David M. Green: Purveyor of fine humour

  • THE Big Show on Triple M: Reflection

    Greetings,

    Well last night I made my commercial and national radio debut with THE Big Show on the fabulous Triple M network. Due to delays, it went to air almost simultaneously in Adelaide and Sydney around 10:45EST (10:15CST). Melbourne didn’t start until after midnight. Not sure about Brisbane. Anyone hear it in Brisbane? If you missed it, the podcast is now up on the Triple M websites, the Semi-Pro Radio website, and the mp3 is right here.

    So that’s it. We did the show and now it’s over. Special thanks to Triple M, to whoever came up with this Semi-Pro Radio idea, to Alan Miller Fast Voice-overs (the agency we represented), to Miles and Sam “on the pots and pans” and their fabulous recording and editing work and to Tim Lordan, APD at Triple M Adelaide for tolerating us. Overall we’re all pretty happy with the show. For a once-off pre-recorded show recorded and produced with the limited time and resources available to us, it’s pretty good. Good. Not great, in my opinion. Although what do you expect? It was only by the end of the recording session we were getting into it. I hadn’t done radio with Matty B in over 2 years and we’re used to sitting in chairs around a panel, not standing “Nova-style” in a 4 metre squared voice-over booth. Funnily enough, we initially wrote in the show’s description “with David M. Green and Matty B in the hot seat, or seats, depending on budget restraints…” Ironically there were no seats.

    I think it’ll be obvious to anyone listening with a basic understanding of radio that some of the talk breaks were quite edited. 2 whole talk breaks weren’t recorded simply because we ran out of studio time. Another sketch we recorded wasn’t edited because we ran out of production time, and other things that were recorded, edited and ready to go were then cut due to their content and further time concerns. I can now personally appreciate why Tony Martin demanded 7 production hours for every 1 hour of “Get This.” For a comedy show, you need a lot of time, even if just to listen back and redo little things (which we didn’t really have a chance to do, although hindsight is 20/20 and with a pre-recorded show there’s always the temptation to go back and “fix” EVERYTHING. In a way it’s easier to do it live…).

    Most disappointing for me personally was the loss of an entire minute from the Smiddy soundboard prank call. I feel like a bit of a jerk now, as on the show I introduced it as “the greatest prank call in the history of the world,” a wild and totally unjustified claim I know. The original was 4 and a half minutes and that version was legitimately too long and dragged a little, so I cut it down to 3 minutes. The 3-minute version is very funny. Certainly a lot funnier than the 2-minute version that went to air. But thanks to the miracle of the Internet, you can hear the 3-minute Smiddy soundboard prank call right here. Hazaa!

    I guess a big problem for THE Big Show was the fact that we simply had too many ideas. We really packed the maximum amount we thought we could get away with into each 3-minute talk break (evidently more than the maximum as it turned out). If we were doing 5 shows a week we’d probably spread the ideas we had over a whole month. We didn’t leave ourselves any time to potter along with some laid-back banter. We didn’t want to take the risk and waste a talk break. We only have 1 show, only the BEST. The end result is a very fast-paced show (probably too fast, even for Alan Miller’s Fast Voice-overs!). I felt we needed a little more time to introduce and explain and just chat. We could have spent another whole talk break doing impressions of those clips from The Lawnmower Man. I love the quotes “His mind is like a clean hungry sponge!” and “You gonna do some, uh night-mowing?” They’re hilarious! We should have made a bigger deal about those, instead of brushing over them so quickly. Not to mention the incredible coincidence that Pierce Brosnan’s character in that film is named “Larry” and we mashed it together with clips from Channel 7’s “Larry The Lawnmower.” Can you believe that? I couldn’t believe it when I noticed that, AFTER I’d already started writing the sketch.

    But all in all a truly incredible, amazing, RARE priviledge. We made a comedy show for Triple M! And there’s plenty more where that came from. We’ll be back on-air somewhere in some form eventually. No doubt about that.

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    Mind like a clean hungry sponge.

  • THE Big Show: It’s Freaking Hilarious!

    Hey!

    I went into Triple M Adelaide yesterday to sit in with Sam (our extremely dedicated producer) while he put the finishing touches on all our sketches and segments for THE Big Show. Poor Sam. He’d just got back from his European holiday the day before (no doubt to escape the huge workload thrust upon him by the Triple M production department) and he had been at Triple M catching up on the backlog of work since 5am! I got there at noon and I was supposed to spend an hour with him going over the show. I ended up staying for 3 and a half hours. Laughter was abundant.

    I gotta say, it sounds fantastic! Kudos to Sam and Miles in production and Tim Lordan, the assistant programme director for their time and advice and excellent work in bringing our ideas to life. Until now, we were all thinking “well, we’ll give it our best shot and hopefully it’ll be good” but now that I’ve heard how it all sounds it’s “Oh my God! It worked! It’s great! This is amazing!” But hey, I don’t want to over-sell it… You can decide for yourself. Tune in this Sunday August 30th 2009 at 10pm on Triple M in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide or online. It’s Semi-Pro Radio. This week it’s  THE Big Show with David M. Green, Matty B, Tim Wray, Nick Godfrey & Adam Navarro and I can honestly say it’s some of our finest and funniest work to date. And we had a damn good time doing it!

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    Look out for the Larry the Lawnmower sketch…

  • THE Big Show! That’s… 3 Ms

    He-he-hey!

    What’s up? No time to wait for you to answer. Get a load of this…

    You can hear the audio fruits of last week’s recording day in the form of “THE Big Show” on the tree that is the Triple M network in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide this Sunday August 30 10pm-midnight as part of Semi-Pro Radio! We reveal some ridiculous movie trailers, weird stores and what some people have carelessly left lying around Triple M. Plus Nick’s tips on avoiding Swine Flu, a trip down That’s Sexist lane, prank calls with a Smiddy soundboard, lawnmowers coming out the back-lot and some other junk we managed to throw together at the last minute before we were shown the door!  THE Big Show! It’s funny (51% new material).

    It really has been a fantastic experience. If nothing else it’s been an excuse to catch up with Matty B again, whom I haven’t seen since he last left Adelaide to return to Sydney about 18 months ago. He came over for 2 weeks and the whole team (Matty B, Nick, Adam, Tim & myself) all met every couple of days to discuss, write, plan, analyse, nit-pick and then record the show (in between just hanging out and wasting time). In a way it would have been easier if we were doing 20 shows, but because we’re only doing it once, the pressure’s on to make it the best…

    There’s still some finishing touches to make before it all goes to air in a week’s time. I’ll post more soon.

    Kind regards,
    David MMM. Green

  • Internet Television? The Future is NOW!

    Ahoy,

    Until recently, I was just like you; I thought that Internet TV was something that only existed one time in my mind when I thought up the concept myself a few years ago. Foolishly I did nothing about it and turns out someone else invented it. Not only that, but Australia’s first Internet TV station, Australia Live TV, is based right here (where I am, at least) in Adelaide, a mere 17.8km (via road) from my house!

    After perusing Australia Live TV’s extensive list of 5 shows (4 of them sports-related), I was just about to close the web page forever, when I noticed that they’re launching their new morning show, to be called “Mornings Live.” Furthermore, they need a couple of hosts. Hey hey! Now it’s personal. And seeing as though applying for the position required little effort on my part, I figured I gotta get in on this, so I threw this demo video together in an afternoon…

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJsmw6IAceo

    I certainly enjoyed myself. In all seriousness, I’d love to do it. but if it doesn’t go beyond the demo-filming stage, hey that’s okay. I’ve also enjoyed watching the other entrants (Check those out here). There are about 5 with which I have been legitimately impressed. I must say, SOME of them are absolutely shocking… I’d love to put together a 30-minute TV special where I critique all the entries. But I don’t have the resources for that, so I’ll just do it here: For starters, about half of them either didn’t read the guidelines, or completely ignored them, as the demo video was supposed to be no longer than 60 seconds. Granted, my own is 69 seconds, but if you only watch the first 60 seconds, I was essentially through. But other entries range from 20 seconds to 10 minutes long! And most seem to be around the 2-4 minute range!

    Furthermore, some of them are not directed to the specific position. Okay, fair enough, a few people have just put up a generic showreel. No harm in that. However, some have gone further (or shorter, rather), actually using their demo video for a completely unrelated talent search conducted earlier this year by the new ABC3 digital children’s channel. Hence several demo videos on the Mornings Live website feature hopeful presenters pouring their hearts out about wanting to work with children on the ABC! I myself also applied for that (and actually re-used part of my ABC demo for this one!), but I was clever enough to sneakily splice in new footage, which explains why my hair subtle changes length throughout the video, hehehe!

    Another trend I noticed: Of the 90 or so video entries submitted so far, the most popular choice of background music seems to be “Clocks” by Coldplay. I can’t help but notice I was the only one to include both “Conditioning” by Howard Jones (stereotypical hilarious ’80s music) AND “Menuet From String Quintet No. 5 Op 13” by Luigi Boccherini (stereotypical hilarious “rich guy” music).

    Lastly, I’d love to share just a few specific entries with you (who ever YOU are…). Please don’t get me wrong. This is not a mean-sprited dig at others’ expense, but merely me pointing out a few entrants’ “interesting choices” with regard to making their demo. Behold…

    1. Helen Ahrens: Shot with camera at 90 degrees.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdxtEoZ3cA4&feature=channel_page

    2. Peter something: Firstly, very low volume. Second… uh… what?

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxI1PUIbyS0&feature=related

    3. Sarah Lawrence: Filmed considerably close to a busy road.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arbDNbG-MOI&feature=channel_page

    4. Fatimah Abbouchi: Used the Ten news theme (with Ten news voice-over).

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1E0SJI8vMs&feature=channel_page

    5. Jason Kemp: Evidentally a keen user of Movavi Video Converter’s fabulous trial version. Also, which one is Jason Kemp?

    But of course, for maximum enjoyment, I highly recommend you watch EVERY entry. Thanks to guidelines not followed, what should be 90 minutes of entertainment, is more like 200 minutes of entertainment. And darn good watching!

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    What’s next? Internet books?

    PS. Oh yes, by the way, if you like, feel free to vote for me on the Mornings Live website. I’d very much appreciate it and be happy to email you a signed photograph of something.

  • Where no stand-up has gone before… probably

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JU_hQB3jdM

    Hello!

    David M. Green again. Hey I made my quarterly stand-up appearance last Thursday at Adelaide’s “The Rhino Room.” Having recently watched “Carl Sagan’s Cosmos” and HBO’s “From the Earth to the Moon,” read up on NASA’s Apollo program and listened to The B-52’s complete discography, you can see how the above stand-up routine came to be. I seriously have no idea what’s “topical” any more. Free-to-air TV is a complete waste of time, in my opinion. I’m not too keen on radio at the moment either There’s no show that makes me want to go out of my way to watch it (Although I hear good things about this THE Big Show on Triple M). So hey, I make up my own damn entertainment!

    The stand-up didn’t go quite according to plan, but the confusion probably actually made it funnier. Sometimes I prefer “rough around the edges” comedy to “slick.” For that very reason I always preferred Conan O’Brien to Leno. I just like the idea that any minute the whole thing could come crashing down around someone, in this case: me. I screwed up the Buzz Aldrin gag, got some of it out of order, and I was going to do a more detailed impression of Carl Sagan but interaction with some enthusiastic audience members forced me to move on. Final conclusion: good, not great. One tick.

    What do you think?

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    There are others like you… thousands…