Crikey, Spikey's made it big now

"I NEVER envisaged doing this," says Dave Spikey, the Bolton comedian whose turn as club compere Jerry St Clair was one of the highlights of the second series of Phoenix Nights.

His performance singing about the merits of black bin bags at the entrance to Asda had the nation in stitches.

And although he says being a comedian was never a major ambition he is now, at the age of 51, about to embark on the second leg of his first ever stand-up tour and he's still quite obviously delighted that people are finally paying just to come to see HIM.

"It's a fantastic feeling," he says, speaking at his cottage home in Whittle-le-Woods, Chorley, where he lives with his wife Kay.

"I am used to doing shows where, really, people are there to see someone else, so it seems mad to me that I am now the sole attraction. It's great though!"

Dave is a busy man. As well as the new tour, which gets under way again at the Lowry on September 23 and 24 (sold out), the second series of Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights is due out next month and his live show, An Overnight Success, Dave Spikey on Tour, will be released on video and DVD mid-November.

His current success comes after years of hard slog.

As a child, the young Dave Bramwell (his real name; Spikey was a reference his bristly hairstyle) was greatly influenced by his father Gordon who died last year.

Gordon, a trained painter and decorator, listened to a lot of radio comedy, such as The Navy Lark and was a great fan of the TV classic Bilko. Young Dave, who was brought up in Heaton, acquired an ear for the structure and timing required to write comedy.

He left Smithills Grammar School at the age of 16 with ambitions to work in the field of medicine and secured some work in a lab at Bolton Royal Infirmary, while studying on day release with a view to pursuing a medical career.

As it happened, despite being offered a place at St Andrew's University in Scotland, Dave remained at the hospital where he worked for 30 years, eventually as chief biomedical scientist in the haematology department.

As a hobby he spent much of his time writing comedy sketches and actually had the thrill of seeing some performed on programmes like The Grumbleweeds and the Russ Abbot Show.

In 1992, he teamed up with a pal called Rick Sykes and they formed the one-off double act Spikey and Sykey, eventually making it on to the TV talent show New Faces.

The lifelong Wanderers fan says: "People seemed to like our act, but we didn't do too well on New Faces."

He jokes: "In fact, we finished a close third to a Todmorden whippet juggler and a Latvian plumber who played 'I've got sixpence, jolly jolly sixpence' on a radiator.

"Actually we came fifth. Barry Took liked us, but Nina Myskow was not impressed."

The double act split up and Dave later won a large talent contest called Stairway to the Stars, but the big venues still eluded him and he spent his evenings travelling to fairly local venues, trying out his own brand of comedy.

The reaction, as Dave freely admits, was mixed.

"I actually tried just a few proper working men's clubs and because my act is much more of an observational kind of humour, most times the audiences just looked at me as if to say 'Hey, pal, just tell us a joke for God's sake'.

"I seriously thought about trying to escape out of a window at a railwayman's club in Blackburn immediately after I had done me first spot prior to the bingo."

Then one day 10 years ago he got a phone call asking if he could get to Blackpool in half an hour to stand in as compere for Cannon and Ball at the resort's huge Opera House.

"It was so unexpected and such a race against time that I didn't have time to be really nervous. The biggest venue I had played up until then was Astley Bridge Conservative Club.

"There were 3,000 people in the audience and I can tell you that to make so many people laugh at your material is a great feeling. When that number of people laugh you actually feel the air move, it's incredible."

The spot went well and then Dave spent some time supporting the comedy duo on national tours, as well as Welsh comedian Max Boyce.

In between all this, however, he was still struggling to be accepted on the northern alternative comedy circuit -- until one night when Agraman, who runs the club The Buzz in Chorlton, invited him to perform there.

"I then got asked to take part in the North West Comedian of the Year competition and won it, which was a great night and not long after I was invited to be compere. That year featured both Johnny Vegas, who was firm favourite to win it, and a newcomer called Peter Kay."

Dave adds: "Vegas had been on and gone down a storm and Peter was last on out of 10 acts in front of a very restless crowd. He still reminds me of how I introduced him -- I thought he was going to be crucified. I said to the audience 'It's all right, there's only one left'.

"Of course, anyone who has seen Peter live will know that he is very special and he just came on and if I remember rightly he sat down and literally talked to the audience in that way he does and he blew them away. There really was only one winner that year.

"After that we got talking and we discovered we had the same approach to writing comedy and I asked him to write some links for me when I was presenting the TV quiz show Chain Letters.

"Then I collaborated with Peter on his first TV venture, The Services and its follow-up That Peter Kay Thing, which I still love and am very proud of. How Peter didn't win some major award for his acting in that show still amazes me; he is just fantastic in that.

"Phoenix Nights followed and it was Peter who suggested I play the part of Jerry St Clair, who was an amalgam of loads of different local club comperes. So many of them use the name St Clair in a variety of different forms that he had to be called that. I even auditioned for the part and thankfully got it.

"Because I had written it I felt comfortable playing him and knew him better than anyone."

Dave was still working at the Royal Bolton Hospital when the first series of Phoenix Nights took off. But he left his job after 30 years when it came to filming series two.

He says: "It's amazing to me that I am now being stopped in the street. I am obviously not as high profile as someone like Peter Kay, but it's lovely that people will come up to me and say they enjoy my work and I give them a good laugh.

"Considering I never aimed to be a comedian I have come a long way.

"I have other writing projects I am working on for TV and hopefully they will come off, though it is a long process.

"One of them I have been working on a long time and has been mentioned a lot. It is based on a Bolton Evening News bill poster I once saw in Farnworth on the way home from the hospital. The poster said 'Dead Man Weds' and I thought it was the funniest thing I had ever seen.

"From there I began writing this comedy about a tiny newspaper office where the staff always missed the big story. I am pleased with it, but we'll have to see what the future holds."

For now the future holds an eight week stint touring the country with his live show. Local comic Steve Royle will be appearing as his guest on this leg of the tour.

He says "I am really looking forward to the next part of the tour. It's a brilliant feeling that people are paying specifically to come and see me and the audiences so far have been absolutely fantastic."

Dave Spikey plays at the Albert Halls in Bolton on October but all the dates are sold out. For a full list of his gigs throughout October and November, log on to www.davespikey.co.uk