Derek & Clive

Warning: Disgusting language!

Depravity, an utter disregard for all decent morality

Two of Britain's great comic talents slumming it

...All of the above could be said...understandably, about Derek & Clive, Peter Cook & Dudley Moore's toilet-cleaner alter-egoes...and yet, I really don't see it as such.

With 3 albums (and 1 DVD) of mostly revolting material, I have to admit, I don't believe I ever laughed so hard in my life as when I heard the first Derek & Clive album in 1978. It was frequently utter filth but instead of just hearing schoolboy humor in excelsis, I heard astonishing improvisational comedy as if the duo were two great jazz musicians working off each other, improvising, sometimes returning to a theme, sometimes not.

Mostly the flights of fancy were from Cook...with Moore frequently cracking up or corpsing as is the English parlance, these days...but occasionally it was Moore who's lead the charge into total lunacy e.g.

After telling Moore about the worst job he's ever had, retrieving lobsters from Jayne Mansfield's bum, resulting in Moore cracking up, Cook suddenly demands of Moore:

Cook:      What's the worst job you ever 'ad?

Moore:    The worst job I ever 'ad...

Moore sniggers to himself...

Moore:   ...was pickin' up Winston Churchill's bogies (U.S. trans: boogers).

And so it goes, lunacy upon lunacy, sometimes falling flat...but often reaching the stars. If you're prepared not to be offended, Derek & Clive LIVE, is superb, one-of-a-kind entertainment.

Derek And Clive: Derek And Clive LIVE

"...The first of the Derek And Clive albums...grew from Peter Cook's desire to record a comic monologue about extracting lobsters from Jayne Mansfield's bottom..." Amazon UK reviewer Mr. A Pomeroy 

"...There's an old show business story about a team of TV writers sitting around in a room telling the funniest, most off-the-wall jokes that anyone had ever heard. After a few minutes, one of them says "OK, it's time to stop and actually write the show." They then proceed to sober up and turn out the usual TV fare.

The "Derek and Clive" albums are like sitting in a session like that - they're terrific if only for the stream-of-consciousness raw liquor humor they contain and which the public usually doesn't see because it fails to lend itself to conventional forms and delivery..." Amazon UK reviewer Mark A. Banash

"...The way in which Pete and Dudely make up conversation on cue about the most outragous things is amazing....Although done in a stupid, vulgar, and quite offensive tone, those of you who love comedy in all its forms should buy this and appreciate its brilliance of making you laugh without control..." Amazon UK reviewer G.A. Pyper

The second album, Come Again, recorded 3 years later is both sharper and nastier, but still just as funny. Here's a little animation that one youtube user created which is pretty good, using the original dialogue...

     Derek & Clive: This Bloke Came Up To Me     

Once more, Come Again is recommended...but only if you can tolerate a harshness and I mean, dreadful, dreadful harshness,  that's light years away from the lovable Pete & Dud of The Sixties. 

Derek And Clive: Derek And Clive Come Again

"...Pete and Dud, sometime in the early seventies, mutated into Derek and Clive, a pair of Tory-voting, heavy-drinking, football-loving toilet attendants who have an opinion on everything, think the world's gone mad and are deeply embarrassed by women..." Amazon UK reviewer The Leebert

"...The comedy is crude, witty and clever all at once. There are some classic sketches here that have probably reached legendary status. These guys were cutting edge and Peter Cooke is utterly hilariously drunk and insane..." Amazon UK reviewer Paul J. Tayler "saul 2006"

"...I'm sorry, but there's nothing remotely funny about the utterly tasteless and offensive material in this "comedy" album, which deals with issues including extreme sexual taboo and a man with cancer of every part of his body. It's still the best thing I've ever heard though..." Amazon UK reviewer the thief of brisco "dean_andy"

Reading Harry Thompson's Peter Cook biography puts Derek & Clive Come Again in a very different heart-breaking light, with the two great talents barely able to find anything good in each other, other than their mutual ability to shock.

The final Derek & Clive album, Ad Nauseam is a very sad affair indeed, with Cook & Moore openly despising each other. The material is shoddy and lacking much inspiration but still somehow manages to sparkle occasionally. By this time Moore had begun to break in America as a romatic lead and Ad Nauseam becomes an ugly battleground, with Cook belligerent that Moore had succeeded where he had not.

Derek And Clive: Derek And Clive Ad Nauseum

"...The humor is coarse but enlivened with Peter Cook's whimsical imagination. (One story begins, "The thing I can't stand about Russia is all the dead dissidents in your hotel room!") Moore, for his part, plays along with improvisations driven by his partner, laughing infectiously and, at times, trying to derail or outdo Cook..." Amazon reviewer Algernon D'Ammassa

"...If you like your humour subtle and politically correct then this is certainly not for you. I listen to the CD every day and even now, after about 200 listens, it is still every bit as funny as it ever was. They take huge sideswipes at organised religion, the BBC, dead rock and roll stars, Kenneth Kendall, Jesus and that is only during one selection, The Horn..." Amazon UK reviewer proudmumofagayson

As Un-PC As You Can Ever Imagine: "...From the gut-wrenching cover art to the final "Critics" sketch, Derek & Clive's "Ad Nauseam" is an essential of the highest order for those (like me) who like their humour as surreal and twisted in the vilest manner imaginable..." Amazon UK reviewer A Customer

Ad Nauseum's improvisations were filmed and released on VHS, but I don't believe they're available any more...though I'll keep you posted on that.