Shayne-Michael.COMedy

The Road Comics Dictionary - by Shayne Michael

Accompanist - The paino guy who plays you onto stage. On the road this man is called a tape recorder.

A Club - A comedy club that features a week of shows. Performers usually stay there for the entire week.

Ad Lib - Improvisation. Often needed on the road to #1: connect the audience to material outside their own experiences and #2: make up for dead spaces when the connection is lost.

Applause Breaks - When you get to the killer material about driving a tractor.

B Club - A hotel where performers do one or two shows then move onto the next town.

Background Noise - Another word for the noise of the dart games, video games and twelve TVs showing football reruns bar owners won't turn off during a comedy show that they've bought and paid for.

Bar Slut - Like the kind you'd meet in a big city, except often dumb enough to believe you're a big star.

Bikers - Rednecks who traded the farm for a Harley and five square meals a day.

Bomb - When the sheep joke go over the audience's head.

Booker - A company, person, comedy club or washed up comic that books more than one room in a specific geographic region.

C Club - Any show in a town so small the population sign includes cattle to keep the towns Federal funding at acceptable levels.

Call Time - When you are expected to set up your amp and microphone.

Casino - Venue between an A club and a B club where bigger name comedians do one night shows.

Check It - When you choose not to bring your luggage on the plane.

Climax - When the headliner tells his best sheep joke.

Comp - When show producers include meals or rooms as part, or all, of your payment for performing.

Comedy Night - Another phrase, nothing else worked let's try making money with this.

Cordless Mic - A tool that allows improv comics to move around the audience better in rooms so small it was never necessary in the first place.

D Club - Any town with a single bar, less than a hundred people and the bar owner is also the mayor.

Demographic - The type of audience you're playing to: rednecks, mountain men, hillbillies or Canadians.

Dive - Any bar that hasn't cleaned the bathroom in three years.

Feature - The guy who's writing new sheep jokes and eventually get's kicked off the tour because he threatens the headliner's hack-ass material.

Headliner - The guy who knows the most sheep jokes.

Heckler - The guy who knows he's funnier than you and resents you getting paid for what he does every day for free. He's usually unemployed and a legend in his own mind. Also, the guy who thinks he knows a better sheep joke.

Hillbilly - A redneck that can't afford Nikes.

Kramer Reality Road Show - Kramer from Seinfeld's touring reality show.

Mason-Dixon - An imaginary line separating the rednecks from the hillbillies.

Merchandise - Things like CDs, bumper stickers, T-Shirts and personalized condoms comedians sell on the road to make ends meet.

Motivational Speaker - A Stand-up comic with a point.

Mountain Man - A redneck who hates the government and technology, except when technology includes a trigger.

NACA - National Association for Campus Activities conference. A trade show for college entertainers.

One Niter - Any show that lasts only one night.

Opener - The guy who still refuses to do sheep jokes because he knows their cheap.

Optimist - The comic who believes the club will still be open when he gets there.

Phallic - Sexual symbolism in sheep jokes.

Red Lion Inn - A hotel chain where a lot of stand-up comedy shows are produced in the absence of local comedy clubs.

Redneck - Ask Foxworthy, he has them pretty well pegged.

Ritual - On the road any sequence of events you repeat before each show because you believe they will prevent you from getting shot at.

Soundboard - On the road this is the plug that connects the mic to the amp.

Tavern - Another name for a bar.

Tenacity - Knowing when you bombed, when you didn't and when the audience is just plain too stupid to get it.

Tradeshow Booth - Booths you can visit on NACA's tours.

Tribble Run - Infamous road comedy routes through the north west United States, including Wyoming, Washington and Montana. Booked by Entertainment Solutions.

Walk - When the town slut gets offended by the sheep joke and walks out of the show.