High 5 for Glasgow

With the start of the Glasgow Comedy Festival today, the city is getting its laughing gear in full working order.

Comedians from around the globe will descend on the city in the 18-day laughter-fest. Here, five comedians who will be appearing, including both homegrown talent and visitors, tell BARRY McDONALD the reasons they love Glasgow and list their five favourite things about the city.

NEIL COLE

1. Glasgow owns massive real estate in my heart because of the music I love that comes from here. The Jesus & Mary Chain, Primal Scream, Teenage Fanclub, Glasvegas, Mogwai, Camera Obscura, Belle & Sebastian, BMX Bandits, Frightened Rabbit. Throw in iconic venues like King Tut’s and the Barrowland, and it is unparalleled.

2. Glasgow is famously honoured in the Clint Eastwood film “Every Which Way But Loose” – it’s no coincidence that the Orangutan is called Clyde, and the catchphrase “Right turn, Clyde” is rudimentary directions to Glasgow. (I might have made this up).

3. The patron saint of Glasgow is called St Mungo, after Mungo Jerry, whose 1970 No 1 hit, In The Summertime, advocated “have a drink, have a drive, go out and see what you can find”.

4. People moan about the weather in Glasgow – it is on the same line of latitude as Moscow, dammit, so frankly it could be a lot worse.

5. My first gig at a music festival was at Glasgow’s Gig on The Green – while Oasis played the main stage. I did NOT want to go back to Edinburgh that night... Glasgow was, as they say, Smiles Better

Neil Cole: Neil By Mouth, Brel, Sunday March 14, 8.30pm

HARDEEP SING KHOLI

1. The view at midnight from Glasgow University over the city. I studied law at Glasgow. It was a special place to be. Late at night we would drink cider, climb up to the top of Gilmorehill, sneak through the quadrangles and watch the twinkling city below. It always makes me want to listen to The Blue Nile.

2. Cafe Gandolfi. Food is home and nowhere gives me more food pleasure than Cafe Gandolfi. It’s a Glasgow institution. I went on my first date there, courted there and cried there. It will always be home.

3. The people. I can’t speak about other cities but the folk of Glasgow make the city. The legacy of the port means a mix of different sorts of influences on the people and so the city. Coming home always ensures the puncturing of over-inflated egos; everyone here ‘kens ma faither’.

4. Mother India Café. The second best place in Glasgow for Indian food. (The best being my mum’s house, obviously).

5. The Big Sky. I do love living in London; once you get ‘yer heid aroon it’, it’s an amazing place. But I love how big the sky is when I’m home. I know it sounds daft, but it feels so humbling to look up on those rare sunny days and see a thousand acres of beautiful sky.

Hardeep Sing Kholi: The Nearly Naked Chef, King’s Theatre, Monday March 22, 8pm

CRAIG HILL

1. The patter on the street’s the funniest you’ll hear anywhere.

2. If you’re not from Glasgow, don’t worry, you’ll be welcomed into any conversation like an old friend.

3. It’s a shopaholic’s dream!

4. It has some of the best small music venues for seeing bands.

5. People are all famously told to ‘look up’ in Glasgow, because most of the fabulous architecture is above your head. Some of the buildings are stunning.

Craig Hill: 40 Love? is at Oran Mor, Friday, March 26, 8pm

JANEY GODLEY

1. The way the people couldn’t care less about the weather.

2. The way a sing song can break out at a late night taxi rank, complete with dance moves.

3. The way Glasgow Central Station doubles up as a goth youth centre, perfect for their hug-a-thons!

4. The way a stray dog can still wander about the city as though they have a plan of action, they have wee serious faces.

5. The way the pigeons in Queen Street Station strut about as if they own the place and believe they are above the pigeons who stand outside the station in the rain.

Janey Godley: Godley’s World, Tron Theatre, Thursday March 25, 9.30pm

ZOE LYONS

1. Glasgow has some of the best Indian restaurants I have ever been to, big bustling and very friendly. I always look forward to my fix of curry when I visit Glasgow. A nuclear hot chilli Madras helps keep the cold out in the winter.

2. I love the sense of mischief in Glasgow. I always giggle when I see the statue of the Duke of Wellington in front of the art gallery in Royal Exchange Square with a traffic cone on his head. It looks like he is trotting home after a great night out on the tiles.

3. Glaswegians love to talk. It’s guaranteed you will at some point get chatting with strangers if you are on a night out. The quick fire patter is breath-taking; you have to be on the balls of your feet just to keep up with the conversation. It’s that quick and funny, it’s like the 100 metres sprint of dialects.

4. Mutton Pies! You can’t beat a hot mutton pie. My stepfather is from Glasgow but now lives down South. He gets cravings for mutton pies still. He has even tried to get a company to vacuum pack some and send them to him. That is how addictive these pastry pots of molten mutton are.

5. The Glasgow Film Theatre. No visit to Glasgow is complete without a visit to the GFT. The fabulous 1930s building makes movie-going feel like an event. And after the film, go around the corner and spy the Glasgow Art School. The Mackintosh building is brilliant. When I was a teenager my pal was at the Art School. I have spent many a happy night in the students’ union there, after a few drinks the building takes on a life of its own – believe me!