Peter Kay: Live at the Bolton Albert Halls (dvd)

A fan of Phoenix Nights and his mock-umentary series I'd never been impressed with Peter Kay's stand-up. To be fair though I'd only really seen his Blackpool show from 2000 and while alot of his themes were similar here they were perhaps just much better executed in this, his 2003 show.

Most of his material consists of taking some (frequently-northern) oddity or aspect of human nature and mocking it, asking 'what's all that about?' That's never seemed the highest level of wit and too many of his laughs come from this observational book of comedy when his other writing obviously displays much greater talent. Still, this time the laughs do come and though they may not last for long (the amusement dissipates as soon as its told) some of them are extremely astute, incredibly funny and worryingly familiar. Favourites included:

1. your Dad numbering the video tapes and wondering how he's run out of the number '3' stickers
2. your Mum calling you every other family member's name before your own
3. Sunday evenings consisting of Bullseye, bath and taping the top 40 while trying to edit out inane DJ patter with the pause button
4. explaining to parents that you need to press a button to hang up the line on their new flashy cordless phones
5. the joys of the weekly Asda 'big shop'

It's charming and impressive that he's managed to build up a fair collection of material that's often alluded to; fans will pick up on the 'gaarlic bread?' and a fair few Phoenix Nights references. The best stand-up I've seen him do but not as good as his best writing.