Edinburgh: Unquestionably, a beautiful place to visit any time of year.
But for me, there’s nothing quite like visiting in August when it puts on what has become
the largest celebration of arts and culture in the world.
Having made several trips to Edinburgh specifically for the Festival I hope this video will peel
back the curtain on why I love this unique experience.
Imagine an entire community throwing a party for 3 consecutive weeks.
One that embodies the vibe of Glastonbury, but focuses on all aspects of performance.
Then take all of that diverse talent and energy and throw into every nook and cranny of a
city that also just happens to be one of the UK’s finest.
That is the Edinburgh Festival.
So in this video, I’ll be taking you through our 3 fun filled days of stand up, musicals,
a capella, improv and magic, as well as the vibrancy of the city itself.
If you’re new to the channel, we aim to make travel movies where the location is king,
hoping you might just find your next holiday inspiration.
This is Suitcase Monkey taking to the stage at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
(UPBEAT JAZZ MUSIC, DRUMS)
Following a picturesque 5 hour train journey from Kings Cross, we arrived into Waverly
Station, the most central way in to Edinburgh.
We had booked an Air BNB a 15 minute walk away and made the way to meet our host.
I’ve always found AirBNB to be the best way to enjoy Edinburgh, it just feels like
a good homely fit.
Our host even made this lovely scrap book, with suggestions on places to see and things
to do whilst we were there.
The big idea of the Fringe Festival, is that if you want to perform and there’s a venue
that will have you, then you’re going to perform, whether that be to 1 or 1000 people.
There’s no individual or committee that determines the calendar of events, making
it the biggest gathering of its kind, and second only to the Olympics in terms of global
ticket sales.
And nowhere is this party atmosphere more abundant than walking up the main High Street
itself, with skilled performers all vying for your attention.
(JAZZ MUSIC BUILDS)
The first show we wanted to see was at The Tron, a pub with a black box theatre tucked
away inside.
As we sat there waiting for showtime, we were excited that this would be our first of many,
with each performance taking us inside their own wonderful world.
(MUSIC STOPS, SOUND OF PENCIL DRAWING)
Sara Baron is a stand up we’ve seen a couple of times before so we thought it was be a
great way to start things off since she never disappoints.
Reviewed as “filthy and fearless”, she’s a great story teller and her show centred
around the fakeness of social media and let’s just say the less positive side of marriage
and having babies.
She also joked how she unknowingly wrote a porno when she was just 13 and the next thing
I know, I’m being roped into reading lines from the original script.
This was my first lesson in never ever sitting on the front row for stand up.
With only 30 minutes from the end of Sara’s show to the start of our next, we went with
what sounded like a good idea at the time.
Enter, A Very Brexit Musical.
Now, I don’t want to get too deep into critical reviews here, so let’s just say that this
show was almost, almost worth the £5 entry fee.
Now obviously all opinions here are of my own but this was my next lesson in the benefits
of sitting on the back row.
It was a satirical musical telling the story of the British referendum staring none other
than Joris Bonson and Cavid Dameron.
Lacking in humour, melody and largely acting, it just wasn’t for me.
But that is actually one of the great things about the Fringe Festival.
Paying only £5 and 60 minutes of your life is always a small price to pay when there
is equally the chance of getting something unique, unexpected and amazing on a whim.
More on that later.
Although we had specifically visited Edinburgh for the Fringe Festival, there are actually
4 other celebrations going on at the same time.
There’s The International Festival, The Art Festival, The Book Festival, and The Royal
Edinburgh Military Tattoo.
Taking place against the backdrop of the Edinburgh Castle, performers and infantries deliver
a world-class military show, rooted in Scottish tradition.
It proves so popular however that if you haven’t been wise enough to pre book a ticket, it
is likely you won’t be seeing it, which is exactly what happened to us.
So if this is something that might interest you, I’ll link their details below, along
with social links for ourselves so you can follow our next trip, live at it happens.
During this years Festival, 3,500 shows would take place, all hosted across 300 venues.
This means that traditional venues are in short supply so you’ll see these bespoke
venue signs hanging all over the city, to indicate something is going on inside.
This year, a venue meant anything from a theatre, a tunnel, a swimming pool, the ladies toilets,
a biscuit factory, a bus, and in our next case, an unused neon lit karaoke room.
Waiting in an underground corridor, we didn’t really know what we were about to watch.
Bumble Me Tinders was described as different stand ups every night telling their online
dating horror stories.
And since Chiaki and myself met through a dating app, we thought we’d give it a go.
This turned out to a great little fun show, if that’s even the right word in this case.
It was basically fitting 25 people into a private karaoke room that was at most built
for 10.
Overall, and to its credit, it actually felt more like just hanging out with friends, with
a few of them just happening to be comedic storytellers.
It involved lots of interaction with both audience and stand ups telling the room of
their dating nightmares.
At one point, they asked the audience if anyone in the room, had actually met online and for
some very un-British reason, I stuck my hand up.
Possibly drunk, I proudly told the story that it was 3 years ago to that very day that we
had actually started chatting online and now we were married.
Following the “awwwws” and applause that followed, it dawned on me that I had so far
taken part in 2 thirds of the shows we’d been at.
If someone else had also been to both this and the Sara Barron stand up, they would no
doubt be wondering who the hell this narcissist is!?
By this point, we were knackered, and it was time for a cup of tea and a sleep.
(SLOW GUITAR MUSIC, GENTLE)
Our first show of the morning was over at Pleasance Dome.
It was for a show called Lights Over Tesco Car Park and had been featured in numerous
outlets as being one of the best plays to see.
In fact, it was so featured, that it had completely sold out.
After noticing that another show we wanted to see was also fully booked, we realised
we needed a new strategy.
We grabbed a coffee, sat down beneath the Dome, and made a list of shows we didn’t
want to miss.
This is something I would actually recommend in hind site.
There are so many shows happening concurrently that missing good stuff is almost a given
and we had to make some difficult choices.
We did discover though that the Pleasance Dome and neighbouring Bristo Square is a great
place to visit even without a ticket.
(UPBEAT JAZZ MUSIC)
So our first show of the day was Karoshi.
This is a Japanese word meaning death by job related exhaustion.
Knowing the dark subject matter we were about to experience, I was surprised to see so many
young children seemingly lining up for it.
Maybe their parents looked at their jolly faces, filled with hopes and dreams, and wanted
to show them the true horror of what their life would soon become.
Either that, or they were here just to see Science Magic or Grumpy Pants.
But Karoshi is a great example of just how varied the Fringe can be, and I guess why
it is called fringe in the first place.
It was essentially a switched on lady called Mel, doing a 50 minute powerpoint presentation
about what it feels like to die inside every time your boss says something like, “this
new thing is an opportunity” when what they actually mean is “this new thing is shit.”
It was the gamble that totally made up for yesterdays Brexit musical.
We quickly followed Karoshi with a play called Feed.
After learning about the sold out Lights Over Tesco Car Park, we were handed this flyer
at the same box office.
Described as similar to Black Mirror, we were instantly sold.
This was a well written, well performed, thought provoking sensory overload.
The story focussed on a YouTuber who gets in too deep and the terrible world of social
media swallows everything up with a mixture of manipulation and fake news.
With that in mind, please do follow me on Instagram for some great photography, interaction
and joyful laughs along the way!
(LAUGHS NERVOUSLY)
(CLEARS THOUGHT)
After spending way too much time in the dark, we wandered around the city’s streets, for
a good old fashioned spot of sightseeing.
(GENTLE PIANO MUSIC)
(RECORD SCRATCH. UPBEAT JAZZ MUSIC STARTS)
Our last show of the day was one of my Festival highlights, where Dave Alnwick, a highly skilled
magician had one simple goal. (DAVE) “for the next hour I am going to prove to you that I am
literally the best magician” To achieve this, he went on to go through “every genre
of magic until I have proven that I am literally the best magician.”
What followed were rope tricks, card tricks, “did you see it change in your hands”,
childrens magic, “it doesn’t matter how old you are, thats amazing”, dangerous magic,
psychological magic “thats some Derren Brown shit right there”, and everything in between.
“When I say catch them, catch them.
It’s not an illusion, they’ll hit you in the face.
Alright.”
A great showman, with fast thinking, and fast talking, his sleight of hand and mastery of
an audience was great to witness close up.
“Are you not entertained?!”
5 Stars
(CALM PIANO MUSIC)
Our final day was a bit more slow paced.
We started our morning with the relatively easy hike up to Arthurs Seat.
Surrounded by over 600 acres of land, Arthur’s Seat is part of an extinct volcano rising
250 meters high.
If the weather’s good, I think this is a must do trip and offers some of the best views
of Scotlands Capital.
(GENTLE PIANO MUSIC CONTINUES)
Our last show of the entire trip was actually something that caught us completely off guard.
Chiaki is a big fan of a cappella singing, and was something different we thought we
should see.
So we randomly booked tickets for Out of the Blue, and walked up to the venue expecting
to just wander in as normal.
Not knowing that Out of the Blue actually have more than 16 million views on YouTube,
the queue to get in came as a bit of a shock.
We later learnt they were runners up on Britains Got Talent.
So imagine you didn’t know who Paul and John were but went to see The Beatles anyway.
That was how we felt as we took to our seats.
As the lights went down, it was as if the cast of Glee had made a triumphant
return, and some girls near us started to go a bit crazy, as if John Lennon himself
had risen.
Despite being completely caught off guard, I had to admit, they were a very talented
group.
With perfectly blended vocal harmonies all hitting the right note, they made for a fun
show with beat boxing, funky grooves and their own original take on well loved pop songs.
Another Fringe Surprise.
(VERY UPBEAT HAPPY POP SONG)
For my next video I’ll be going through my personal tips and tricks to get the most
out of the Edinburgh Fringe.
I only post every 6 to 8 weeks so please subscribe to not miss future videos and enjoy my back
catalogue if you’d like some travel inspiration around the world.
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drop me a comment to let me know your thoughts on Edinburgh or this video in general, it’s
always good to hear from you all.
Until the next time, thanks for watching Suitcase Monkey.
AND THANKS FOR READING THESE SUBTITLES! :)