NORMALITY: WHAT EVEN IS IT?

I tweeted something the other day saying I'm worried that my sense of humour isn't normal, and that it scares me a bit. It was meant in a kind of tongue-in-cheek way, but, very kindly, lots of people replied reassuring me that not being "normal" - whatever that might be - is a good thing, and to keep doing what I do.

Of course, it is a good thing... to a point. I'm always striving towards creative freedom, and an honest expression of creativity. 

But there is, very obviously, a baseline of what might be considered "normal". More than this, there's a line at which a majority of people will turn away from what you're doing, because it deviates too far from their definition of "normal". 

I'm not even talking about them just not liking what you do, because they don't think it's good. I'm talking about them finding it too "weird". I don't get that, I guess, because there's very little - at least in terms of creativity and comedy - that's too weird for me. While I appreciate the structure of a well-crafted joke, I love that pure mainlining of somebody's subconscious that you'll see in stuff like Tim and Eric, Eric Andre, or Aunty Donna. I grew up with Python and The Young Ones, and the weirder and more surprising they got, the more I enjoyed them. 

THE LINE

Certainly, it's a line I know I crossed at points during Found Footage, and with this week's baby food video it seems to have happened again, at least for a few people!

In our defence, Sanja and I just thought we were being silly - I've written CBBC shows where adults dress as babies! - but I realised we might've stumbled into different territory, when somebody said it was like Found Footage meets Cornershop Corner. Uh-oh. It was that weird?!? I honestly hadn't seen it. Hence the tweet!

I mean, I'm not really being any different to how I usually am in our videos. I just happened to be dressed as a baby. But no! No, no, no. "That's not for me! You've gone too far!"

Of course, on one level I loved that people got weirded out! But at the same time, judging from some comments, and the number of unsubscribes, a big chunk of people seemed to have either found it disturbing or kinky, rather than just ridiculous and daft, as we'd intended! And then of course, some arse paid for a load of dislikes - that's how much it annoyed them!

Consequently, much as I try to resist it, I end up feeling torn between wanting to push that sort of congruent creativity even further and get even weirder... and kind of recoiling a bit, and wanting to play it safe for a while. Similarly, the "Mr Biffo" on Digi videos is a kind of extreme version of me, and I worry about how palatable he is.

Over the past year or so, I feel like I've really found my comic voice, in terms of performing, and... it's being a whiny man-child. Gannon messaged me a while back saying "You're very funny when you're being pathetic", which sums it up! I also occasionally worry that some people think I'm really like that (and some clearly do; I did laugh at a comment which said "Christ, Mr Biffo is a mess of a man"). I'm more the real 'me' on our podcast, and the Patreon videos - but it's a performance on Digi. It kind of has to be. Same as the Mr Biffo on Teletext Digi was a character.

Maybe we'd be more popular if I was less like that on camera, less shambolic, less shouty, less whiny, more contained and restrained, and presenterly... but I'm not sure I'd entertain myself as much. It's funny (to me) getting to be that guy. There's something incredibly freeing about it. 

THE TENSION

This tension between being true to myself and wanting to make stuff for as wide a possible audience is something I wrestle with quite a bit. 

Well, I say that. It's more something I think about occasionally. I'm no longer really chasing a big audience; Sanja and I were talking the other day about how not all the Patrons watch our Patreon-exclusive vids, and I said to her "Yeah, but... that's still 160 or so people, few of whom we've even met, who are still watching". It's relative. It's still a big number. I've been to gigs and stand-up comedy shows that had fewer people than that in the audience. I'm happier this way.

And, most importantly, we have a really loyal core audience. We've mostly jettisoned all those who were only there for Larry, Octav1us or Eli, and the pandemic has given me the opportunity to reclaim Digitiser. And yet... if I do anything that goes too far one way or another away from the baseline of what's expected... it's less popular, it kills subs. Which leaves me fighting against that straightjacket somewhat. 

Take Found Footage. The earlier episodes, before it got really strange, were incredibly well received. But views dropped off as I became (I felt) more creative and experimental, and by the time I was doing Lost Footage - which started, of course, as just a bit of fun for people in lockdown, very few people cared. Even many who had seemed obsessed with Found Footage. They just wanted more Goujon John-type stuff.

I've bemoaned before about how few people have watched the final two eps of that run, The Early Years and The End. Chris Jerden-Cooke and I, I think, knocked it out of the park, and made something that's borderline art. But, of course, art is subjective, and some people just want the funny. It occasional feels like trying to give a dog medicine; I guess you have to disguise it in their food.

Something else I've really struggled with on YouTube is, of course, turning away from video games. Even though the Digitiser channel really began with Found Footage, Digitiser The Show was watched by a lot of people, and even now we still get the occasional snide comment complaining that we don't do gaming stuff anymore.

WILSON!

I've been thinking about it of late, off the back of the release of the new album by Steven Wilson. If you don't know, Wilson is kind of the acceptable face of modern prog rock. He's prog in its purest sense, in that he pushes himself, makes the sort of music he wants to make, even if it costs him fans. 

His latest album is sublime, but a large section of his fanbase is up in arms, bemoaning how electronic it is, whining about the soul and funk and dance influences, and getting arsey because it isn't "prog" enough. Or at least not close enough to their entitled belief that he should be making music just for them. I can relate.

In a recent interview, he said he felt he's taken electric guitars as far as he can - at least given his abilities - and so he's exploring new sounds. I feel the same about games; I wrote about them on-and-off for close to 30 years, and I'm not obsessed enough with them, and they play too little a role in my day-to-day life, for me to do nothing but make videos about them. I'd be faking it, and end up making mistakes, and getting bored, and deleting the channel. All for just a short-term hit of views. 

It's an issue for any creative person, that kind of tension between doing what they're drawn to do, and not completely defying expectations to the point where you lose your audience entirely, and no longer have the financial support which allows you to create with absolute freedom. 

It's like... you can scare the horses a bit, but not too much. And I worry that by holding back, by being more "normal" than I want to be, I'd not be completely fulfilling myself.

And I also wonder whether "normal" is just another word for "being too scared to be who you really are".

I do see some of my YouTube contemporaries (hah: I'm older than everyone!), and they seem to go out of their way to be as unchallenging as possible. I can kind of feel their fear of letting their guard down too much, lest they be seen for the real them, and lest that damage their views. Inevitably, all of them are far more popular than I am! They would never scare the horses. Just do the same thing. Don't ask too much of your audience. And that's fine, but I can't go that route. When I've tried to be "normal", when I've tried sticking to a formula that works... it almost hurts me on a physical level. 

Even if I'm being the shambolic, pathetic, man-child "Mr Biffo", I'm still being true to some part of myself. I guess I've reached an age where I don't really give a flying fig - even five years ago, I'd have felt too self-conscious to dress as a baby on camera, and eat baby food - but within that remains this fear that it's a self-sabotaging way to be, and that it might, in some way, lose me an audience entirely, and threaten my ability to create with absolute freedom. Without me even realising what I've done.

DON'T WORRY

What I should say is don't think for a second this means that I'm not enjoying the videos we're making. I've been loving it over the past few months, getting to go out and about with Gannon, messing around with Sanja. It's a joy. But I also want to make stuff that satisfies me on a purely creative level, that feels like it has something to say, and makes a difference to those who 'get it'. 

Putting Lost Footage on the Digi channel was an experiment that, frankly, didn't work. It clearly needs its own audience, and its own place. 

I know some of you were subscribed to our second channel. You may not have noticed, but earlier this month, I made some changes to that channel. Changes which may give you some idea of what I might be doing this year to scratch that itch. 

Stay tuned.

Paul