Lists.

Word up, Gs.

As it's nearly the end of the year it's time for me to blog shamelessly in a good old review of the year kind of way. Because I've always loved lists. My favourite magazines of the year as a teenager were the end-of-year editions of NME / Kerrang / Empire / C&VG and so on - thus setting me on the path to nerdishness that I now tread most firmly on a daily basis.

Anyway, these are my lists. Tell me yours, oh Facebook friends! Because I'll read them and either nod with my chin cupped in my hand... or tut like an irked librarian.

Lets get on it.

TOP 5 ALBUMS OF 2008

1: "Angles" - Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip
2: "Glasvegas" - Glasvegas
3: "The Hawk is Howling" - Mogwai
4: "Third" - Portishead
5: "Sunday at Devil Dirt" - Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan

I'll be honest, I nearly said the Kings of Leon album, because that's ace. But just missed out. I know that they'll be gutted, of course. I tried to dislike them for years, I really did. But they're quite good. Angles is the best album in years, I reckon. More people need to own it.

TOP 5 SONGS OF 2008

1: "Letter From God to Man - Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip
2: "Evil Urges" - My Morning Jacket
3: "Revelry" - Kings of Leon
4: "Why Do You Let Me Stay Here?" - She and Him
5: "Wayfaring Stranger" - Jamie Woon (Burial Remix)

I really like "Handlebars" by Flobots, but if I listed it here I'd be stoned to death by the music chauvanist illuminati. I spent most of 2008 listening to every song from "Untrue" by Burial, but as that was released in 2007 I can't bloody choose any of it. Bah.

TOP 5 GAMES OF 2008

1: Fallout 3
2: GTA IV
3: Soulcalibur IV
4: Super Street Fighter 2 HD Remix
5: Saints Row 2

Look at all the sequels. Saints Row 2 is bloody good fun (and Amelia likes stealing cars and respraying them pink, so who am I to argue?), SSF2HDR is an amazing update of arguably the greatest game ever (and apt after the tattoos I've had this year), SC4 is awesome and GTA4 was worth the wait, just about. However, Fallout 3 is one of the greatest games that I've ever played. And I've wasted a lot of my life. My Xbox got the red ring of death when I was 30 hours in and I nearly cried. If you don't own it, buy it. Seriously. Words fail me. It's amazing.

TOP 5 GIGS OF 2008 (Watched)

1: Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip (Manchester Academy 3)
2: Radiohead (Old Trafford CC)
3: Those Dancing Days (Summer Sundae, Leicester)
4: Cadence Weapon (Manchester Academy 3)
5: Laura Marling (Manchester Academy 3)

Not many gigs this year, but what I did see ruled. Didn't think that after a 15 year wait to watch Radiohead that they would be topped by a beardy bloke in a hat and a fat bloke with a laptop doing a pretend business presentation in a basement in Manchester.

TOP 5 FILMS OF 2008

1: In the Valley of Elah
2: Cloverfield
3: Persepolis
4: Juno
5: Mad Detective

I didn't watch many films this year. And I know that #1 has no proper ending, #2 is daft, #3 is black and white, #4 is overrated and #5 is mental.

TOP 5 THINGS I'VE BOUGHT IN 2008

1: The girls (on my arm, not whores)
2: All the trainers
3: My phone, which now works remotely well
4: Fallout 3
5: iPod bracket for my car

My arm rules. You knows it.

TOP 5 GIGS OF 2008 (Performed at)

1: February 12th, Bambu, Leicester - First ever hour long solo show
2: October 21st, Student Union, Leicester - I love mental students
3: December 20th, Lonestar Comedy, Folkestone - Last pre xmas gig, was lovely
4: September 16th, Cheeky Monkeys, Birmingham - Fun MCing times
5: July 5th, Jumping Jaks, Bournemouth - Crazy gig with me delirious from 6hrs of tattooing

RESOLUTIONS FOR 2009...

1: Global domination
2: Eat less cake
3: Have more tattoos
4: Finish the book
5: Stop playing Fallout 3

That's it. Now swear at my lists! Have a lovely 2009, everyone.

Jim x

Ink.

On Sunday I went to visit the lovely Gemma in Norwich and had some more of my arm finished off...

Here's Chun Li...



And Kitana...



Kitana hurt like hell in particular. I wanted to try and get as much done as possible but after 5 hours of work (in the most pleasant surroundings possible - Gemma's house) my arm decided to act up and not take any more. So Zelda (on my inner forearm) now has a coloured in face but not much else. My arm is very, very swollen. More to come in half term week, woo hoo!

My house now has the familiar smell of Bepanthen in the air.

Whilst being tattooed I watched the following films:

King of Kong. Genius. Billy Mitchell is the most loathsome character EVER, to the point where I was honestly convinced that everyone in the film was an actor because he's such a successful caricature of a complete tool. Also ironic to watch the film whilst having a video game tattoo. Meant I couldn't call anyone in the film a nerd, really...

The Devil Dared Me To. Silly fun. New Zealanders swearing is FUNNY.

REC. The film Diary of the Dead wishes it was. Too short, but makes sense in the grand scheme of things. Probably not the smartest move to watch a film that makes you jump whilst being tattooed, mind.

Trainwreck: My Life as an Idoit. Was reaching my pain threshold at this point, but what I could concentrate on I enjoyed a lot. Was quite touching whilst completely wrong.

No gigs this week so more blog updating than usual, I'll wager...

School.

In 2 weeks time I finally leave Next after 8 years of working there. Very sad to be leaving the people behind, not exactly quite as sad to be leaving the job behind. I've grown tired of making money for rich shareholders (which is basically what I do) and at 30 I really did need to finally make the plunge and properly follow my dreams of becoming a full time comedian. So I have. Kind of.

I did want to ensure that if I didn't make it into the glamorous world of showbusiness (since I last wrote - Birmingham! Hartlepool! York! THE GLAMOUR!) that I'd be doing something I liked. Plus, I need to pay the mortgage - so I'll be going to work in my old school as a teaching assistant. I'm both excited and terrified at this sudden change in career. I'm going to be terrifically poor - but I would wager a million times happier.

Got a nice review of my performance at Cheeky Monkey's in Birmingham on Tuesday. The gig has been running for an amazing 11 years, and the promoter (Martin) is ridiculously knowledgeable about the comedy scene so it's nice to get some praise from him. He also takes pictures of every act that performs there... so this is me onstage this week, slightly blurred...

Funny.

The above video is easily my favourite 2 minutes of stand up comedy of all time. I watch this and am in awe. As a fan of both James Brown and Eddie Murphy watching this still makes me giggle with glee.

Incidentally, "Delirious" was the first ever 18-certificated stand-up video I ever watched. I was about 9. I have very lenient parents who happen to be comedy fans. God job that, on both levels...

Peach.

This is Peach. You can also see a small glimpse of Zelda. I'm stunned at my own shoddiness for not showing off my sleeve until now via the joys of the blogosphere. It stuns audiences into silence (even more than my Blinky tattoo on my right arm) and I love it. A thousand thanks to Gemma at Modern Body Art in Birmingham - although she has moved on now (but her gifted hands will finish the sleeve of aceness, wherever she may roam). She's brilliant and it's a great studio. I'll post more pictures as the rest of the girls are coloured...

Still to be coloured...

Zelda
Chun Li
Morrigan
Kitana

Still to be outlined...

Felicia
Tifa
Maybe one or two more...

Plus loads of little bits and bobs in between that are VERY exciting... woot!

In other news, I'm going to be covering up the tattoos to be involved with the opening of the new High Cross shopping centre in Leicester. This is the biggest thing to be happening in my home city for a long time, so this is quite a big deal to me. And a chance to try my hand at some more straight presenting, which is another string to my bow.

Archery isn't, ironically.

Glory.

I like the above picture. I had hair then, and was pre-cowboy shirt days for me. I now always wear a cowboy shirt on stage - not just because it fits my opening gag, but also because Tony Law often wears them and he's a hero of mine. Anyway, that was Summer Sundae last year. I just did an image search on Google and found the above pic and one of me onstage at Cheeky Monkey's in Birmingham - looking far too thin. Which is a nice was of me saying that I'm a chubby chubster now. That was the day that I was watching the Pigeon Detectives and I got a phone call - I'd already done my slot on the Saturday, but We Are Klang were delayed on the M40 thanks to a shooting (not by them) so I had to go back to the comedy tent and perform again. Which was ace.

Right then, the Edinburgh festival is done with. Not that I was there, being poor and all, but it does mean the beginning of the new comedy year - in the same way that Wrestlemania ends the wrestling year at the end of every March. Shut up, I like wrestling.

I jumped up and down in my lounge saying "woot" when I heard that Sarah Millican won the Perrier (fuck "if.comeddie", it's a daft name) newcomer award doo-dah because she's bloody awesome, tremendously funny and ridiculously nice to everyone. Yay for her! When she's a bajillionaire I can say I gigged with her a few times and that we once sat in a bar in Edinburgh with other comedians having a laugh texting AQA. Back then I presumed that I'd be making bigger strides in comedy by now... and not that I'd actually be working for AQA. Which is actually quite nice, but that's another blog.

I have been thinking though. I've been a comedian for 3 years. The other week I met a lovely lad called Jonathon Elston, really funny kid (I can call him that, he's at least 10 years my junior) who deserves to go far. We had the standard "how long have you been going" conversation and he's been going around a year. And has done nearly as many gigs as me. At last count I've done 170 gigs. In three years. That is poor - and mainly down to my own laziness and circumstances. So that's it now. The quest for glory is on. I've got a plan. Mwuhahahahahahaha.

It doesn't really need the sinister laughter, but I kind of like it.

Part one of the plan is to get VERY good at my trade. I'm not bad. I get good work from some promoters, less good work from others and quite a few promoters sit there and have no idea who I am. Which is understandable - I never go to London to work and I certainly don't gig as much as I might. But with every gig I do I can feel myself getting better - in the same way that steroid abusers feel themselves stretching at night (apparently), I can feel my skills actually getting to a point where I'm not an enthusiastic amateur anymore and I'm really half decent. So from now on, no gig gets turned down. I will work my arse off to ensure that I get better and better and better and that I don't miss any opportunity through my own lack of motivation. Part one (a) is that I need to go to London, do open spots in tough clubs and generally put my name about a bit. It's either that or put my card in phone boxes...

Part two is hassling promoters. I'm a promoter myself so I know how annoying it is to be contacted all the time. But I've got a good CV, audio, video and a million testimonies and references - I need to be using this effectively and taking the step up. And if I get knocked back, I need to not just sit under a duvet for a week, worried that every club in the country hates me. You can't have everyone like you, after all. I jut need to keep going. Consistently.

Part three is Edinburgh, which I will now do in 2009. I did a solo show in Leicester during their comedy festival this year and it went well - it sold out, but that's more down to being a local than actually being good. But I can perform for an hour and it really wasn't bad - all the material in that show gets used during regular gigs, dependent on the audience. The name of this blog comes from my proposed Edinburgh / Leicester /Camden / Sheffield / Glasgow / Manchester hour long show in 2009 - "Boy Next Door Gone Wrong". It's the best description of my act that I've ever heard (from Rob Gee) and will move away from my club set and discuss how I went from cute, well behaved little James Daniel Smallman to heavily tattooed, useless in relationships, messed up former alcoholic Jim Smallman. I'm going to use a slideshow and everything. It'll rule.

I hope.

So then. I feel energised and ready to take on the world. Starting with the Smirking Rooms in Leeds tonight. YEAH!

(This energy will last until I have a bad gig or a flat tyre on the motorway.)

Burial.

Just after Christmas 2007 I was in London, trawling the post-xmas sales and trying in vain to spend money that I'd decided upon spending in my brain. This means I didn't physically have any money, I'd just allowed for a further kick into the overdraft. I was in Fopp in Covent Garden, looking at all their recommendations for their albums of 2007. My eyes scanned across the above CD - "Untrue" by Burial. I had no idea who Burial was. Or were - as I'd immediately dismissed "them" as some low-rent metal band due to the name. I stopped reading music magazines many moons ago and as Burial was getting no radio play anywhere I had no idea what music the album contained. I then forgot about it and bought more Mogwai albums, as was the norm for me at the time.

A couple of months later I was driving to Beverley in Yorkshire for a gig. I'd forgotten any CDs for the journey so was forced to listen to Radio 1, where Radiohead were running the Evening Session. They played "Archangel" by Burial and it was one of those beuatiful moments where you hear a song and you need to do everything within you to obtain that song as soon as possible. I actually pulled onto the hard shoulder so I could write down in my notepad the name of the song and the artist, eventually remembering the little story above.

I downloaded "Untrue" the next day and was immediately blown away by it. It is the most frightening, beautiful, haunting and amazing album you will ever listen to. I recommend listening to it LOUD through a very good pair of headphones. In the dark. You will never, ever hear another album like it.

I can't describe it. Burial is a dubstep artist but the album is a twisted, ambient, deformed version of dubstep that virtually invents a new genre of music. I have not stopped boring people about this album at all in the past few months because I honestly feel everyone who has an interest in music should own a dozen copies of it. Seriously. Get it. Now.

The thing I loved about the album when I got it was that Burial was, then at least, anonymous. He's now been "outed" as William Bevan, a 2o something from South London who just happened to want to be anonymous. As the press have been doing since he got nominated for the Mercury Prize though, I spent ages trying to figure out who he was. I mean, how could you make something of such beauty, have such immense critical acclaim and be in such enormous demand as a remixer and stay anonymous unless you were already famous? The papers have recently published their theories of him being Aphex Twin or Fatboy Slim - my theory was that he was Mike Skinner. Yeah, laugh it up.

So yeah, the Mercury Prize. I've always looked at the nominations for this and picked my favourite, but the record I have picked has always been the lesser of many evils - picking something I'm ok with and don't hate. But with "Untrue" - I want it to win SO badly. I will petition Mercury themselves if I have to. This is not some pointless indie rock, or pretentious singer-songwriter-wankery - this is a project born of love to a genius, an album like no other on the planet. And it's pushed boundaries so far that they're just a dot to us now.

Get it. Here ends the advert ;)

And for those people in the UK, put BBC 3 on and watch the QOTSA set from Reading. Best lve band on Earth.

Chips.

I really like chips. This is a new realisation. When I was a child, all of my friends would eat chips at lunchtime as I tried to choke down my dairylea sandwiches on that kind of squishy white bread that always tastes a little bit like it isn't properly baked. I would never look at their chips with envy though, oh no. I was safe in my knowledge that chips were bad and I was an odd kid - so doing the opposite was ok.

In the same way, I was just doing the opposite when all of my friends were getting girlfriends in their teens and I wasn't. Honest.

Anyway, tonight on my way home I passed a chip shop. And for the third time in just over a week, some unknown force dragged me towards said takeaway, like a greasy tractor beam. And just prior to writing this blog, I ate many chips. And a fishcake. And I now have this strange guilt, the same kind of guilt I would have post-masturbating as a callow youth: Knowing what I'd done was bad, but good lord did it feel good.

For the record, I don't smoke, drink or take drugs. Anymore. So this is to be my release, my opium. Anything deep fried.

The only thing better than chips is someone elses chips. Oh yeah. You know what I'm saying.

Ron knows. I was informed that Anchorman 2 is coming. I should probably claim to love loftier comedic films than anything starring Will Ferrell but naaah. He's hilarious. The fact that I own a "More Cowbell" t-shirt is testement to that.

Why.

Why write a blog?

I'll tell you for why. Because I spend my days trying to stem the flow of words and rubbish that comes spewing from my cavernous mouth. People run, screaming, from my tirades. Not in a bad way, like I'm some kind of frightening beast. But in a bemused way, like they cannot believe for one second that a 30 year old who has somehow managed to father a child could talk such utter and unmitigated bollocks.

Still, that's what blogs are for - right?

I hereby promise to not talk about anything that makes any sense at all.

Bring on the trumpets.