‘Songs are just very interesting things to do be doing with the air.’ This was how Tom Waits modestly brushed away the clamour for his genius at his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame speech in 2011. He’s a prolific, original and authentic artist, and I’ve been immersed in the world of his music since I heard ‘Underground’ from Swordfishtrombones back in 1997. Treading a fine line between darkness and sentimentality, brutality and humour, showbiz and apocalypse – Waits has a metaphor for every emotion, a set of intriguing images of those on the margins of society, and a way of structuring words that summons the musicality in every sentence.
As a burlesque artist, clown and physical storyteller, I wanted to find a way to bring together my interests in psychoanalysis, mythology and feminism, and take up the challenge of creating an extended piece that harnessed the rhythms  and references present  in the writings of Waits; and so came ‘Frontal Lobotomy.’ This was the way Jeu Jeu la Foille was finally given the opportunity to speak, and who better to channel my writing through, than the man with the most commented upon voice ever.
The show is a collection of myths, poems and images, all gravitating around seduction and danger, trauma and healing, cabaret and science. There is plenty in there the Tom Waits fanatic, and similarly for those who have never even heard of him. He’s an acquired taste!

Some of my favourite videos.....

Induction in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Speech
‘They say that I have no hits, and that I’m difficult to work with, and they say that like it’s a bad thing.’
A round up of his many faces, performance style and charming, rambling persona.

9th and Hennepin
‘All the doughnuts round here have names that sound like prostitutes....and the rooms they smell like diesel, and you take on the dreams of the ones who’ve slept there....’
Waits has a really evocative way of describing places, and there are some beautifully disturbing images in this spoken word piece about a street he specifies as in Minnesota. The video has a startling reveal halfway through that I just love!

Chocolate Jesus
‘The Immaculate Confection.’
Waits performing on the David Letterman show, with such style. He performs like he’s channelling spirits here, and that confetti hat strut is delicious.

Tom Waits on Everything and Nothing
Some Waitsian ramblings from various interviews matched with great animation on this video. He is a wonderful storyteller, and I love the way describes his creative process. Waits is notoriously difficult to interview, and journalists can never get a straight answer out of him. But buried within the conjecture is magnificent insight and authenticity.

Innocent When You Dream
Singing and standing a bathtub with bubbles floating all around him. Need I explain any further?! Such a whimsical and fantastical image to frame one of his most well-known ballads.

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Waits has had an illustrious film and theatre career, playing off-beat characters such as drunks, crooks, inventors, and this case The Devil. In every film, in every scene, he makes an unforgettable entrance.

Pasties and a G String
This is the Waits most people think of first, slurring and swaying his way through the music. What I enjoy about this clip is that this performance sounds so different to the recorded version on ‘Small Change’, he goes off on a guttural tangent, and tangos with his cigarette smoke to a saxophone solo.

Mr Seigal
A resoundingly cool performance with beautiful saxophone and double bass backing.

Hell Broke Luce
A more political song from Waits, accompanied by shadowy, disturbing imagery in this video.

Tom Traubert’s Blues
Beautiful lyrics and melody, a sentimental Tom hunched over a piano, singing about ‘wounds that will never heal’ – it’s still strangely uplifting, and remains the only one of his pre 1983 songs that he will play live.

If you download the file, you'll see how much money I spent on taking a solo show to the Edinburgh Free Fringe, and what I spent it on. Not that the money matters, but as I was reminded earlier this week, taking a show to the Fringe is monumental....and it's not cheap either.

Had the Free Fringe festivals not begun, I doubt very much that I would ever be able to afford to take a show there. Although in my budget I have overspent in some areas, to add another £2000-10000 would have made it out of reach. The free fringe is donation only, money is collected in the hat of the performer(s) on the way out, and though I made a good amount after 16 shows, it was no way near to covering what it cost. I knew I was there to develop a show that was formed, but needed to be tested in front of an audience, and I could've spend that much on courses and directors to work with me - this was what had been missing.

I spent a little bit on props and costumes over the 8 months running up to the London previews, but much of it was recycled from old projects or belonged to me. The music editing, photography and graphic design were all done at mates-rates, and the show was produced for no fee other than gratitude and alcohol.

Every spare corner of Edinburgh is turned into a venue during the fringe, and the spaces used for the free fringe are pretty basic. I chose my venue - Southside Social - based on the time-slot they gave me: 8.45pm. I knew I didn't want a lunchtime or very late evening slot, and this was best on offer. The location was only slightly off the beaten track, but was still quite difficult to find. The room spec said it held 60 - it was 40 maximum, and the most wonderful thing was that the ladies toilets were at the back of the room, meaning that anyone who needed the toilet during a show was forced to walk past the performer and the whole audience! This made for some hilarious moments onstage for me, and some of my favourite performances were the ones with well-timed interruptions!

The room looked like a library reading room, which suited the show, although the only stage lights were two lamps that I had to switch on and off as part of the show, when I needed a blackout halfway through. This part of the show became it's own little skit, and was different every night.

Then there was a problem with the stand up comedy group, who had the space before me. Their show overran twice in Week 2 and twice in Week 3. With such tight turnarounds it's very impolite to do this, and I did have to say something to them. Some of the paying venues charge the company £10 per minute that they overrun. One night my show went up 10 minutes late, and I knew I had a reviewer in, which made me nervous for the start of the show. Having said that, my show has a lot of props and costumes, I found a specific way to arrange the room that worked better for me a week into the run, and I came up with a system for packing up and setting up. I didn't ever overrun as I had an hour slot for a 50 minute show.

The day after I arrived in Edinburgh, I started looking for a tech. I had some luck, a friend put me in touch with someone he knew, but my other leads didn't follow through, and I only had a tech for my opening night. There were only 7 sound cues, and I operated them from my ipad plugged into the PA at the side of the stage. There were a few hiccups, sometimes the music was too loud for certain moments, but I experimented until I eventually found what worked, I don't think it detracted too much from the flow of the performance, and gave me more flexibility in terms of cues.

The main problem with the fringe is trying to fit everything in, there are so many shows to see. I saw 26, 7 of them were ticketed shows, but everything else I saw either on the free fringe, or the pay what you want fringe. I only saw 2 awful things, and both were in shows where I'd turned up to support a friend doing an open spot, and one or two of the other acts were.......The three shows that have stuck with me since returning are Sheets (Kiki Lovechild), Pss Pss (Bacala) and The Expector (Madame Senorita), all three were clown shows, all quite unusual, and all brilliantly performed.

And finally....the bar staff at Southside Social were some of the nicest people I met, they were so supportive of me, and I told them the day I left 'I wish this pub was my local.'