Ep 196. Melanie Bracewell - TM NZ S2 Ep.6

Hello there, it's Ed Gamble.

Welcome to the Taskmaster Podcast, Taskmaster New Zealand podcast.

We're still talking about series two of Taskmaster New Zealand, and this week we'll be discussing episode six with a fantastic guest, the brilliant Melanie Bracewell.

Mel is a wonderful comic, known her for many years, doing

New Zealand Comedy Festival, Melbourne Comedy Festival, and she comes over to do Edinburgh.

And she is on tour in the UK right now.

Her show attack of the Melanie Bracewell is on tour at the moment.

She's doing London, she's doing Brighton.

She is doing Cambridge.

Those are the three dates that are left as you will be listening to this now.

So make sure you go and see her.

But for now, let's talk about Taskmaster New Zealand Series 2, Episode 6, with Melanie Bracewell.

Welcome, Mel, to the Taskmaster Podcast.

Oh, what a pleasure.

It's truly a pleasure to have you here.

Of course, always a pleasure to have a Taskmaster champion on the podcast.

Series 4.

If I wasn't on the other side of the world, I would have brought the trophy into frame on the Zoom call just to prove it.

But that would be a commitment.

It was so heavy.

It's like,

I don't know what your one is made of, but ours,

it's like cement or something.

I had to take it back to Australia, and I had to really pretend like I wasn't carrying 12 kgs of Jeremy's head.

Yeah, mine's pretty heavy, I think.

But it's maybe like plaster or something like that.

But yeah, it's

how do people feel in New Zealand that obviously you then had to go back to Australia where you live with the trophy?

How did that feel that you were taking this out of the New Zealand economy?

Oh, yeah, true.

It's the real brain drain, they call it.

I didn't mind it, obviously.

I don't know how other people felt about it.

I'm sure Ray O'Leary had something to say about it.

He actually moved to Maldon and he stayed in my spare room for an obnoxious amount of time.

And

I had the trophy on his side table just so that he could wake up next to it every morning and feel awful, I guess.

We will obviously be talking about your series

in probably at our rate a few years' time when it's so far in the distance that you can't remember any of it.

I remember that.

I remember that television show

back when my knees were functioning.

But today we're going to be talking about Taskmaster New Zealand series two, episode six.

Now, I mean, look, everyone in New Zealand knows each other.

I take it the people on this lineup you are all familiar with and you are friends with and

you have worked with them in the past.

Yes, worked with all with all of them even um non-comedian matt heath i was a producer on his radio show with with jerry and so um yeah all of them i would say some of my nearest and dearest but that's you know that's all of us we're all in a whatsapp group together so you know

everyone is mates did you ask any of these people for advice when you signed up to do the show uh any of this particular lineup

I don't know if I asked for it, but just in seeing those people, they would just, they would offer it, you know, like everyone knows who's on the next taskmaster lineup because it's all secret, but then it's not.

Like, I live in Australia and I'm in New Zealand for a suspicious amount of time doing nothing else.

And then, yeah, so people would sort of go, oh, you're on it, eh?

Oh, make sure you read the task, or you know, like they'd throw something at you in small little nuggets.

Well, you did, you didn't need the advice.

You went on to win, but we are going to talk about series two.

Let's start talking about this episode then, uh, which is an amazing episode.

Just before we started recording, you said you were absolutely delighted to find out that you would be talking about this episode.

Oh, yes.

When the title came up and it said eat your asses, I was like, Oh, yeah,

this one.

I can't wait because it's often that you know the title is kind of obscure and you can't actually remember what task it's referring to.

This one, oh, yeah.

Yeah, we will get to that task in due course.

It is, you know, a legendary moment in the history of Taskmaster New Zealand and indeed Taskmaster as a whole.

But this episode, back to back, you forget everything is very good on this episode.

It's a real purler.

So let's talk about the prize task, which is the two most different things.

Now, I say it's a classic.

I would say no one...

No one gets this particularly well.

I don't think anyone absolutely nails this.

Everything seems quite similar.

It's really hard.

Because when you say the opposite of of something like is

is the opposite of hot cold or is the opposite of hot

you know

general existence or like a concept like something that's so far away from like is it can you not possibly have two nouns because at least they're nouns uh so i think that's the thing with like opposite day you know when you're at school and you try and do opposite day and then you know someone like that's not the opposite because they're too similar that's what i felt like this this this conversation ended up like yeah it really did I think it's it's almost a untenable philosophical um concept really isn't it but why not tackle it on taskmaster um

something that we definitely know isn't that different was Ursula's um and she brings in tofu and Bill Tong

what

I mean I was gonna say what was she thinking but we've chat we've chatted to her I really don't think she cares that much and just literally just sometimes goes straight down her first thought, just nails it.

And she's so funny and so quick.

Yes.

So Ursula has some targets in her, in her brain that she goes to quite often.

It's

vegans,

people who don't know how to merge, and anti-vaxxers.

Like those are her three like people she hates like with a vengeance.

And it's so funny that vegans is like the top of that list.

And so I don't know if it's like growing up in South Africa, you must just like have like a high protein rich meat diet or something like that.

But yeah, she's got it in for vegans, and I think she wanted to get her political agenda out there.

Yeah, I mean, to be fair to her, I think she's already had a go at vegans on this series.

I think we all know her feelings on vegans.

But yeah, Bill Tong, of course, is proudly South African.

So she manages to get

a shout-out for Bill Tong in there.

And the opposite is tofu.

She's got a point in the

vegans, were they presented with tofu and built on, they would not say that they were anywhere near to each other.

They'd say they were the most different thing possible.

And I didn't mind that reasoning.

But they're both foods.

They're not different at all, are they, Mel?

That's the thing is that sometimes as a comedian, and we'll see it later on in the other prize submissions as well, is that do you go like something that you're like me?

I'm competitive.

I want to like win and I want to follow the instructions of the task.

But some people are just like, what's the funniest thing I could do?

What's something I can riff on?

And I think Ursha has gone for riff over

trying to earn the points.

She's gone for riff over points, but she still gets three points.

And we're trying to limit the amount we talk about Jeremy scoring on the show.

And I think we're actually doing quite a good job.

It's been a couple of episodes since we've mentioned it, but three points for this, personally, I find...

insanity.

Something Jeremy said to me when we were recording, he said in the first season, he really didn't think people cared about the points.

It's like, you know, we do seven days and we do other panel shows,

but the points don't matter.

And this is probably like one of the only shows where

it's, you know, comedy focused, but people really give a shit about the points.

And so he was like, oh, okay.

So I was just kind of firing it out a little bit randomly in the first season.

And the second season, it's stressful because he had all of that backlash.

He was like, okay,

what people seem to resonate with is not even necessarily that you've got it 100% right, but then you have a reason.

He was like, I just need like a reason or like to explain why I gave points in a certain order.

And people are kind of like, okay, okay, I don't agree, but okay.

Yes.

And so he, I think he just started going on that vibe of like, okay, as long as I have a reason, it doesn't matter what the reason is.

That's so true.

I just have to express it.

I think that's so true that, yeah, that in the first series, he would just go, yeah, five points for you, four points for you, three points for for you, and everyone was tearing their hair out because they're like, I know the whole point of Taskmaster is obviously it's silly, obviously, it doesn't matter, but we need to apply rigor and a serious nature to all of this silly stuff.

This is why Taskmaster works, and he is he is way better at that in this series.

But also, he's the Taskmaster, he can do whatever he likes.

If he doesn't want to give reasons, he doesn't have to give reasons.

I disagree with some of his scoring throughout the show, but it's okay, it's okay.

Having said that, three points is fucking mad.

Um, guy

Guy brings in chalk and cheese, which I think this covers both bases.

This is a good thing to bring in in terms of the two most different things.

It's a pre-proven different thing from the idiom, as Guy says.

Also, it gives him a little chance to do a bit of riffing.

This feels like a Montgomery routine, the infancy of a good Montgomery routine.

Montgomery, when he told me he bought a book of idioms so that he could write just straight-up comedy, I was like, that's the most guy Montgomery thing of all time.

He will 100% rip into an idiom.

And so this is GM to a T.

This is perfect stuff, GM to a T, exactly.

Look, there's almost nothing to say about that.

He absolutely nails it.

And

he gets the four points.

Matt, now,

there's a couple of ones here where I've been using this podcast not only as my job, not only as an excuse to watch Taskmaster, but also as an excuse to get some real New Zealand history lessons and sort of cultural insight.

Let's talk about the signs for Bluff and Cape Regina.

Am I saying that right?

Oh, absolutely not.

But you did it as funniest possible way you can.

Cape Brianga.

Cape Rianga.

So,

yeah.

So I wish there was some sort of rich history, some beautiful thing that would make this really satisfying for you.

Cape Riyanga is at the top, and Bluff is at the bottom.

So that's all.

It's just

that's it.

And I really, I do hate that,

but it's like something that's referenced a lot, like capiriona to bluff.

Like, people like mention it as like the opposite ends of New Zealand.

So I understand why he's gone that way.

I mean, even Bluff isn't really even the bottom of New Zealand because he's Steve Island as well.

So it's, it's, you know, it's neither here nor there.

But what I noticed with Matt is that like his intro to the prize is so bad.

Like he just kind of goes, well, I was, I I was in a place and I saw an opportunity and then I took the and then I did blah blah and then he like puts the signs up Yeah, and gets a round of applause.

I was like he barely even strung its inners together Yeah, it was it was not

a good pitch for for the prize task also he admits himself I don't think he read it properly because he brings in the two signs and sort of suggests those two things are opposite even though they're both signs just with different places on even if he was suggesting the two places places are the most different things i think he did think it was opposites right so are they opposite each other opposite ends of i think he's saying yeah i guess he's saying the opposite ends of new zealand but again you're still in it at a very small category yes um it to me it was suggesting that one of the places was really nice and one of the places was really awful is that is that not have i misunderstood that no no both both pretty nice

you kind of you know the middle of new zealand is where you get a little bit dusty, but the top is like, oh, beautiful beaches, and the bottom, beautiful oysters.

So let's, yeah, you know, that's that's that's New Zealand.

Um, yeah,

awful attempt from Matt, but still, uh, still didn't get the one point.

Um,

let's talk about Laura's.

Uh, again, we're gonna have to have some pronunciation, even though I watched this uh half an hour ago.

The Treaty of

Waitangi Waitangi and its English translation.

Now, I did think it was my responsibility to not just ask you about this.

It was more of a pop on the Wikipedia and check out some details.

But I tell you what, Mel, it's very complicated, isn't it?

And it made me feel awful.

It's very complicated.

Essentially, the Treaty of Waitangi is the kind of founding document of

New Zealand by British colonisers.

And they wrote this treaty and

then they sort of presented like a, I'm also going to get this wrong as well, so I'm worried, but

a version in Te Reo, which was kind of not quite right.

And so what the Māori chiefs agreed to was not necessarily is in the English version, which is what kind of gets used today.

So it's about like, you know, ceding sovereignty versus just like saying you can live here sort of thing.

Yes, from what I could work out from what I was reading, the British, obviously the bad guys again,

I can't believe they managed it so consistently.

The

that there was an agreement where they basically said they could buy it whatever they wanted.

But then it was, I mean, look,

Queen Victoria and the rest of them, absolute rotten ones.

So it was actually a lovely bit of political stuff from Laura.

I thought it was interesting.

It caused me to actually do some research and look up what went on.

And one point.

One point, I know, and it's a great gag.

And people, like, it's the one that, like,

you know, when we're work, like, you know, when you're thinking of your own prize tasks, you're like, ah, crap, I've got to think in that frame of mind because that is great.

And as soon as you just say what it is, people are like, bam, that's amazing.

And so

I love how Laura can't even contain herself.

She just goes, what?

And

like a very visceral reaction.

But I did love that Matt's counterpoint was like, you know how we argued that mine were two signs with text on it.

I just think this dynamic of this car is the way they argue in this prize task is kind of perfect.

They all kind of,

each person has an argument for each other person's prize task of why they hate it.

Yes,

their chemistry is very, very good or not good, depending on what you enjoy.

But I thought this was obviously a good gag and I thought it was interesting.

But they do have a point.

I think Jeremy and Matt have a point there in that it's still two treaties, and the text might be different.

That's obviously what caused such

consternation and

wars, I think.

But

it's still two treaties.

I think we are just shocked by Jeremy choosing one point because that implies he thinks that they are so the same.

You're just making a political point by going, actually, no, that is a direct translation.

You get what you get and you don't get upset.

Now, David, I thought this was really good.

Really put a lot of effort into it.

And through word association, he doesn't really go into detail, but comes out with cinder block and custard.

They, to me, feel like the two most different things on here.

Yes.

I think he's gone for like every adjective and tried to find the opposite.

You know, he's gone hard and soft and squishy and he's gone like edible and then because he's argued that he could uh what did he say that he could eat chalk everyone's everyone is on board with eating chalk which makes me laugh and he's just he's just tried to go with every adjective and go for the opposite and he's come to a great you know a great result yeah i think he has although i could see david eating a cinder block in one of his shows oh yes oh absolutely yeah there's nothing but then you know we we open up the category to everything if it's just things that david kraos would eat in a comedy show yeah all things David would shove up his ass on stage.

Saw him do something pretty full on at the French.

Oh my god.

My favorite thing about that, I think, is that I think he did that show crazy, insane.

Got a little bit of a cult following.

And then the next year he decided, you know what, I'm going to do straight stand-up.

I want to work on my stand-up.

People who came, you know, you get a little bit of carryover from those people that watched that show who really loved that.

And then come the second time and go, oh, this is just observational material.

It's so funny.

Ultimately, the only thing he could do that was more shocking than the previous year was to do a stand-up show.

So I think he nailed it.

Laura got one point.

It was two points for Matt, three points for Ursula, four points for Guy, and five points for David.

Let's start with Marl Pal Ursula Carlson.

Yes, I have tofu and biltong.

Tofu

and Biltong.

One is amazing and one is tofu.

Okay.

We've asked you to bring in two different things there, Urshla.

And I don't want to nickel and dime you on this so early on in this particular episode, but they are both foods.

Listen, if we had a vegan here on this stage and I said to them, just tuck in, it's basically the same.

They go, fuck no it is not

so those are two vastly different things are you vegan Jeremy no so was there any difference no they're both disgusting

task one evacuate the items from the parachute while sitting in the rocking chair once you sit down your feet may not touch the parachute most items removed wins you have 10 minutes your time starts now A brilliant task.

I think it's a brilliant task because it reads deceptively simply, but there there are so many important things

that are easy to forget.

This is one where you need to keep the task on you at all times.

Yes, which I love, but Matt immediately, the first thing he evacuates, is the task.

Yeah.

Crazy.

Incredible.

Yes, I love it.

And I also love these practical tasks, but when you're doing the practical tasks, I think I had the same attitude of Laura, is that you think, oh, like, you know, surely everyone's going to do this the same.

And so, like, have I missed something?

Is there another extra trick that I don't know about?

But you're not really aware that people's methodology, just in regular practical tasks, are going to be different.

And that Ursula, oh, God.

I mean, we'll get to Ursula at the end, but like, when I was watching everyone else's attempts and knowing that Ursula hadn't been played yet, I was just like, oh, show me Ursula.

You know, like, you can't wait till that last person.

Yeah.

Exactly.

Yeah.

I mean, she was brilliant in this.

Do you have any tasks from your series that you particularly remember that were like the big practical ones that you think you got right or you did badly in?

Yeah, I think there was

the one was it was get the glitter from the sea.

It was like put the bowl of glitter in the fridge.

And

we walked in and Paul is holding a stick and there's like a bowl on the ceiling and he's holding the stick and like getting you to hold it there.

And like I'm like getting my legs out trying to get a chair and stuff even before i've read the task and he's like put it back put it back and i'm just like trying to get ahead ahead of the like on what we're supposed to do and um the reveal being that that it's just a bowl stuck to the ceiling and and the stick you're holding is doing nothing and uh the glitter is just in the kitchen and because i was like you know i figured that out and then i got to the kitchen i started thinking yeah i was like maybe that's not the bowl of glitter maybe that's you know like you start thinking a layer above you're like yeah well maybe they're tricking me again Like, there's like no, no, no, but you already did the trick.

There's not like a second trick

because it was right by the fridge.

I was like, but maybe I don't have to move it very far.

It was too easy.

So you do overthink it as a performer, but then when you watch it back and you know, Bubba in our season took about 45 minutes to see the gun at despite being in the room with it for that amount of time,

you go, oh, everyone's very different, and these always are successful.

Yes, yeah, yeah.

I mean, yeah, you've always got to to think someone's going to fuck it up more than you.

And Ursula certainly thinks that.

To the extent that she's the only one who realizes to not stand on the chair and move the stuff, not sit on the chair and move the stuff.

And she still doesn't throw everything off.

She just like, that'll do.

That'll get me mid-table.

That's all I care about.

I do love how honest she is with it as well.

And she is very smart and also just like very comedically minded.

So she like knows what she's doing and she knows that she's got to just be herself she's never going to be like scampering around being like oh no i missed i missed the shovel oh whoopsies so she just leans into her character so hard which which i love yeah also like she's got 10 minutes which isn't that long to do all of this to to remove you know over a thousand items and she still focuses on just slamming paul quite a lot and like interacting with paul giving him a guitar saying play that holding up a skull saying this is your social life.

Like, she just absolutely beasts him

for sure.

That is always her priority, is to

win the conversation and not the task.

Guy, Laura, and Matt have already sat down by the time they read the task, which is obviously a disaster because it means they can't touch their feet to the parachute at all.

Guy does really well here, though.

There's something about them choosing a rocking chair.

Like, as a comedian, you think, oh, I'm going to sit in that.

I'm going to rock it while I read.

You know, like, I feel like that was a choice.

Like, they chose a rocking chair, not only because it's like hard to maneuver, but just because you go, I'm going to rock back and forth while I give this a read.

Yeah, I mean, and Guy does it.

He sits down, but then hops on the chair and then starts to throw stuff out when he stood on the chair.

It's very impressive when he hops on that chair.

There's people in the studio going, like, ooh, this is

yeah

yeah because you just don't i don't know you don't expect that to be as effective as it is to sort of pogo stick a rocking chair around it doesn't make sense but he does it and also like i think karaos does a similar method as well like it it doesn't feel physically like that should work as well as it did but he is exhausted which i totally exhausted i also think there's such a low bar for physical fitness that in the world of comedy that when when anybody does anything like that, they're like, oh, this is incredible.

He's basically a gymnast when it comes to stand-ups.

Yeah, exactly.

Yes, but

his method is very effective.

I feel like that's maybe what I'll do.

But then I watched Laura and I thought, maybe I'd do that.

You never know, like, what kind of instinct is going to kick in when you're presenting something like that?

I don't know whether the instinct.

I think I would have remembered that I had to be sat down when I threw the things out.

I think I would have done because Guy remembers just about, he throws a few things out while he's still standing on the chair laura um remembers the whole weight doesn't stop sitting on the chair and uses the rubber ring for her feet which i think is genius i don't think i would have thought of that to be honest uh to be able to scooch while sitting down with your feet on something else i would have gone with what guy did and i think i would have remembered because david doesn't david david hops around all over the place same with matt they're hopping around it looks great they're so delighted with themselves that they're chucking stuff out they completely forget they have to be sitting down i i think that would be me for sure.

Is that you?

You get it, like it's like a, I don't know, like your brain is full of information.

And then, as soon as you add like one extra thing, you're like, okay, now I realize, oh, this is what I can do with the chair.

Then that detail is gone.

That happened to me so many times that I'm like, okay, I've thought of a method to do half of the task and the other half I've completely ignored.

Yeah, yeah, it's uh it's a chaotic one for sure.

Um, but uh, yeah, but guy does very well like we say uh 1161 only doesn't get the full uh the full lot because he was um standing up for a few things laura i'm gutted for laura that she missed three lego pieces uh but her face i mean shows how competitive she is even though she's clearly done amazingly anyway those three lego pieces haunt her dreams

Oh, absolutely.

Laura, very, very competitive person.

I'm a very competitive person as well.

I think I would have um, yeah, I would have lost it.

Yeah.

I love that your analysis, though, was like, oh, I think I would have got it right.

Like, I'd be honest there.

Well, I think I would remember because

I kept the task on me.

I always keep the task on me if I'm doing tasks.

And I think I'm so panicked about breaking rules and letting things go in a silly way that.

Okay.

I think I would have done really well, Mel.

Congratulations.

Five points.

Also, what's great about doing this podcast is I can just say that for everything.

I'll never have to do it again.

Oh, absolutely.

I think I would have got,

yeah, I thought I would have got a thousand points in that one.

But, you know, that's just me.

Well, I say I don't get to do it again, but I was at the house the other day filming a YouTube video for Taskmaster, and they let me

test a task for a future series.

Oh, my god, what was that like?

Were you

feeling like, wow, like I'm going, was it like going back to your old school?

It was a bit, but I can't tell you how weird it is filming, not filming a task.

So doing a task, but with absolutely no cameras on you, you just sort of get on with it.

Like there's no, you don't need to say anything.

You just crack on with the task.

And they did tell me out of film everyone who tested it so far, I'd done the best.

So I just want to let, I just want to.

Oh, wow.

I feel like the pressure on that is on the task and not you.

But then you feel the pressure to be entertaining enough that they keep the task.

Because if they if that task doesn't make it to a series, you must feel, wow, I must have

interesting enough.

Okay, well, that's fine.

Whatever.

What I did is I gave them some notes

to change the task slightly to what it would have been like if I'd done it perfectly.

So I was like, that's a bit annoying.

You've put that hurdle in that way there.

So not a literal hurdle, by the way.

I'm not giving away anything uh in in the task but yeah

so it was five points for guy four points for laura three points for ursula two points for david and one point for matt who has an absolute nightmare completely knocks the rocking chair over is on the riding the back of it like a little pony it's It's genuinely.

He's so funny.

He's so funny, Matt.

He's such, he just makes me laugh.

Everything he does makes me laugh.

He's so funny, and he's such a great, like working with him on radio, you realize how much he like sets up for other people as well.

So when he asks

Paul, I can't even remember what the question was, what's the opposite of bluff?

And I think he knows where the joke goes there.

I think every time he sets someone up, he is just trying to give someone a moment of glory, which I love.

Yeah, that's lovely.

So I'm imagining someone who read the task standing up, probably just relocated the chair and accumulated a bunch of shit around them.

Got it off that way.

Who do you think that would be?

Literally anyone else, except probably David.

I'd say David and I probably had similar methodology.

Am I missing something?

No.

What a weird task.

Task two.

Here we go.

This is it.

This is the crowning achievement of all of New Zealand culture, if you ask me.

Team task.

Create a diss track about the members of the other team.

Best diss track wins.

You have 45 minutes.

Your time starts now.

Look, we've talked about this on the podcast before.

The first time we had David on the show, he even wrote us a bespoke rap for the show.

It is

incredible.

But I think we should talk about Ursula and Matt first, their diss track, because I think this often gets forgotten because of David's performance in the other team.

But this

is insane.

Their rap is absolutely insane because

it feels like they've written their bits separately

because Matt keeps saying, We're going to eat your asses.

And then I've never seen a rap song where someone says something, and then the other person rapping takes a step away and distances themselves from what the other rappers say.

Yes, it's also again that the Matt playing dumb thing as well.

He 100% knows

it's a sexual thing, but he's really leaning into it.

And he has a band as well, Matt.

So he's got a band called Deja Voodoo.

My dad loves his song Bears, which goes, I'd give you one of my bears, but I've only got six.

It's a great showing.

It's a great song.

Check it out.

But, yeah, and I love how Ursula in her rap,

she uses the phrase,

this runs with this, runs with this, runs with this.

It's It's like

not often

referencing the fact that what they're saying is rhyming.

Yeah, the very basics of really exposing rap, sort of postmodern rap, just showing everyone what it is.

Yeah, but this is, oh gosh, this is basically, you know,

Kendrick and Drake levels of beef, this,

this rap battle.

This is the thing people are talking so much about Kendrick and Drake, and you want to be like, just watch Taskmaster New Zealand's season two, episode six, guys.

That's the only rap battle beef you'll ever need.

David is accused of wanking everywhere.

That seems to be the main.

Guys pale and Laura makes shit cakes.

So those are the.

I feel like David was the one who got the worst of it.

Oh, gosh.

It is so entertaining to watch because there's a lot of panic as well.

But these are your friends.

And you're like, what can I say?

about these people.

And I'm sure like Matt and Ursh will probably also genuinely try to be like a little nicer.

You know, they feel like they're higher status or you know been in the business for longer and so they're like, oh, what's Laura been in the news for lately?

Like she kind of, okay, what can we do about that?

And then David wanks everywhere.

David wanks everywhere.

It's so funny.

What was the reference to his garage?

Was he is this something he was doing in lockdown?

Was he doing like a live streaming thing or something?

I actually don't know.

Probably.

It sounds like something Dave would do.

He is at the moment, he's releasing a series of him doing DJ sets at gyms and getting kicked out.

So, you know, it wouldn't be surprising.

He's kicking out this DJ Death

at like 3 a.m.

No, absolutely.

It was shoving things up his ass.

Then he went to straight stand-up, and now he's DJing in gyms.

He's...

You'll never know.

You'll never know what you're going to get.

Let's talk about

David and Guy and Laura, the three friends.

I mean, even just the freestyles at the beginning while they're writing the rap,

Guy's face when David's freestyling is so funny because he's like, he finds it amusing, but he's so worried because he's talking about

running Matt Heath over like a cat.

That's one of my favorite bits where then both Laura and Guy are in a race to go, like, you shouldn't even run over cats, David.

You can't use that as a comparison.

But I say I think about

drown you, drown you in your own blood every day.

It's also like it's got flow.

That's the other thing.

Is that like this wreaths have flow?

Jordan, drown you in your own blood now.

It's the now at the end.

I find it stuck in my head to this day.

And it's quite an unsettling thing to just be thinking while you're doing your washing.

Yeah.

But just so violent.

And he's completely in his own world while he's doing it as well.

Like his head's going.

I love that.

And the rap itself, the rap itself is so funny because

when it starts, I'm like, Laura's about to absolutely annihilate these people because she's so good at this sort of thing.

The rap is so fast, but like clear and concise.

She sort of pulls back a little bit, and both her and Guy do the thing of being it's slightly ironic, so they're like acting as if they're completely taking Matt and Ursula apart, but they're like silly insults.

There's like, you know, semi-ironic

rap battle beef.

And then David comes in and it is full on.

It's,

yeah, it's like they have like a like, I love the order in which they did it as well.

Like the last, like David being glass, it's like they're like unleashing the beast from the cage.

Like it's this huge,

this huge moment.

And then just, yeah, again, you've never seen a rap group where the other two members are a little concerned about

the third.

Yeah.

Just sort of drawing rain a bit a little bit.

Yeah.

It's just, yeah.

It's really good.

It does have flow.

And ha, ha, split you like a banana.

That's good.

That's good stuff.

And I love that he did the meat pack thing and he wanted to apologize because it's, I think it's so sweet, but also the fact that he felt bad and you wanted to apologize makes me think that he meant it.

You know, like, like they all were on board that it was a joke, that like it wasn't fun.

And then he's like, I'm so sorry.

And suddenly it carries more weight.

You're like, well, if you're, if you've you've been really guilty about it, I reckon some parts of that were true.

Yeah,

you must be apologising for actually considering drowning us in our own blood and stringing us up with shoes.

Exactly.

I always thought this was a little bit of fun, but to know that you're remorseful makes me think

that these are the things you believe.

Well, it's astonishing.

I must have watched it over a hundred times since it came out.

It is absolutely brilliant.

And it's four points for Guy, Laura, and David.

They get one point, Guy, Laura, and David, for ageism.

Imagine that being the thing that annoyed you the most about this, or that worried you the most.

The ageism, one point, not the horrific violence.

Yes,

that's classic.

That's classic Jizza.

And Ursula and Matt get two points, which I think is fair.

That feels like fair scoring.

Maybe they could have got one more.

But I think both the wraps were great, but just nothing compared to what David did.

I loved that David had so many amazing moments of this

because

he was pretty new in the grand scheme of things.

Like he hadn't done a lot of television.

I don't think he'd done a lot of panel shows or anything.

So this was kind of like his first huge thing.

And when he like nailed it and he was so funny, like, I just felt so proud.

It was so, you know, kind of silly.

But, you know, seeing someone like that who hasn't had the opportunity or the right kind of of show, I guess, to show

him off as a performer and then Taskmaster coming around and being like, oh, this is perfect David Krause fodder.

You know, it's perfect for him.

Well, I think that that works for Taskmaster.

And certainly in the UK,

it's a really good home for

brilliant comics who wouldn't necessarily get on more traditional stuff.

So anyone who's just a bit odd and a bit more character based and, you know, who are brilliant, but there's just not been that format for them.

And I think, yeah, David's the perfect example of it, just allowed to run wild and show his personality.

And it really worked for him.

Fuck you!

Things we know about Laura.

She was on Seven Sharp.

Cakes.

You bake ugly shit cakes.

Yeah.

This is how flow goes.

I'ma break your nose.

Break your teeth, bitch.

Get out of my clothes.

Can't wait to hear his Christmas song.

Montgomery, more like Mont Goobery.

I'm gonna go, I'm gonna drown you

in your own blood.

Hold your face down, in your own blood now.

Hurry us, Wi-Fi boy.

Why you need all that Wi-Fi in the garage?

What are you wanking in there, buddy?

Yeah, that's good.

And the thing is, they've got nothing on us.

There's nothing, we're untouchable.

So we know.

Good luck to them.

Oh, we should make fun of them for being old.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

We should really bully them for being older than us.

Oh, do you think they put them together because combined their ages are the same as ours?

Surely they won't focus on that.

Let's talk about task three.

Keep this phone with you at all times, await further instructions and then I don't know how much later than receiving the phone, join this video chat.

You must be dressed as Abraham Lincoln.

Also, you must pretend to be Abraham Lincoln.

First to arrive wins, your time starts now.

This is brilliant.

So rarely are things taken outside of the house.

And the results are absolutely absolutely incredible.

Did you have anything like this

in your year where you had to do something outside the house just when you remembered?

Yes, it was win something and you had by episode eight

to win something

from from and I, because I used to work in radio,

called up Jeremy's radio show and put on a weird voice to win some movie tickets.

And I called myself Lem, as in Mel Backwards.

And he had no idea.

I really thought they would know because I was like, Hello, I'd like to win some movie tickets, please.

And like, they were like, Oh, this Lem guy seems a bit odd, but you know, here he goes.

And so, um, that was so fun.

I love, I love when it gets taken out of the studio, and I feel like this has another layer to it because you know, that was in my control.

I could decide when I do that, I could, you know, figure it out.

This was like all-consuming.

Bring this burner phone with you at all times.

It's like the show is over, but it's not over.

Like you have to, you have to stay ready that whole time.

It must be so anxiety inducing.

Yeah, I don't, and it's amazing that they all managed to get on to the call, to be honest.

It's amazing they were all in the same country.

You know, someone could have been on holiday.

I guess maybe they checked that everyone was around.

I reckon they must have, you know, had it, had an inkling of where people were just to make it.

Because that's the thing is like a zoom call in theory like could be hard to watch on tv you know what i mean like it could be like

hard to see visually how it could be interesting and edit together perfectly but it is so perfect and like it it escalates so much throughout the zoom call and there are revelations that like David and Guy had just had lunch together and they're sprinting to the same costume shop and

it's just like and then you know like Laura being so quick, but then looking like her summer bin Laden.

And Ursula, again, being Ursula, like doing her own spin on it and her own kind of lazy in air quotes way about it, but being so comedy focused.

Like the joke, I'm dead, I'm under a sheet, of course, is perfect.

It's oh, and then

Matt being just a bit rubbish in the viaduct.

In the viaduct, which the context for our

UK listeners is a very lot of foot traffic.

So he is just standing in amongst probably crowds of people.

And I assume lunchtime, they've all just had lunch with a cone on his head and like holding his phone out.

It's so funny.

It's so good.

And then Guy saying, I'd like to see this Abraham Lincoln waving with two hands and the cone just drops over his head.

It's so perfect.

But

it's art.

It really, like, Laura's speed was incredible.

I mean, obviously, she's at home, I'm assuming.

So she just grabs whatever she can

to dress up like, well, like Osama bin Laden.

But the fact that Guy and David are out and they managed to get like proper costumes, really, is very impressive, isn't it?

It was so good.

And I'm so glad that they did because

it could have very easily been everyone at their house

and it just wouldn't have been as chaotic.

But having people out in public on the street, I assume choosing around around lunchtime was the choice as well.

Hoping people were out to lunch and doing their own thing in public and just, oh, yeah.

And the person working at Look Sharp, just someone quick,

guy Montgomery going, you haven't able to have Lincoln costume, grabbing one quickly, and then not sort of a minute later, it is an even sweatier person running and asking for the exact same thing, but in more of a panic.

You must have been like, what is going on?

What's going on?

Is it like some sort of national emergency?

Has there been an alien invasion where the only things the alien can't see are Abraham Lincoln?

We need to get on this.

Yeah, absolutely brilliant.

I would have loved something like this to do in the series of Taskmaster I did.

I think, you know, having something where it doesn't feel like the show's over because it's so sad when you finish doing the tasks that I'm like, no, I've got one more.

I need to nail this.

And it's funny people getting, you know, Matt saying he was accused of being a drug dealer because he did have to carry around this like $29 phone with him at all times and just sort of check it.

And then, like they said, like there'd be, you know, a voda phone has a DL arm and you'd be like, like

in a panic, not knowing what it is.

It's just, yeah, I feel the same.

As soon as it was over, I was very sad.

So having something to keep it going.

Like that person who just wants the night never to end.

Yes, yes.

Let's keep going, guys.

Come on.

I think almost a good thing to do would, you know, the next series of New Zealand Taskmaster, give them something like this, but never do anything about it.

So be like, you've got,

keep hold of this phone, but never, ever do anything with it.

So they are tense for the whole time before the studio.

Perfect, perfect.

Laura, of course, gets the five points.

Guy with the four points.

David with three points.

Two for Ursula and one for matt and i think if it was quality of abraham lincoln costume matt would have got one there as well there's another person joining the call

oh

who is that

whereabouts are you right now uh the viaduct sir

right

just been having a bit of a lunch

Who's going to the theater tonight?

Well, I just got called out of it by the gentleman in the bow tie

this is very awkward because i've got i've got five different people claiming to be abraham lincoln well we all know who the real abraham lincoln is now i would like to see the abraham lincoln with the orange cone wave with two hands

live task taking turns name a celebrity your celebrity's name must start with the last letter of the previously named celebrity You cannot name a celebrity that has already been named.

You have 10 seconds to name your celebrity.

If you do not name one, you will be eliminated.

If Jeremy has not heard of your celebrity, you have a further 10 seconds to convince him that they are famous.

If you do not convince him, you are eliminated.

Last contestant standing wins.

A great game.

This feels like a car game.

This feels like the sort of thing that we've all played.

That's exactly what I was thinking.

It is fun to, yeah, have a game that you like want to play at home or in the car or at a party.

And you can also play it at home, but it's a lot, it's a lot harder than you think while you're trying to play along because it's like

Billy on the street where he goes up to someone and says, Name a woman.

You're like, oh, I don't like everything goes out of your mind.

You can't possibly think of someone that fits that.

I love how David starts with Yaquin Phoenix.

Very, very smart.

Yes, really, really, really good, but

it does not outfox the next person.

So this is just reminding me.

I was in a car with Sam Campbell once and we decided to play a game that I think he suggested where

you name a film,

then

the person has to name someone who's in that film.

Or I can't remember now.

But it's yeah, it's an actor.

It's actor then actor then film.

And then you have to name someone else who's in that film.

And I was always after Sam.

So I was always after Sam.

What people might not know is Sam has what I would call an encyclopedic knowledge of films.

So he will always get the answer right.

And what he did to me every time, when it's my first go, he'd, someone would say, you know, Tom Hanks or whatever, he'd then pick the most obscure film he could think of that Tom Hanks was in.

So I've got no idea who else is in it.

So I'm out every time.

And then every time I would get eliminated, he'd switch up his tactic to naming the most easy film for the next person just to get on my nerves.

It It was infuriating, Matt.

I cannot tell you how annoying it was, but

couldn't do anything about it.

I love that so much.

Oh, yeah, that is classic, Sam.

Choose a target.

Choose a target.

I kept doing it.

Doing a lineup, and we're doing a tour around New Zealand, and Sam was on the tour.

And

I felt like he chose the target, which was Guy Williams.

And

he kept, the way he was just targeting him was just go, you're a a bit of an alpha guy, aren't you?

You're the alpha.

And Guy was so, so defensive because he didn't want to be seen as like he was trying to be the alpha.

He said, no, no, no, you're a big, strong dude.

You're like the alpha of the group.

It was just so beautifully uncomfortable.

I loved it.

Yeah, I think Sam knows who's the pick on, and it's men who get angry easily.

And there we are, me and Guy Williams.

But yeah, this was very entertaining to watch, just to see the panic in people's eyes.

And also,

I think the added layer is you need to pick a celebrity within 10 seconds, which is hard enough with the right letter, but you also need to make sure that Jeremy might have heard of them.

Yeah, Guy was smart going

sport because Jeremy loves sport and he would 100% know all of the obscure names.

And there are a lot of obscure names in sport.

But yeah, going for young lean, that was never, that was never going going to pay off.

No, no, no, no, I don't think so.

And it's difficult to convince someone that a rapper is famous if they're not, you know, plugged into the rap scene.

Um, yeah, it was one point for Matt, two points for David, three points for Ursula, four points for Guy, and five points for Laura, meaning that Guy wins the episode with 21 points.

Very impressive.

Uh, then Laura, then David, then Ursula, and Matt at the bottom with an equally impressive seven points.

It is very difficult to get seven points in an episode of Taskmaster, and he's absolutely smashed it.

Well done to Matt.

Meaning Laura is still in the lead, only just by four points with Guy in second, David in third, Ursula in fourth, and Matt, of course, on the bottom with 77 points.

You know, Matt scored so lowly, but people didn't really disagree with it.

You know, often someone gets a really low score and people go, oh, he's being picked on by the Taskmaster.

When Matt is like, oh, no, that's about right.

Jeremy's finally got it right.

I think Jeremy absolutely nailed it there.

I think not even Matt would disagree, really,

that he was underscored.

Mel, thank you so much for coming on the Taskmaster podcast.

Please, can you tell us about your tour?

Because you are in the UK at the moment.

As we speak, you are in the UK.

So, obviously, anyone listening to this in the UK, I think there's a fair few of you, do go and see Mel on tour.

Tell us a little bit about your show.

My show is about, it's called Attack of the Melanie Bracewell, and it is about how I lost my AirPods and I tracked them down

and I tracked the person down and I confronted them about it.

That's essentially what it is.

I think that's as good as a sell for any show I've ever heard.

Like when shows are like, it's just about me and, you know, how I feel about stuff.

I'm like, no, I want a story and I want you to track someone down.

That's fantastic.

Oh, yeah.

And every other show I've ever done has been, it's about me and my life.

And when this happened to me,

I was like, this is great.

There's a cameo as well from Ursula Carlson because

I brought her as my muscle because I was quite scared to go by myself.

But we turned up at this guy's work and

I asked for him back as a form of, you know, rejection therapy, I guess.

But

it kind of...

weirdly, and I didn't even, I mean, I kind of wrote it this way, but it ended up being, sort of has a lot of layers and a lot of mystery and a lot of kind of red herrings of people who actually thought it was and it wasn't and things like that.

So at the very least, I think it's a very satisfying show to watch.

Fantastic.

Well, tickets at melanybracewell.com.

If you're in the UK,

Leicester Square Theatre on the 7th of March, Forge Comedy Club in Brighton on the 8th of March, and the Cambridge Junction on the 9th of March.

All fantastic venues.

Do go and see Mel.

Mel, we always ask our guests to rate their experience on the podcast between one and five points in the style of of the Taskmaster.

We hope you've had a good time, but please give us an honest point score for today's record.

I will be honest, and also because I have had a great time, but also because

you know

we're sort of

kind of friends, but we sort of don't see each other very often.

And I think if I rated you poorly,

that would

kind of pull our friendship apart at the scenes.

And so I would 100% go five stars, five points, Eden.

Five stars, no, five stars.

I take it.

this is the first time i've ever had five stars it probably is whoa um i was just thinking about my shy my own shy sorry i was confused

i will take five stars uh mel thank you so much enjoy the rest of your tour and i will see you soon bye-bye awesome

Thank you so much to Mel for coming on the podcast.

You heard the details of the tour there.

Make sure you go and see that show.

She's absolutely brilliant.

Thank you very much for listening.

We'll be back next week to talk about Taskmaster New Zealand Series 2, episode 7.

But for now, I've been a gamble.

Bye-bye.