Andrew Maxwell

Last week I went to a 'proper' comedy gig for the first time in - well - possibly ever. One of my favourites from Irish TV show "The Panel", none other than Dubliner Andrew Maxwell.

Maxwell goes to see Hibs every time he's in Edinburgh, so he's quite clearly a man of vision (especially as he's from Dublin, which is full of more part-time carpet bagging bigot Celtic fans than any other location on the planet). Plus, he's got some quite socialist tendencies, so as a bit of a left-wing type (I'm in to controversial things like free healthcare to everyone at the point of delivery, large-scale cheap public transport, people who are earning vast amounts of money should be taxed heavily - radical stuff right?) - he's often in huge amounts of agreement with what I think.

He made one very interesting point during the gig, which is that while the Israeli Christmas slaughter was happening (my words, not his), RTE (the Irish state broadcaster) didn't want them talking about it. Despite the fact he wanted to talk about it, RTE preferred to edit anything out regarding that, and keep it on light and funny local stories.

Anyway, there's loads of his stuff on the web, including some funny stuff on Hibs and oil.

My favourite of the moment, is his rant about SUVs. Mabye you have to be in Dublin to grasp the full scale of the insanity, greed and reprehensible consumerism that has gripped Ireland and its capital for the last ten years - whatever, Maxwell's rant on The Panel mixed righteous fury about these futile status symbol pedestrian-killers, which some mindblowingly funny spluttering Irish twists on the English language.

"Red as the fucking Mars!"