Jason Byrne is a lucky man when it comes to unearthing material before his very eyes. I don't know what comedy God he prays to, but who else would be lucky enough in the opening minutes of a set to pick on a random audience member and land a sixteen year old American called Elk, son of a circus clown? Comedy gold, You could make a whole show out of that alone, but then he noises up another punter who happens to be a heavy metal fan from Cyprus. And so it goes on.
These unfortunates find themselves woven into the fabric of Jason's show, playing bit-parts throughout the next hour. It's all good knock-about stuff, but it's when he stops playing with his audience long enough to turn to his set, that we get the to carefully crafted core of this year's act.
This turns out to be a wonderful, daft prattle involving the state of his marriage, childbirth (and the consequent condition of his wife's nether bits), having an evil seven year old son, giving advice to the young and throughout it all, the sheer joy of being Irish. All of it wrapped up in nonsense and delivered at break-neck speed whilst bounding around the stage like Tigger on ketamine.
Finish this off with a some near-the-knuckle remarks to Charles & Camilla after Jason's appearance at the Royal Variety Show; add a bit of the best crap 'magic' I've seen for a long time, and you have a justifiably big-name performer at the top of his comedy game. Go see.
PS It's the Assembly on the Mound, not the Assembly Rooms in George Street even Fringe-hardened veterans can get it wrong learn from our mistakes (blush)!
