Joseph Morpurgo: Soothing Sounds for Baby

Stand up comedy isn’t what it used to be. The 1970’s scene was populated by tight joke technicians who knew there way round the mechanics of a joke but were hamstrung by boorish subject matter: their material operating in a tabloid world of thwarted men, stupid women and dumb-casual racism. Also, the telling of the tale was more important than the tale itself: in some instances, such was the scarcity of brain cells, jokes were put on a chalkboard backstage and comics selected the ones they would tell. To use a dismissive analogy, these comedians were drummers to today’s songwriters: they could keep time and cue laughs; however, what they couldn’t do was create a unique sound and vision.

Then in 1979 Don Ward opened a comedy club, The Comedy Store, above a strip club in Soho. With a young audience thirsty for social change, the comedy of the status quo was no longer welcomed. Spearheading this revolution was Alexei Sayle, a young socialist comic from Liverpool. Appointed MC, his job was to create a club in his image: rebellious, inventive and original. Before long comedy had turned on its head, embracing the surreal and ridiculous, Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson – and that rare species woman in the form of Dawn French and Jo Brand. The stand up of the 80's had broken free from its straitjacket and was now revelling in its newfound freedom of creativity and enterprise. This was a new dawn; the old days would never come again.

Sayle at the original Comedy Store.

Fast-forward to today. A landfill Indie tune has welcomed a man to the stage. He strides confidently to the microphone, projecting vim and vigour. He has something to get off his chest. Up until now, he can’t believe this issue hasn’t been confronted. His suit may have been designed on Saville Row, but don’t let that fool you: under the sharp tailoring lies the creases of misrule. Like a Medieval court jester, his occupation allows him to say the unsayable. He will use his moment to prick the powerful, to puncture the orthodoxy, to tear a hole in conventional wisdom. “So have you noticed that men have a separate draw for tools?” The camera zooms to a laughing face from The Only Way is Essex. This is what comedy has become.

Comedy finds itself yet again complacent in a coma of bland homogeneity. Admonished over Sachsgate and fearing further Tory cuts, the BBC’s aversion to risk is being mirrored by its stars on screen. So many of the Live at Mock Michael McIntyre’s Week are from the same management company, leading to a narrow carousel of voices that don’t reflect the diversity of the nation. And The Comedy Store? Its popularity has come at a cost: to protect its brand reliability - not risk - is now its watchword.

"The horror! The horror!"

So, we find ourselves yet again in need of a Don Ward: dependent on a club to re-awaken The Comedy Store’s ghost, to re-house the idiots in need of an asylum.

The Invisible Dot is the first custom-built comedy club to open in London for twenty years. Over the past three years it has been a champion for experimentation, favouring acts that push comedy’s parameters. This year in Edinburgh they promoted stunt provocateur, Luke McQueen; multi-racial sketch act, Daphne; and character comedian, Lolly Adefope. With their diverse stable of acts and idiosyncratic poster design, The Dot is stand up’s answer to Factory Records: a label that you can trust. I’ve been to four Invisible Dot productions over two years: the first was a storytelling show presented by Edinburgh award nominee, Liam Williams; the second was their monthly Live at the Chapel, where the best alternative comedians in the country perform in the hallowed environs of London’s Union Chapel; last year, it was perennial Edinburgh nominee, James Acaster’s ‘Work-in-Progress’ show; and on Saturday it was innovator extraordinaire, Joseph Morpurgo.

The man himself.

Morpurgo has been receiving rave reviews for a number of years now. Originally, he gained favour for his role in Austentatious, an improv group that performs a Jane Austen novel from audience suggestion. Further, his 2014 solo hour Odessa was acclaimed for its original format: the show was centred on a twenty-second local news bulletin depicting a chemical plant fire; the characters from the feature were then inhabited over the hour to create a riveting piece of comedy theatre.

His new show Soothing Sounds for Baby is his most ambitious to date. The title is irregular; it’s hardly Joseph Morpurgo: Live and Unloaded. In fact, it’s perfectly apt for a comic that exults in the esoteric and makes a home of the hinterland. His new show is about the old art of record buying. Over the past year, Morpurgo has visited charity bins around the country and picked out the most ridiculous vinyl sleeves he can find. Using the perverse cover art and batshit inlay as inspiration, he has made heroes out of these forgotten artists by mining their strangeness for laughs.

Morpurgo's stage.

Morpurgo’s dedication to finding appropriate records is admirable but it isn’t the most painstaking thing he does. In moving between the artists Morpurgo needed a narrative structure he could sequence the albums to: being a fan of Desert Island Discs, the Radio 4 castaway show seemed the most apposite way of doing it. Morpurgo then makes himself the star of Desert Island Discs with actual presenter Kirsty Young interviewing him. Does he have Young record an actual interview with him? No, that would be too easy and less funny. Instead he performs a gruelling Cassetteboy feat of splicing together hundreds of episodes of Discs to have Young’s questions fit his narrative. Clearly, this comedy is a world away from the 70’s backstage game of bagsy-a-joke.

Fans of the Radio 4 show will know that the interviewee intersperses their life story with music selections significant to them. Morpurgo does the same by intercutting his love story with record choices. However, whilst the Radio 4 subjects choose A-Ha, Elbow and Abba, Morpurgo chooses The World of Joseph Cooper, Winnie the Pooh read by Norman Shelly and 90’s RnB outfit Y?N-VEE.

What Desert Island Discs should look like.

These bizarre titles are the launch pads for the comic’s surreal flights of fancy. He re-imagines Joseph Cooper as a drunk piano teacher, whom uses Google route planner to teach musical pitch. He treats Y?N-VEE’s unpronounceable band name with hilarious incredulity by putting the group leader in a skit with a record boss. Most inspired though is his observation of Stanley Clarke’s vinyl cover: clad in white suit, the hirsute matador has his elbow propped on a burnished skull – Morpurgo channels the soul lothario to explain why.

Comedy doesn't have to be bland observations about the world we live in; it can be fantastical imaginings that open up new worlds of strange vistas and curious landscapes. In a small studio in Kings Cross stand-up has remembered this and invoked its 80's tradition.

The Comedy Store is dead. Long live, The Invisible Dot.

Joseph Morpurgo’s Soothing Sounds for Baby residency ends on Saturday.