LOCAL comedy singer songwriter, Tom Veck, is bringing a new show to the Merlin Theatre this March recounting his experiences of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and the ‘crazy’ confessions and stories of the public. It’s set to be his biggest comedy performance yet.
The Festival Fringe in August last year saw Tom, who is known locally for his work in Rocktopus, the Frome-based children’s rock band and other projects, scoop four and five-star reviews and a nomination for best newcomer.
“I have been in Rocktopus and doing stuff with kids for many years,” explains Tom. “As a hobby I had been writing comedy songs for myself and playing them to friends, they are observational songs about life and the ridiculousness of humans and me and my embarrassing memories and experiences. I found that I was actually quite good at writing these songs and everyone was encouraging me to get out there and perform. It was petrifying really but eventually I plucked up the courage and did it and realised I absolutely loved performing this kind of music for adults. I started doing more gigs and writing more material and got more and more confident.
“I had a year to prepare myself and my show is pretty whacky. I didn’t want it to be the average music gig; I’ve done a crisp tasting competition to go with the song about being addicted to crisps, I bring out the weirdest flavours and get volunteers to come up and taste the crisps and guess the flavours. I’ve got a song called Walking on Lego, it is a parody of Walking on Sunshine. After this song I get a volunteer to come up and walk on Lego blindfolded without flinching; the first person who did that won a VHS of the Royal Wedding.”
At the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Tom said he wrote 77 songs with members of the public that he then performed at his show.
“It was a life-changing experience,” says Tom. “All I knew was that I was going to be performing my 50-minute set for nine nights in a row somewhere in a city I’d never been to, at a festival I knew very little about. I genuinely had no idea how the festival worked, if I’d be able to get anyone to come along, or even if anyone would actually like what I did.
“I arrived in the beautiful, enormous and daunting city a day early and made my way to The Royal Mile – the street where everyone goes to promote their shows. Part of my worry was how I was going to stand out from all the other artists. I knew everybody would be out giving flyers. I had no reviews; I wasn’t known by anyone. To make things worse, I’d had the great idea of creating a huge sign, covered in flashing lights saying ‘hold my sign and I’ll use the ‘songamethingy’ to write you a song about your embarrassing memories three minutes and play it at tonight’s show! (If it’s any good!)’ The songamethingy was a ‘songwriting machine’ I’d created featuring more flashing lights, a spinner, buttons and dials. The whole experience was leap of faith after leap of faith and definitely one of the scariest things I’d ever embarked upon.
“I was walking around Edinburgh with my massive sign and going up to people with my guitar. After some cringe-worthy hours of nobody wanting to engage, finally someone wanted to write a song.
“For the next eight days I worked harder than I’ve ever worked for my craft. I lost my voice several times and somehow found it again, talked to hundreds of people about my show, coaxed reviewers to come and watch and received five-star reviews, was put forward for Best Newcomer by TheSpaceUK and managed to sell out several shows to boot.”
“I left, utterly inspired, with a load of new friends, an absolute ton of new ideas and songs and finally believing that I was indeed good enough to be out there performing this stuff.
“The biggest show I have done where I performed my comedy stuff was in front of 90 at the Black Cherry Theatre in Boscombe, so the Merlin Theatre will be my biggest show yet. I’ll be treating the audience to the best of my Edinburgh show, along with a new addition, The Confessional Music Box, a light and some filled box from which audience members can randomly select story songs for me to play in the show. Another huge hit at the Fringe was my comedy raffle ‘The Naffle’ where I give away the worst prizes I have found at the car boot sale. I’m already saving some really special prizes for my theatre show in March. And by special, I mean especially terrible!”
The show takes place on 15th March at 8pm. For more information or to buy tickets visit https://www. ticketsource.co.uk/whats-on/frome/merlin-theatre/ tom-veck-live/e-dqaqdz
