ON CLOUD NINE

JASON BYRNE TELLS MARION MCMULLEN WHY HE'S LOOKING TO THE SKIES FOR HIS NEW COMEDY TOUR

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How are things, Jason? I’ve just been dancing around to Jamiroquai and Virtual Insanity with a huge cloud on my head.

I think I'm going to teach younger people about that music video where he is sliding across the floor and older people will go, “Oh, I know that” I’m going to get loads of bits of lino for the show and get people sliding across the stage back and forth.

I've also got a floating cloud that I am getting built and even have baby clouds for younger members of the audience. [Laughs] By the way I'll never get this all done in time for Edinburgh.

My idea is to try and do whatever Ican. I'm planning to give younger people items from the 80s and they have to figure out how to use them.

They will never get them, but the older members of the audience will be like, “Oh, my gawd”.

How did you come up with the name for the show?

I call the show Jason Byrne: Head in the Clouds, and the reason for that is last year I did a stunt with three people on stage, including myself, and we wore clouds on our heads and everyone loved it. It was just a silly idea.

I didn’t think anything would come of it, but every time I did the show people would go, “Are you going to be doing the clouds, Jason?’ and I'd go, “There's other stuff in the show as well that is really, really good” and they'd say, “Yeah, but we like the clouds”

It's almost as if the world is so vicious right now that people want comfort. When I was a kid, I know it’s a cliché, but I was a daydreamer in school.