Written by: Luke Toulson
Published: Tuesday 5th August 2014

Being referred to as a 'veteran' has none of the Vietnam movie-cool I anticipated in my youth, but nevertheless this year will be my 12th Edinburgh Fringe. An entire year spent attention-seeking in the Scottish capital.

My first pilgrimage to the Fringe was in 1997, in the back of a clapped-out mini-van with a bunch of Manchester University students. The show was a 5-star sell-out and I thought, "This Edinburgh malarkey is a piece of piss". The following year I returned in a production of Macbeth. The infamous curse struck our play by throwing together a cast utterly devoid of any acting talent. The audience of mostly American tourists looked on, genuinely bemused to have discovered a group of people who understood less about Shakespeare than they did.

At this time the Fringe was evenly spread across both the Old and the New Town and Bristo Square was yet to house any of the 'big four' venues. The Pleasance Courtyard didn't have a curfew, the Gilded Balloon was a hive of comedy down on Cowgate where a hotel now stands and the Underbelly was no more than a twinkle in the eye of two Edinburgh students.

The biggest change during my years at the Fringe is undoubtedly the huge increase in the number of comedy shows. When I first came, Edinburgh felt like a theatre festival with bits of stand-up on the fringes of the Fringe, but by 2012 comedy had officially became the largest section of the Fringe brochure. Theatre in particular seems to have suffered as a result, with many prestigious companies choosing to premiere their work elsewhere. Other areas of the Fringe programme however - such as cabaret and children's shows - seem to be flourishing.

More shows of course require more reviewers. Back in the 1990s, ThreeWeeks was the sole festival-specific publication and The Scotsman was the Fringe Bible. These days there are huge numbers of websites and publications, meaning that it is very difficult for a show not to get at least one great and one terrible review, somewhat undermining the integrity of the whole system.

The least welcome change over the past 15 years has been the vast hike in ticket prices. In the mid-90s an average ticket cost £5-£7, encouraging Fringe-goers to take a punt on unknown acts. With prices now regularly twice this, audiences are less like to take a chance with their time and money. However, the increase in ticket prices, along with the huge costs faced by many performers in bringing a show to the Fringe, has led to the most significant change of recent years; the explosion in the number of free shows. Free(ish) for the performer to put on, and free for the audience to watch - the latter of whom are then encouraged to pay what they want at the end of the show. This feels in some way a return to what the Fringe should be about: experimental, unfiltered, accessible, live entertainment.

The one constant has been the huge number of Fringe-goers, without whom none of this would be possible. Every year they continue to attend in their thousands, swarming up and down the Royal Mile and into the various cloakrooms and toilets which double as performance venues.

Spare a thought for the many students who will be travelling to the Fringe for the first time this year, possibly in the back of clapped-out mini-vans. They may not know it yet, but they might just have started a relationship with the Fringe that will dominate their adult life.

Luke Toulson: Laid-Back Grouch is free at Cabaret Voltaire, daily at 7:35pm until the 23rd August. Listing