Jay Em - Leath L. Payne Live Debut

Jay Em - Leath L. Payne made their triumphant live debut this past Sunday at J. Foxs Freestyle Comedy Night. This local pseudo-gangsta-rap duo were the surprise hit of the evening performing 3 songs and providing more laughs than the actual comedy acts that pre- and proceeded them.

The first act of the evening was a new improv duo, 1 Foot 1, named because James Van Niekerk is one foot, one inch taller than partner Caitlin Curtis, clever...eh? I know improv isn't always about laughs and good story lines, but this performance provided little or no laughs and had more awkward pauses than a...ah..ah...? In improv, especially for duos, chemistry is a top priority and unfortunately there didn't seem to be a lot. Caitlin tried very hard to rescue scenes, but the lack of a compatible skill level made it difficult...and it dragged on a little too long. Maybe next time.

The other Improv troupe ("the best part...", the headliners) is the core cast of the Micro Theatre Company. The cast is made up of Liam Schumacher, Caitlin Curtis, Lucas Conway, Kya Dimaline and Erik Berg. They had their moments and despite the young age of most of the group, their experience as improver's was evident. They incorporated some weird kind of style where the members that weren't in the scene were actively writing short monologues (this style is called "Ghost Jail") that were read aloud on stage and was used as inspiration for the next scene. As I said, this was all hit and miss, but with more hits.

Squeezed in between was the highlight of the night, Jay Em - Leath L. Payne, whose identities have been shroud in mystery before this evening. What worked in their favour was that most people in the audience didn't know what to expect. Close friends have probably heard some of the songs on their MySpace page, but the question whether they would be able to reproduce their sound on stage was a challenge. Jay Em sampled their beats and music from a laptop on stage (all the music was originally recorded by both musicians), but all the vocals were live. Their music and lyrics were so over the top and a dead-on parody of this stupid genre, that you almost thought they were serious. The over-use of that annoying "auto-tune" was ridiculously funny. Songs with subject matter such as bullying, girls that like to be treated badly and religion are given an insensitive politically incorrect treatment that was laugh out loud hilarious. Hopefully next time they'll be given more time so they can perform a larger repertoire of soon to be anthems.

Here is the live recording from Jay Em-Leath L. Payne's set. It is also available on their MySpace page as well as the studio versions of these and other songs.

JAY EM-LEATH L. PAYNE
J. Foxs, Winnipeg, MB
December 6, 2009
1. Bullies
2. Mr. Jerk
3. Re: Demshun