you, isn't it? I can see you dress. The costumes they wear, I can absolutely see you wear. It's too good. It's too good, too well put together, too beautifully.

Like, they haven't just sort of gotten bored halfway through the project. Everything looks good. They've really thought about this. Pleasing. All right, cool, man. Let's get out of it. And we'll come back on Thursday.

We'll maybe do a couple of emails on Thursday. They won't have done emails for a week while. Let's do that. Hello, Luke Beach,o is our... Hello, Lukepeachio.com is the way to get in touch it via the emails. And you can also get in touch via the YouTube comments or wherever you find us. If you see us in the street, tell us about it for crying out though. See you later.

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