We walk indoors almost reluctantly on a beautiful Saturday night.  If not for the promise of a hilarious evening, that would have been a more difficult step. We seem to be surrounded by bogans drinking bourbon (bar the 80 year old couple behind us) and sit in a line of seats in that don’t have too many sittings left.

I mean I’m not complaining, just nervous that I may end up thrown from the third tier to ground level if someone moves too violently or that I’ll get bottled. Canned, rather. There is no glass allowed. At any rate, either occurrence seems like an average alternative to enjoying the last of the Saturday sun. 

Carl comes on only five minutes late (was that his own voice introducing himself from back stage?) and opens with ‘How ya goin?’ – a rhetorical question as I don’t suppose applause is a proper answer. Does he expect us to retort “Good, Mr Barron”? I could be that heckler. Next time. 

He warms the crowd with an easy pleaser and makes reference to the s***hole that (he thinks) is Palmerston North; ie, the location where he performed his show last night. Crowd pleaser? He has us infatuated. I’ll admit as much as any Wellingtonian that a reference to this city being better than Palmy is a win by a foreigner in our books. Between raucous laughter, applause and whoops of agreement not many people stop to think that we only make that joke on the daily to stop us getting depressed about our enthusiastic wind. If ya didn’t laugh you’d cry, right?

His comedy set flows like an enema right from the start. He is self-effacing to the point where I start to embrace my own short comings and wonder if I too can create comedy gold just by looking in the mirror. His tales of family life and childhood are all too relatable and we get a sound knowledge of where his questioning the English language with its quips and quirks began.

I mean, we were all little smart-arses as kids but not many of us have taken a truly literal interpretation into adult hood. We got that mum telling us we weren’t bored was a strange reply to us saying we were but still couldn’t help feeling a bit guilty. Carl? Not so much. He embraces every emotion straight up without question or conviction. 

He does swear and he does talk about sex. Surprise! Luckily though the swearing for the most part fits with his presentation. Shit, I meant for the all part. And the sex stuff is bang on. None of it is particularly distasteful and when he does break the rules a bit, we secretly agree with him. He candidly tries to talk himself up in the bedroom – hell, if you had a whole audience scrutinizing everything you say, you’d be mad not to imply! 

Thought provoking, inquisitive, and always taking what seems normal that one-minute-let’s-stop-and-think-about-this step further, Carl sweeps a vacuum cleaner over convention, sucking up commonplace banter and leaving behind what really is just superfluous chitchat. He takes the noise out of societal niceties and politeness to reveal them as pointless, and even a bit dumb. 

And just when you think his comedy is all deadpan bluntness with under enthusiastic presentation, he morphs. No longer is he Carl Barron from Longreach Australia, but a Lord from England; a fan with an unfortunate walk; a guitarist who strikes an emotional chord using sound not word; and a chicken on steroids. He is one co-ordinated, accented, energetic, linguistic, insightful and intelligent guy which he cleverly shadows between flat witticisms about going bald and being short so as not to intimidate us. We know why there is bogan appeal now. 

He’s just a bit of a bloke. The links and reincorporation in his stories are peanut butter smooth. He woos us with his musical ability as well as his off the cuff remarks showing that he lives comedy. His tales were not only relatable but I’d be surprised if one person left without some extra material for their own Saturday night out.  He says he takes what he can get from reviewers? Well I’ll take what I can from him. Next time anyone asks ‘Is that the lot?’ I’ll unashamedly say “naaah there’s heaps left” as if it were my own.

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer