Election night stand-up

I was back in my home town last night for the excellent Manilla Road comedy club at The Victoria pub in Birmingham City Centre! Jim Kelly persuaded me to do an Open Spot, even though I have very little experience of doing stand-up. It was great fun, but I can’t see myself doing it again any time soon. They say nothing goes out of date quicker than topical comedy, but on the night of the General Election I thought it would be a missed opportunity to stick to UHT Long-Life Comedy. So I did a set entirely composed of stuff from the news. As always it was a great night with Jim the hairy compere steering his eclectic ship towards the smashing headliner, the furious and fiery Ian Cognito. Bostin – as they say round these parts.

Audiobooks

  I’ve always fancied narrating an audiobook. Getting to interpret a whole cast of characters, immersing myself in a novel – and recently, I’ve got to do exactly that. At over 10 hours long, I certainly don’t expect you all to listen to it – it’s a rather more gargantuan project than anything we usually blog up here – but it was a lot of fun. The novel is a wartime adventure story about a daring young man who gets unexpectedly assigned to a top secret mission that could help Britain win the war… Above are two reels comprised of extracts from the book. Please note, I’ve added in the sound effects to give a bit of oomph, and to act as an audio shorthand for the 10 hours worth of plot and prose which the novel contains. The full audiobook itself contains no sound effects.  

The gloves are off

Our very own regular from the blog comments Mr Geodaddi sparked a feature on BBC Radio 4 today, when he phoned in to ask why modern TV historians are allowed to get their grubby fingerprints all over the precious manuscripts. Skip to 20mins50 to hear the answer…

The Guinness cookery book of records 2013

It’s been 2 years since the last Bakery records so without further ado, here are the official most popular Bakery videos… All record true on 31st December 2013 MOST VIEWED OFFICIAL BAKERY VIDEO (YouTube.com/bakerytv or Vimeo.com/thebakery) 3) 5,449 views – Crap audio transcription rewrites classic novels (2/2) (since April 2010) 2) 7,654 views – David O’Doherty interview part 1 (since Jan 2010) 1) 76,487 views – The Last Bookshop (since April 2013) MOST VIEWED CO-PRODUCED BAKERY VIDEO (hosted by external YouTube accounts) 3) 27,282 views – Advertising with Bells on (since Dec 2011; produced for Fold7) 2) 39,785 views – Edge of the Earth (since May 2012; produced for Syd Arthur) 1) 41,686 views – Sty TV winners’ introduction (since July 2010; produced for WickedPigUK)

In brief: how we made Ode To The Summer

Back at the beginning of October, Dan Fryer, Richard Dadd and myself spent 13 hours in a cold art studio on the outskirts of Canterbury, filming the latest music video for Syd Arthur. Although filming only took one day, preparation had been underfoot for about a month with Colonel of hard graft, Mr Thomas Langley, building the orbital camera track, dolly, and pyramid.

A lick of paint

We’ve had a little spring clean of our site, do come in and have a poke around. The previous re-design was SO July 2010 and our fashion-conscious Chef Alaric wouldn’t be seen dead in it anymore. He bundled it into a carrier bag last night and gave it to a homeless man who looked in need of a web presence. From today, we’re all gleaming minimalism… until next web season, when I hear comic sans and animated borders will be making a comeback.

The Last Bookshop

Here it is. The biggest, most ambitious production The Bakery has ever embarked upon. With location filming, CGI effects, and an original musical score. It’s been a gargantuan undertaking, taking years to get from conception to filming to editing, up to now: releasing it online. We’d like to thank all the many many people who put in so much hard work to make this film a reality. We hope you enjoy stepping into this make-believe world where books have been forgotten. And hopefully share in our musings that bookshops are fantastic and storytelling will never die…

Musical updates

After a slight delay (alright almost a year) we’ve just updated The Bakery’s film portfolio with our 2 Kent-flavoured music videos: Morning After by Arlet, and Edge of the Earth by Syd Arthur. Why not celebrate our administrative ineptitude by listening to both belters below…

Bakery NYC

Irrelevant photo of Mikey Rossiter (colour man of The Last Bookshop) atop a roof in NYC

An 8-bit lane

Another bit of shameless self-promotion but Chef Dan and I just finished a fun little project for Disney. Fold7 were asked to get people talking about ‘Wreck It Ralph’, Disney’s upcoming film about an 8bit video game character who escapes his game. So we thought it could be interesting to invite London’s trendies to do the opposite: exchange Shoreditch for the 8bit world. We therefore 8bit-ified a black cab, some pigeons and yes, an all-important dog turd. Enjoy!