The comedy basement is a new venue just off the main street of Reading at 8 Queen Victoria Street. This is a brand spanking new venue. It's downstairs (as the name implies) from the Cosmopolitan Bar & Bistro - who incidentally do a pretty good Americano Coffee. The venue itself is quite small, seating between 30 & 40 people. The room is "L" shaped with the stage sited in the corner providing good lines of sight to the entire room. A small portable bar is at the back of the room by the main entrance to the venue and amenities are just off to the left of the bar area. There were a couple of issues with sound as the night before (after the gig) the mic had been left in the stand and some punters got a hold of it and broke it. This fact, discovered at 6pm 2 hours before the next gig on Saturday. The room was small enough that you didn't really need a microphone, but the venue staff and tack supplier were doing all they could to ensure the venue was as adequately furnished as any good comedy club would be. The microphone wasn't able to be repaired and a new mic was brought in. Lighting was adjusted so that it was facing the stage, and the show started to a full house albeit 20 minutes after the advertised start time of 8pm. The crowd were predominantly white couples, no birthdays or stags, one guy from Jordan (the place not the glamour model) and one dick who thought he'd have a crack at out "funny-ing" the acts. There's always one! I was MC last night and faced with 10-15 at the top, seeing that the crowd was young (average age was maybe 24) and white, seemed relatively well heeled and educated. Didn't appear they were drinking heavily, I figured I'd start off light and witty, filed out a little chit chat followed closely by clean and clever and the audience just weren't into it, sure they laughed in the right places but weren't really committed. By the time Aaron Counter came on the crowd had a little more energy to them and had strapped in for the night ahead. Aaron went really well and it was only after watching his set and recognising which gags they really laughed at, I realised that the crowd we had in that night, even though they weren't drinking, wanted blue. Half time came and went, I opened the 2nd half by taking the crowd to dick joke island where they lounged on ball sack bean bags (as a friend of mine said) and laughed contentedly, comfortable in the knowledge that they had found "their" place. Gerry K was headlining and stepped onto a well warmed crowd and killed for 25 minutes and proved why he had top billing. We wrapped the show just after 10pm. All told, a good little venue run by very hospitable staff who kindly offered free coffee, soft drinks and water while I was there. Props to Hana Skalli who put the whole thing together, organised the bookings and the sound & lighting and was still on the street at 7.45pm flyering for next weeks show.