“Dumb Things I’ve Doneis pretty self-explanatory – I’m a young, stupid person,” explains Alex ‘Shooter’ Williamson (AKA The Loosest Aussie Bloke Ever). In this live show, the new-gen comedian showcases the candid, swear-filled humour that has garnered him a huge social media presence and followers around the world.
Williamson’s stand-up is full of personal, relatable and often embarrassing anecdotes. “I put myself in all sorts of awkward and horrible situations because I’m a bit of a yes man,” he admits. “I don’t have great decision-making skills, I just go with the flow. That ends up in some horrible situations where I’ve had to find my way out of, and I discuss this onstage. They go as private and personal as me showing a few text messages that I’ve tried to send to girls in an attempt to court them late at night, and it went horribly wrong – I’ll show their responses onscreen.”
Williamson’s live show differs significantly from his YouTube videos. “When you come and see me onstage, it’s very clear – I’m very honest,” he says. “It is more personal, you get to know me, and that’s the big difference: if you want to know who I am and what I’m about as a person, come to the live show.”
Does that mean he is not actually The Loosest Aussie Bloke Ever? “That’s true. I have nightmares about people coming up to me at music festivals going, ‘Oi, ya loose, I’ma scull a beer, nah, right.’ I’m actually quiet – I play with my bunnies and I’m quite reserved, but I can switch it on.”
With close to a million subscribers across his social media platforms, Williamson says he gets recognised “all the time. One day when it [his YouTube series] first started to take off I got recognised by a group of 12-year-old little giggling school girls at a train station … I moseyed on up the platform and there was the opposite end of the spectrum, some 50-year-old junkie-looking fella who looked like he’d had a rough life going, ‘Oi, you’re that loose bloke.’
“When people travel, especially, they like showing other people my stuff – you know, ‘You gotta see this Aussie bloke’ – I start dropping C-bombs and all the Americans are like ‘Yeah, he’s really funny.’” However, Williamson has found issues with his exaggerated ocker accent. “In Edinburgh there was a heckler who couldn’t understand me because of my Australian accent, but he had a strong Scottish accent and it was the worst heckle fight you’ve ever seen. No-one could understand what me or the heckler were saying.”
Williamson became interested in filmmaking at an early age. “I just started watching films as a kid. If your parents have a video camera in the house, you can just film yourself doing your videos, like urinating on the cat and stuff like that when I was a kid. They weren’t too popular. Then I developed those skills a bit more, because I did media studies at high school and then furthered that with a Bachelor of Creative Arts degree at university where I learnt editing skills … and [watched] a shitload of Curb Your Enthusiasm and Family Guy.”
In keeping with the title of his current show, Williamson confesses one particularly dumb thing he’s done recently. “I was having to mail a whole lot of letters and I had the envelopes I thought you were supposed to lick, but it wasn’t – it was in fact the envelopes that just stick on. You haven’t had to lick envelopes for ten years, apparently.”
CatchDumb Things I’ve DoneatThe Comedy StoreatFriday November 28 and Friday December 5, tickets online.
