#02 Nitty Gritty Advice For Stand-Up Comedians
Table of Contents
- Record Every Single Set
- Learn From Social Media to Refine Your Jokes
- Practice Performing With Distractions
- Network With Other Comedians
There is so much advice passed around amongst comedians if you listen closely. These are a few things cherry picked from conversations with comedians around the country, plus some just good general bits of advice.
Everyone's journey with comedy is unique, so as always, take it with a grain of salt. If you feel it doesn't fit your journey, examine why. If the why matches with your goals in comedy and isn't just that doing the work is uncomfortable, then the advice isn't for you.
Record Every Single Set
Download an audio recording app on your phone if you haven't already, and start there. Grab a simple tripod for your phone next. Then invest in a decent little video camera when you have the money. There are affordable options. We'll have recommendations for this soon.
And don't forget the important part: listen back and watch the videos, no matter how uncomfortable it makes you. The cringe is a lesson learned.
I know it makes some uncomfortable, the thought of recording themselves and having to listen back. But do it. Do it religiously. That's one of the ways you go from a career open mic-er to a booked stand-up comedian.
If it's a video, watch how you hold the mic, watch where your eyes go, watch how much you move on the stage. Do the details match your joke styles? Does your stage presence add to your joke delivery?
And never miss a set, for multiple reasons.
- Revisit Premises When You're a Better Comedian. Premises you have as a young comedian might not land because you might not know how to write or deliver them correctly yet. If you record everything, you can come back when you're more experienced and see how you can punch it up and make it work.
- Recognize Your Cadence. I talk so much about cadence, and we'll have a dedicated blog soon, but cadence to your joke delivery is everything, but it's intuitive more than anything. So listening to yourself over and over and over will help you start to recognize what your natural cadence is when you deliver a joke well, and replicate that in jokes going forward.
- Learn From Your Mistakes. You can catch where a joke was a bit too wordy or where you lost the audience. Pay special attention to jokes that bomb when they typically do well, because you might have delivered it wrong and you can make a note for next time.
- Catch a Killer Set. You never know when you might have magic happen and the perfect audience meshes with an "on" day for you. Now you can either learn what you did right to replicate it or even pull a clip for your social media or to send to bookers.
- It'll Become Your Backstory. If you ever make it big, it'll be fun to go back through where you started.
Learn From Social Media to Refine Your Jokes
Learn to Use Fewer Words
If you post on text-based social media like Threads, the character limits will help you figure out how to get your joke across in as few words as possible. Use this as good practice for how to be meticulous about cutting the fat on your jokes.
Learn to Get There Faster
Video time limits on platforms like Instagram will show you if you're getting to your punchline fast enough. Your reels might not be popping off, not because your joke's not funny, but because you took too long to get there. Use the short attention span mindset of Instagram and TikTok when you tell your jokes on stage. Get there quicker.
One way to test this is to post a clip of your joke as a reel, then share it in your Instagram story. Do you get a laugh before the story times out? That might be a clue that the joke is possibly too wordy or needs punching up.
Sharing a reel in your Instagram story clips it to just the first 15 seconds. A super general (and loose) rule of thumb is to aim for a laugh every 6 seconds. For your first few years of comedy, that might be hard, so then use Instagram stories as a minimum measure and aim for a laugh within 15 seconds. Plus, that makes your followers more likely to click through to the reel and watch the whole thing, too.
Think about your own behavior when scrolling Instagram or TikTok. What keeps you longer on a comedy clip or a video in general? Once you figure that out, figure out how to apply it to your comedy and your reels.
Extra Bennies of Using Social Media to Punch Up Jokes
The benefit of punching up your jokes using social media? Your reels are more likely to pop off. Long set ups lose views. People scroll when you don't hook them in those first 3-6 seconds. Meta itself has confirmed that the first 3 seconds of your video need to have a strong hook to keep your audience interested. You'll find your reels start doing better if your jokes are more refined.
Another plus of using social media to refine your joke is you might get a clever commenter who contributes a tag for you. Or you might get just good feedback. Pay attention to what people are saying about your joke. Yeah, comments can be rude and ridiculous sometimes, but they can also be useful feedback for learning how to punch up your material.
Practice Performing Your Set With Distractions
This piece of advice might not be for everyone, because some are naturally great at having presence on stage. Maybe this bit of advice is for others with ADHD like myself. I also have a brain injury that makes it sometimes difficult to focus on performing a task if there's a lot of stimulation. Even in a calm theater setting, there will be distractions while you're performing and it helps to practice your set with distractions.
My Personal Exercise in Performing With Distractions
Something I practice regularly, ever since my first open mic, is performing my set while music is playing in the background and while I'm performing other tasks. It is super difficult for me sometimes, thank you brain injury, but practice helps. Expert level mode, for me, is turning on music or the TV and cleaning the house while performing my set out loud.
The act of physically doing something while saying my set out loud over the noise distraction helps prepare my brain to be able to deliver my set while being aware of my physical presence and ignoring distractions.
And to go pro with that exercise, time the set, make sure to work in pauses after punchlines for laughs, to make sure you're delivering at the cadence you want on stage.
Obviously, open mics are also great opportunities to practice performing with distractions. If there's a particular open mic you avoid because it's rowdier than others, maybe make a point of hitting it occasionally just to refine your performance, distractions and all.
Network With Other Comedians
Hang out before and after shows or mics to meet other comedians. I know for some people, this comes naturally, but there are others that show up, do the thing, then dip. Networking with other comedians is more than just learning who the bookers in town are and trying to get booked.
This might not fit everyone's style or social habits, but it's worth a try whoever you are: network with other comedians with the intention of hanging out outside of shows/mics.
Make friends, invite them for coffee or for writing sessions. Hanging out with other comedians will sharpen your own comedy skills in the long run, especially if they're more experienced than you. I personally have gotten so many tags and such great feedback from just shooting the shit with comedians. I've also learned a thing or two about how to approach comedy, just learning from other perspectives.
Join a Writer's Group...Or Start One
If there's a writer's group around you, join that. If you're in San Diego, check out Write Tight, that meets every other Sunday. Writer's groups are a fantastic way to learn a lot more from other comedians, as well as get feedback on your own jokes.
You can't get far in comedy alone.
If coffee or writing sessions aren't it for you, start a podcast. (Gawd I hate myself for saying those words, but whatever). Interviewing other comedians on your podcast is another way to spend time with other comedians, and inevitably, it will help your comedy.
Any Other Tips You'd Give?
Drop them in the comments or shoot us an email, hey@sdcomedyscene.com and we might include it!
