Glom of Nit #42 I did the biggest show of my career

And now I have to write another one

Photo by Kim Burrows

• The usual monthly musings on whatnot

• Upcoming tour dates

• Links to articles ands reviews I’ve written this month

• An excerpt from my work-in-progress book

• Music and film recommendations.

BUT BEFORE THAT … Have you bought my new biography of NIRVANA yet?

Also PLEASE DO drop me a line by replying to this email, or the post on Substack or finding me on social media. Unless it’s to point out a typo. Don’t do that. No-one likes it when you do that.

Hello there.

Good grief, but it’s been a hell of a week. And one that isn’t yet over, since I’m sat writing this from a hotel in Liverpool as i’m at Liverpool Comic-Con this weekend selling my wares and signing books and trying to spot James McCavoy, Rosario Dawson and Anakin Skywalker out of the corner of my eye. Will I pay to queue up and meet them? Probably not. Why? I don’t know. That sort of thing just never appeals to me. It doesn’t feel like properly meeting someone. At least for me. I know other people get a lot out of that sort of encounter, and I’m delighted for them because they probably lead happier lives than I do. Although even I was tempted by Anakin Skywalker (yes, I know his real name, obviously. It’s Sebastian Shaw. Everyone knows that.)

Anyway — why has it been a hell of a week? Surely not just because I spent Friday lugging a trolly full of books from Bristol to Liverpool? Wednesday, a day in which I was already working a shift for The Big Issue (writing it, not selling it. Although I’d honestly be proud to sell The Big Issue if I needed to) involved too huge milestones. Firstly it was the deadline day for my new book, Mistletoe & Vinyl: The Story of the Christmas Number One (available to pre-order now at your fave bookshop! Please do! It’s the most useful thing you an do for an author, I promise!). That book has been hanging over my head since September, and I don’t think a day has gone by when I’ve not worked on it in some capacity, even if it was just thinking through something. Now it’s out of my hands for a bit. I can do nothing to it. The homework has been handed in. It feels, honestly, very strange to not be “in the middle of a book”. I do have another one (another three, actually) I need to start writing, plus novel on the go, but that needs to be put on hold for a month or so, due to … the other thing. Because Wednesday was also the day we announced the tour dates for my next stand-up show, The Britpop Hour, which once it’s away from the strict times of the Edinburgh Fringe will be retitled The Britpop Show.

That’s a hell of a tour, isn’t it? Massive props to Corrie, my booking agent, who really pulled it out the bag for this. No-one knows if I can do a big tour that’s nothing to do with Terry Pratchett. Even I don’t know. And yet lots of people are taking a chance that I can. Getting all of that ready to go out on Wednesday, designing the artwork, updating the website, making sure everything was present and correct - stressful. Especially on top of handing the book in and, ya know, actual work. But it gets worse.

That’s 56 planned performances, booked in, confirmed, on sale. And there’s probably going to be more. I’m hoping to go back to Adelaide in Feb/March, for example. And here is the secret. The fun bit. Are you ready? Brace yourself for this … I haven’t written this show yet. It doesn’t exist. The first Work In Progress performance is in 16 days and there is, as yet, no show.

Now, this isn’t as bad as it sounds. The show does sort of exist. It exists in my head. It exists in a notebook full of ideas and headings. It exists in various little bits and bobs I’ve been trying out at new material gigs in the last few months. But I haven’t actually pulled the whole thing together yet. There’s no file marked “Britpop Hour” that has a script for a 60-minute stand-up comedy show. If you’ve never developed a stand-up show (what in America is often called a “special”) this must sound bonkers, but there is a process, I promise. It’s all swimming around in my hind-brain, and my subconscious is doing a lot of work for me right now. Often, when it comes to writing something down, bits of it just fall out of the back of your head and onto the page, having been stewing their for a week or so. I do know what the show is. And there are some jokes. And what I think is a strong framing device. You work a lot of it out onstage, too. That’s what Work in Progress shows are for — not just trying out and sharpening material, but generating it. For me, a lot of my best ideas burst into by brain two minutes before I’m due to step in front of a mic. It concentrates the mind beautifully. Then there’s the inevitable improv once you’re infront of an audience. The Magic of Terry Pratchett was in exactly the same state two weeks before its first preview too. And that turned out alright.

By the time I write my next Glom of Nit newsletter I’ll have performed the show twice and it will definitively exist. Something from nothing. The process of creation. It’s exciting! (Please come and see a preview! They’re listed below!)

And what form will it be in by the time I hit the road in 2026? I genuinely don’t know. Which brings me onto the other other reason this week has been so preposterous … Monday.

That’s the view from the stage at the Duchess Theatre in the West End of London, where I performed The Magic of Terry Pratchett to a sold-out audience just-shy of 500 people. on Terry Pratchett’s birthday. With Sir Terry’s daughter Rhianna in the audience, who joined me onstage, alongside Rob Wilkins, Terry’s former business manager and one-time assistant, for an onstage chat chaired by my old friend Dan “No Such Thing As A Fish” Schrieber.

I was indescribably nervous about this performance. Not doing the show itself per se, I’ve done TMOTP so many times now, and the show has become so sharp, that I could probably do it in my sleep and still turn in a relatively solid performance. It was having Rob and Rhianna in the room. Two people that knew Sir Terry better than almost anyone. Also in the audience was Colin Smythe, Terry’s agent for 30+ years, though he at least had seen the show before — as had Rob. Rhianna hadn’t though. I’d done the show a few days earlier, at the Cranleigh Book Festival, and had an out-of-body experience on stage, where I seemed to zoom out of myself and observe every line, tagging “Rhianna Pratchett is going to watch you say that on Monday” after each one. It was petrifying.

Fortunately Rhianna was sweetness itself, and the show was a joy. The first half, I think, is the best I have ever performed it. It felt like two years of work had been leading up to that night. The audience was incredible. There’s no sound like the noise of an audience laughing reverberating around a big, grand old theatre. I enjoyed myself tremendously. The second half was also a delight. Rhianna and Rob had some fascinating stories. Dan was brilliant, of course. I was just happy to be among them — the only person on that stage to have never met Sir Terry Pratchett. And yet he has become so very central to my life these last five years. Well… these last 35 really.

It felt like the peak for that show. The capstone. Which, actually, it isn’t … we have another tour in Autumn and a smattering of dates through the rest of the year, including, excitingly, the Prague Fringe! Dates are all below.

Still, it felt like the end of era where The Magic of Terry Pratchett was my main concern as a performer. Now we start the next era. I wonder where we’ll be in two years time?

Love as ever

Marc B x

Tour update

THE MAGIC OF TERRY PRATCHETT

27-29 MAY Prague Fringe PRAGUE TICKETS
30 MAY UK Games Expo BIRMINGHAM TICKETS*
01 JUNE UK Games Expo BIRMINGHAM TICKETS*
19-20 JULY Sudely Castle FANTASY FOREST FESTIVAL TICKETS*
04 SEPT The Y Theatre LEICESTER TICKETS
05 SEPT The Civic STOURPORT TICKETS
13 SEPT The Alex FAVERSHAM TICKETS
21 SEPT Theatre Severn SHREWSBURY TICKETS
27 SEPT Komedia BRIGHTON TICKETS
02 OCT The Institute BRAINTREE details soon
04 OCT The Point EASTLEIGH TICKETS
19 OCT Phoenix EXETER TICKETS
26 OCT Spa Theatre SCARBOROUGH TICKETS
28 OCT The Stand NEWCASTLE TICKETS
31 OCT Little Theatre CHORLEY TICKETS

*Require event ticket

THE BRITPOP HOUR

Join award-winning writer-comedian Marc Burrows for a multi-media stand up celebration of one of British music's most iconic and enduring moments, marking 30 years since the Blur vs Oasis chart war.

Music journalist Marc (Guardian, The Quietus, Big Issue) dives into the stories, rivalries, OTT personalities and some of the finest music the UK has ever produced. Part nostalgic love letter, part send-up, part rock'n'roll party. DoyaknowwhatImean?

17 MAY Steel City Comedy SHEFFIELD (with Vix Leyton) TICKETS
18 MAY Duffy's Bar LEICESTER Duffy's (with Juliette Burton) TICKETS
8 JUNE Hen & Chickens LONDON TICKETS
17 JUNE The Albert Arms ESHER (with Juliette Burton) TICKETS
18 JUNE The Cornerhouse SURBITON (with Juliette Burton) TICKETS
26 JUNE West End Arts Centre ALDERSHOT TICKETS
10 JULY Forest Arts Centre NEW MILTON TICKETS
11 JULY Museum of Comedy LONDON (with Juliette Burton) TICKETS
19 JULY Norden Farm MAIDENHEAD TICKETS
22 JULY Hen & Chickens LONDON TICKETS
24 BRIGHTON Komedia TICKETS

2026 UK TOUR - THE BRITPOP SHOW!

06 MARCH The Junction CAMBRIDGE TICKETS
07 MARCH Arts Centre COLCHESTER TICKETS
20 MARCH The Stables MILTON KEYNES TICKETS
21 MARCH Y Theatre LEICESTER TICKETS
27 MARCH Hen & Chickens BRISTOL TICKETS
03 APRIL Rondo Theatre BATH TICKETS
09 APRIL The Attic SOUTHAMPTON TICKETS
10 APRIL The Lights ANDOVER TICKETS
11 APRIL Bellerby Studio GUILDFORD onsale 9th May
15 APRIL Playhouse NORWICH tickets tba
17 APRIL Comedy Hall TIVERTON TICKETS
19 APRIL Glee BIRMINGHAM TICKETS
21 APRIL Theatre Severn SHREWSBURY TICKETS
22 APRIL The Atkinson SOUTHPORT TICKETS
24 APRIL Waterside Arts SALE tickets onsale 7th May
25 APRIL Foundry SHEFFIELD TICKETS
26 APRIL Glee LEEDS TICKETS
28 APRIL The Stand EDINBURGH TICKETS
29 APRIL The Stand GLASGOW TICKETS
30 APRIL The Stand NEWCASTLE TICKETS

OTHER LIVE APPEARANCES

10 MAY - Get Your Geek On comedy night (with Juliette Burton, Sam See and Sooz Kempner) A&O Hostel Bar BRIGHTON TICKETS

24 MAY - Nirvana book talk, Chapter Two - CHESHAM TICKET

06 JUNE - Get Your Geek On comedy night (with Juliette Burton, Sam See and Sooz Kempner) Phoenix - LONDON TICKETS

Many more dates to be announced

Stuff I’ve written/done this month

Where to start with Terry Pratchett (The Guardian)

Terry Pratchett’s Night Watch — A Penguin Modern Classic? (Flux)

Green Party leader calls for urgent NHS reforms to stop homeless people being denied eye care (Big issue)

Podcast appearance — Hellish

Recommendations

Music

You know there’s a new Self Esteem album out, right? You don’t need me to tell you that, surely? As usual, Rebecca is pinsharp, painful, glorious, wise, hilarious, heartbreaking and horny. All human life is here.

Wishy have a new EP out — Planet Popstar. It’s lemonade-guzzling scrappy indie pop and it’s glorious.

STOP THE PRESSES: There’s a new Pulp single out. GLORY BE. And it’s as Pulp as you possibly could want.

Also, I’d recommend tracking down the current issue of Mojo magazine, as it has a CD of Pulp rarities on the cover that is well worth the price of admission.

TV

ANDOR ANDOR ANDOR ANDOR ANDOR ANDOR. Proper, grown up sci-fi that also happens to be Star Wars. An incredible second season so far.

My favourite scene so far:. Many Bothans died so you could HAVE IT LARGE.

Work in progress book excerpt

This in an excerpt from the book I’m working on right now, due out this time next year. Please don’t share it, and remember this is a work in progress and could change hugely before publication.

Mistletoe & Vinyl: The Story of the Christmas Number One

The surprising success story of Mr. Blobby

For some it was a baffling nightmare, for others an absurdist laugh. But for younger children, especially, it was catchy and funny and had a video with an oddly-loveable pink giant knocking everything over. To the disgust of many but the surprise of few, and with very little radio support, ‘Mr Blobby’ by Mr Blobby sold 200,000 copies in its first week and went in at number three behind Elton John and Meat Loaf. The following week it leapfrogged them both and hit the top spot with two chart weeks left before Christmas. It had already sold 450,000 records. William Hill’s odds on a Blobby Christmas dropped from 50/1 to 33/1, to 7/1, at which point Noel Edmunds himself declared that he’d put £1,000 bet on a Blobby win. The character was also media gold: the BBC’s three Blobby suits were dispatched across the country to do in-store appearances, delighting children with pratfalls and cuddles. For the important appearances he was always played by the “official” Blobby actor, Barry Killerby, previously known more for his Shakespearean stage work (“I was doing Measure for Measure when I got the gig” as he told the Evening Standard) who inhabited the suit for TV appearances in which he crashed haplessly through the GM:TV and Top of the Pops studios. Newspapers would do anything they could to add a Blobby angle. When it transpired that Prince Edward’s new girlfriend, Sophie Rhys-Jones, worked for the PR company promoting the single she was quickly dubbed “Blobby’s Girl” and Buckingham Palace was asked for a comment on the Queen’s opinion (she declined to give one). A photoshoot in Smash Hits saw him tangled in Christmas decorations and covered in flour. On December 10th, Mr. Blobby was the “guest editor” of The Sun (“there we were thinking he’d been in charge all along” sniped the Evening Standard). The Mirror, meanwhile, did a rather pointless expose of Blobby actor Barry Killerby and his wife, Felicity, in which it revealed juicy details like “the Blobbys live in a three-bedroom semi-detached home in suburban south London” and that the “Blobby Mobile” was an “L-Registered Peugeot 306 XR in a shade of John Major-grey”. Perhaps the most tantalising morsel in this vigorous piece of investigative journalism comes when the Mirror reporter asked Mrs Killerby if she would care to “describe her life as Blobby’s girl”, in which we learn that “she replied ‘no’ and slammed her front door”. The piece carries three separate bylines.

Away from the gutter press, sociologists, psychologists and broadsheet writers were attempting to decode and explain Blobbymania. “Mr Blobby is Monty Python without the politics,” Leicester University’s Stephen Wagg told The Independent. “A lot of television worships itself. Mr. Blobby appears to undermine that. He is a maverick, anarchic element.” Meanwhile, Dr. Mike Money of Liverpool John Moores¹ saw Blobby in terms of early twentieth century philosopher Carl Jung’s theory of “collective unconscious”. “Mr. Blobby is a clear manifestation of the trickster character that appears in many societies,” Dr. Money told Merseyside’s Daily Post, referring to a “benign anarchist” such as a jester. “He’s a clear indication that people think things should be different — that it’s time for a change,” he continued. “Perhaps it’s because we’ve had the same political party in power for so long.” Noted psychologist Dr. Stephen F. Blinkhorn² told The Independent that Blobby was likely a symptom of “anteretrograde Korsokovian psychosis” in which a rare collective hallucination of a pink and yellow monster was shared by the whole country in anticipation of their Christmas boozing. Another psychologist interviewed in the same paper had a less intellectual perspective: “It’s simply that people are being subjected to such marketing and hype that some of the mud sticks”, said Martin Lloyd-Elliot. “This is not reflecting our culture or some mysterious section of the British psyche … it’s a transparent con.” It’s clear that none of these experts had studied the history of Christmas in Britain, else they’d surely have speculated that, what Blobby actually was, was a return to the days of Lords of Misrule and Bean Kings, when festive celebrations were entrusted to the hands of an assigned agent of chaos.

“Proper” music types were appalled. Top of the Pops presenter Tony Dortie publicly called the song “dross” and doubled down when Blobby’s record company demanded a retraction. “If they want an apology they are just whistling in the wind” he told the Hull Daily Mail. “It was fair comment and they know it”. The Guardian’s Caroline Sulliven called the song simply “rancid”. Meanwhile, a Chrysalis Records exec told the Mirror that Blobby was symptomatic of a decline in British pop as the industry focussed on cash-grab one-hit wonders over developing long-term careers (“HAS BLOBBY RUINED POP?” was the paper’s summary). “At Christmas time”, an HMV spokesman told The Independent “everyone’s taste disappears.” One of the few positive responses came from a young music exec who wrote into industry bible, Music Week. “Am I the only person in the record business not connected with Mr. Blobby's single who was pleased to see it go to number one?” pondered one Simon Cowell, A&R consultant to Arista Records and future creator of The X Factor. “We have done nothing but pour scorn on this single … if we as an industry continue to ignore the under elevens here, perhaps they will never get into the habit of buying records. What may seem ‘crap’ to your average record company executive, is obviously bringing pleasure to hundreds of thousands of youngsters and that is what counts.”

The song was dethroned after just a week at the top by the latest release from boyband Take That. ‘Babe’, comfortably the group’s weakest single, had been the bookies' favourite for Christmas number one that year; and it did seem that, for once, they’d gotten it right. Despite an astounding 80% leap in Blobby’s sales week-on-week, “the That” (as Smash Hits endearingly referred to them) were in their imperial phase, and ‘Babe’ became their third consecutive number one. Groups in that position always try for the Christmas prize. It’s part of the playbook; a way to cement their ascendency. Blobby had sold half a million singles, but the Christmas number one dream seemed to be over. Take That had bided their time and owned their moment. “All but the most charitable have ruled out his chances of regaining [number one]”, said the Daily Express’s Andrew Preston, sagely. “Fate can be cruel”. Blobby’s Christmas number one odds rose to 20/1, since artists rarely bounce back to the top of the charts after losing the position, while Take That’s fell to 1/8: a virtual certainty.

And then something remarkable happened. Take That ran out of fans. Despite having thrown everything at the campaign, including discounted sales, special edition CDs with free calendars and framed pictures of Mark Owen, and despite absolutely dominating the pop press, sales started to slip. ‘Babe’ was the third single taken from the band’s hugely successful Everything Changes album, and compared to their previous two, the robust and danceable ‘Pray’ and ‘Relight My Fire’, this Mark Owen-sang ballad felt weedy and thin, holding little appeal outside of the (admittedly large) Take That faithful. The band’s army of fans had turned up in the first week to buy the single, sure, but sales momentum was slowing. Blobby, meanwhile, was gaining ground, sailing past 600,000 copies.

The bookies noticed it first. A surge of bets started coming midweek, leading some at William Hill to speculate that sales data had somehow been leaked. “All of a sudden at lunchtime we were inundated with punters wanting to place bets of up to £1,100 on Mr. Blobby,” a spokesman for the bookies told the Mirror, “when according to all the pop experts Take That should already be past the post”. Blobby’s odd’s were shortened to 3/1 and betting was promptly suspended. Come Sunday, it was ‘Mr. Blobby’ by Mr. Blobby that was announced as the Christmas number one — the first record in 25 years, at any time of the year, to be knocked off the top spot and return to it. William Hill were forced to pay out £100,000 in Blobby bets, including a not-inconsiderable £8,000 to Noel Edmunds who presumably wished he’d had his flutter a little earlier when the odds were still at 33/1.

Awful novelty records hitting the top of the chart for Christmas is, of course, by no means unusual — we’ve seen it plenty of times before, from ‘Ernie The Fastest Milkman in the West’ to ‘There’s No-one Quite Like Grandma’ to ‘Long Haired Lover From Liverpool’. ‘Mr. Blobby’, though, does rather stand out. It was awful in an entirely new way. This was a very nineties version of a novelty hit … more knowingly grotesque, more media-saturated, and more catastrophically unmusical. For much of the adult population its success was baffling, and though plenty of people have tried to explain Blobby’s appeal – by referring to a British anarchic comedy tradition, tying it to The Goon Show or The Young Ones, for example – no-one had quite been able to nail it. “[Blobby] is not some aberration of taste but an intrinsic part of British culture,” wrote the Sunday Times. “But it's not the part we like to boast about, especially around the Americans.” The Americans were indeed baffled: “watching Mr. Blobby at work, his green plastic eyes spinning maniacally, one has to wonder whether his appeal to this nation of Shakespeare, Milton and Philip Larkin isn't a bit more complex” speculated the New York Times from across the pond. “His frozen smile has a malevolent curve. Blobby is Barney without his medication.” People talked about this cheeky spirit of maniacal chaos cheering up a disaffected Britain mired in recession and struggling with an identity crisis in the post-Thatcher age. “Some commentators” summarised the New York Times, “have called him a metaphor for a nation gone soft in the head.” Ultimately it was Simon Cowell who got it right in his letter to Music Week — this was a children’s song, and young children genuinely loved it, just as in the past they’d loved Pinky & Perky or The Chipmunks, and in the future they’d love ‘Baby Shark’ and Teletubbies. It was really no more complicated than that.

1.  Stephen Wagg and Mike Money are, honestly, really their names.

2.  Also his real name.