Good show
sounds a good joke.
I also definitely advise everyome to check out Kevin Bishop's send up of her singing the James Bond theme.
Winehouse jibe wins Fringe's funniest gag
A tasteless jibe at the expense of galactically-talented bouffant platform Amy Winehouse has secured the Edinburgh Fringe festival's funniest gag crown for comedienne Zoe Lyons. Zoe Lyons with her Dave funniest gag trophy Lyons (pictured) entertained the crowds during her Mangled Mantra of the Messed-up Modern Mind show with …
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Friday 22nd August 2008 12:34 GMT Marvin the Martian
Festival of unfun
Wow, what a funny joke.
Amy Whineweasel jokes were totally like fresh around 2006 like, dude. At the point where she started falling apart and cancelling shows and being an obvious wreck, it was a bit... passe? I know time slows down up north but this is a bit much.
Judging from the top-ten it still beat out the others in freshness [OK, one references Obama but it's a pre-2000 Bush joke, when Bush converted] but still. If you want to throw up, google for photos of the Rivers creature --- "when plastic surgeons go bad" or something.
[Hippopotamuses thing is not even close to true --- not even in africa, where you have a world war going on killing a few millions the last five years.]
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Friday 22nd August 2008 12:34 GMT dervheid
"galactically-talented"
You CANNOT be talking about Whinehouse, really.
Unless I missed the <sarcasm>.
As for the self harm, I suppose that carrying that rats nest about on top of her head must qualify.
She may have been talented to start out with, but any scrap of that seems to have been buried under the over indulgence in her own publicity.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 13:03 GMT Anonymous Coward
Waste of space
"A tasteless jibe at the expense of galactically-talented bouffant platform Amy Winehouse"
I'm sick of hearing how talented Amy Wingehouse is, and how sad and tragic it all is. She's a waste of space!! Talented, maybe, but the press and music business ought to spend their time on more worthwhile people than the drugged-up waste-of-time mess that AW is.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 13:04 GMT Sarah Bee
sigh
I hate you all.
Anyway, objectively that is not a funny joke, nor a fresh one, regardless of who it's about. Nor is the second one. That's a real nasty barrel-scraping bit of misogynist piffle.
The hippo one isn't bad. At least it has the form of an actual joke. It's all in the delivery, anyway, innit.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 13:46 GMT dervheid
Sarah, you must've known...
that ANY reference to the 'talent' that Mrs Fielder-Civil once possessed would result in a barrage of flaming cow-pats.
Unfortunately, the only 'talent' she currently exhibits is that of being a drink/drug/publicity ravaged shadow of her former self. Her apparent inability to perform (ie the recent Bond Theme fiasco) serves only to fuel the flames.
As for the 'famous friend' angle, I went to school with Robin Guthrie (and Bill Heggie) of the Cocteau Twins (bit before your time, I suspect). Still see Bill around occasionally, but Guthrie was, and (living in the states) still is I suspect, a self indulgent wanker. I do hope he's managed to replace the old army greatcoat he used to wear to school, and to college, as it stank of cat's piss.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 14:18 GMT Chris
@dervheid and @Sarah Bee
dervheid: If you went to school with the original bassist from the Cocteau Twins, then you'd know his name was Will, not Bill.
Sarah: If you like the Cocteaus, then check out a band called Lowlife if you haven't already. Will Heggie's band after he split from the Cocteaus.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 15:23 GMT dervheid
Chris
Will.
Short for William?
Like Bill, and (as we called him when we were kids) Billy?
Believe it or not, I never actually new that 'Will' was his 'professional' name, as it were. He's always just been Billy or Bill to me. Even when we served our apprenticeships together at what used to be the ICI. Did see him gig with a band prior to the Cocteaus, "All this and More". (what were they thinking!)
Ah, the hazy late 70's/early 80's.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 18:21 GMT adnim
Talented?
I'm not so sure, her voice is hardly pleasant although she can hold a tune. She can also convey emotion, fair enough, but hardly worth the tag of talented. I have flushed more talented turds.
imho, and the opinion of others I write better songs and write better music than Winehouse, and I'm in IT. My sound engineering skills are far from awesome though.
Some people just don't have a clue, accepting I maybe one of them and I is just deluded. Yeah right I like I really believe that.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 21:26 GMT Anonymous Coward
winetavern?
amy who?
actually, i know vaguely who amy winehouse is, having seen photos of her in tabloid-esque locations but i'm proud to say, i have no idea what any of her tunes are called... or what any of them sound like.
god - it's great growing old and out of touch! when i were a lad it were all sidney viscous on smack and elvis paisley dying on the bog around here!
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Friday 22nd August 2008 21:26 GMT mick gregory
Adnim
I accept that "talented" was probably the wrong name to describe Billie Holiday, perhaps the nickname Lester Young gave her of "Lady Day" will suffice.
It's nice to see that someone with your self confessed limited sound engineering talent can still recognize her name, fifty years after her death.
Begs the question - how many people in IT will remember your name 50 years' on?
Hot Tip - Spend more time analyzing her music rather than analyzing your talented turds.
Regards,
Mick Gregory.
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Friday 22nd August 2008 22:49 GMT adnim
@Mick
I made no mention of Billie Holiday so I am at a loss as to the point you are trying to make. Perhaps you confused my post with the one immediately below?
As for me being remembered, That is not my purpose in being here, at least I don't think it is. Whatever the case, I haven't finished yet ;-)
As for analysing her music, I'm afraid it contradicts with at least one purpose I am here for... enjoying life. And despite sucking (currently) as a sound engineer I am sure I could out mix the Winehouse non-entity, even on the rare occasion she has clarity of mind.
Like I said she has no talent, at least none that should be lauded.
Although the truth sometimes does offend, please don't take it personally.
regards
Adnim ;-)
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Friday 22nd August 2008 23:59 GMT Anonymous Coward
the talent of Amy Winerack
... is also lost on me. To my knowledge, her greatest renditions are merely remakes of other people's songs, she doesn't play an instrument, she doesn't appear to write music or lyrics, she don't even dance... making her a glorified pub/karaoke singer... nice voice, crap attitude, but what do you expect when the only reason you are not doing a 5-stretch for possession is because your heroin addiction came to light AFTER you became famous. The truth may offend, it also hurts... but I remember you Adnim, and we'll always have Paris.
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Sunday 24th August 2008 10:06 GMT Pete Jones
re: It's all Greek to me
"Hippopotamus means 'horse of the river', so the plural should probably be something like hippoipotamos, 'horses of the river'."
Hippopotamus is a second declension Latin noun, so the plural in that language is hippopotami. The fact that it came into Latin from the Greek doesn't change the Latin grammar!
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Sunday 24th August 2008 10:06 GMT NT
Not really a joke at all
I agree with Sarah. The Amy joke just isn't. There's a clear difference between humour (and isn't the Fringe supposedly the place for *clever* humour, and Dave the 'home of witty banter'?) and simple malice. If Zoe Lyons is the best comedy the Fringe has to offer, and if that's a representative sample of her material, then things aren't looking good for the laugh-making industry.
As far as the rest are concerned, again, #2 was nothing more than catty sniping. The hippo one, yes, I liked that. Tim Vine's Velcro comment was worth a chuckle; Joan Rivers is just hugely irritating (subjective, I know); and Jeff Kreisler: c'mon - George Bush is an even easier target than Amy. Talk about a no-brainer.
Incidentally, I don't particularly rate Winehouse as a singer, either, so this isn't from loyalty to a favourite artist. Actually she strikes me as a total wreck - but in any case that's a sad thing, not comedy material.
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Sunday 24th August 2008 10:06 GMT Law
doesn't matter anyway
She'll most likely be dead within the year, then most of us will stop bashing her, and her adoring fans (including Miss Bee from what I can see) can buy her greatest hits, you know, the one with the "previously unheard tracks" she was working on while going through her darkest periods - so we will be told by the music exec's anyway.
If you feel like there is a void even after the new cd's though, you will likely be able to purchase her dad's new book, interview dvd, family biography, and probably even an exercise video within a month or three of her funeral.
Not an Amy hater per-say - but definitely not a fan.... even less of a fan of media and music companies hyping/demonising people for sales though.
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Monday 25th August 2008 07:18 GMT GrammarNazi
@hippos
Look it is quite simple. Hippopotamus is an English word. So are Octopus, khaki, xylophone, quack, mutton and sheep. They have various origins but they have been adopted as English words and English grammar (what there is of it) applies.
If you want to use Latin and Greek plurals go and speak Latin and Greek. If you use Latin plurals in an English sentence you are a pretentious wanker.
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Monday 25th August 2008 12:10 GMT NT
@ GrammarNazi
"If you want to use Latin and Greek plurals go and speak Latin and Greek. If you use Latin plurals in an English sentence you are a pretentious wanker."
In some cases, but by no means in all. It's always difficult to apply sweeping decrees like that to the entire language. The '-ae' plurals are a good example: standard English usage has 'formulae' as the correct plural of 'formula'. Astronomers aren't being pretentious when they refer to 'nebulae'. That's the correct English plural form of 'nebula'.
Sure, there are many words whose 'original' plural forms are now discarded. We don't hold sports events in stadia, we hold them in stadiums. Despite the insistence of some purists, 'data' refers to a single piece of information or a whole bundle. But plurals are funny things anyway: one goose, many geese; one mongoose, many mongooses.
And as for the hippopotamus, well, to my knowledge 'hippopotami' and 'hippopotamuses' are both recognised as correct in English, although 'hippopotamuses' is considered preferable by most usage authorities.
It's generally better not to get too hot under the collar about this sort of question, because sometimes there isn't a totally clear-cut answer.
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Monday 25th August 2008 12:10 GMT Daniel
winehouse
is pretty interesting in being one of the few for many years that actually *can* sing and also write a song, although she sounds nothing at all like Billie. Shades of Dinah Washington sometimes maybe. Sharon Jones would leave her for dead though.
shame she's hell bent on effing her life up, but hey, that's her business. The joke would have been a lot funnier without the "she's so irritating " bit, it is about as subtle as a bricklayer the way it stands.
Personally, I found #9 ("I like Jesus, but he loves me so it's awkward") a lot funnier, most of them were crap.
(music nerd alert)
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Monday 25th August 2008 15:53 GMT Andy Hards
Sounds to me like you lot have no clue
If you have only seen pics of her in the tabloids and heard one or two of her (yes HER) tunes on the radio then you will no doubt have no clue to her talent. She is an amazing talent but has let it all go to her head and thinks that being a smack/crack head will not affect her or like so many greats (Coltrane, Davis, Baker) thinks that having a smack habit makes her cool.
She writes most of her own stuff, sings other peoples stuff well and is far more talented than that waste of space from Babyshambles. If you don't think she is talented then name me someone of her generation who is.
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Monday 25th August 2008 20:54 GMT adnim
Hi Andy
She is not talented. How old are you? Do you know what talent is?
@ mick, bye.
Thanks to both of you for confirming my suspicions regarding the fate of the human race. Fortunately I will likely die before my suspicions are confirmed, probably through arrogance. Is it possible to die through arrogance? I guess it depends on where one drinks.
Wishing you both well, sincerely I may add. I thank you both for making me feel smart, even if deluded ;-)
Don't take yourselves to seriously we are products, conditioned to defend ourselves and that we believe to be right.
hugs if you care to accept
Adnim
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Tuesday 26th August 2008 05:50 GMT GrammarNazi
@NT
I'm not too bothered as the concept of a fixed 'English grammar' is a pretty marginal one in the first place, IMHO.
Most of the 'proper' grammar in English is the result of a nasty 18th century hack when the grammarians tried to retrofit Latin grammar onto a non-Latin language. An ugly kludge was the result.
English has also been prone to 'fads', such as the adoption of French spelling and spelling reforms and dictionaries and vowel shifts, etc, etc. Which all leaves the language in a glorious, vibrant and flexible mess. Tell me the correct spelling of the Bard of Avon's name, for example.
Overall this is a good thing I feel and perhaps I should have qualified my original 'wanker' statement a bit better. People who correct others for using 'octopuses', 'stadiums', 'formulas', etc are the wankers.
In a technical/scientific document I can see the justification for using Latinate endings but I don't see how it can be considered as proscribed in 'common' English. One thing about dictionaries, they follow the language, the do not lead it.
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Tuesday 26th August 2008 09:04 GMT NT
@ GrammarNazi
"Tell me the correct spelling of the Bard of Avon's name, for example."
There simply isn't one, because during Shakespeare's time - and up until quite recently - there weren't really any standardised spellings in English. In Shakespeare's case there is a conventional spelling (see left); but not a 'correct' one, nor even a single one that he used for himself.
"Overall this is a good thing I feel and perhaps I should have qualified my original 'wanker' statement a bit better. People who correct others for using 'octopuses', 'stadiums', 'formulas', etc are the wankers."
Or maybe nobody's the 'wanker', as such, but just people with differing views on something that doesn't always have a straightforward right or wrong answer.
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Wednesday 27th August 2008 15:30 GMT Anonymous Coward
TV Debut? not sure..
Saw Amy Winehouse on Jools...maybe a debut, Jools is good for that.
She was a nervous wreck. First time i'd heard of her, so i gave it a listen, and decided if she could stop playing with the hem of her hideous outfit, and actually lift her head, she might be able to bang out a song. In current state though, not fit for purpose. Since then, I lost interest. She had a chance, once... blew it.
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Biting the hand that feeds IT
