There aren't many taboos left in comedy. Or at least that’s what I thought until I saw Sanderson Jones. Jones knows everyone who is coming. He greets us all by name, he's researched us. He seems at times to know everything about us. The experience is deeply uncomfortable, utterly compelling and absolutely hilarious.I first meet Jones the day before the show. He is selling every ticket in person and mine is no exception. He bounds up to me, big bushy beard and unkempt hair, and asks me to phone his dry-cleaners whilst he rummages in his bag for my ticket. He takes a couple of photos of me, one of us together and then bounds away as quickly as he came. When I sit down at his gig the following evening he introduces me to the people next to me, both named John. 'Tom's here on his own today' Jones tells them. 'Did he take a photo of you too?' I ask when I sit down. John gives me a considered nod.Over the next hour or so Jones takes us to the extremes of comedic convention and taste. In a genre where genuine discomfort and transgression are hard - almost impossible - to achieve, Jones has found a mode of humour so dark and arresting that he manages to create an atmosphere of collective danger, rather than a parade of merely distasteful articles. This is all about testing the sensibilities of the audience, rarely about mocking the unfortunate and is carried off with the perfect mixture of linguistic ingenuity and joyous immaturity. Even a Venn diagram can become darkly comic in Jones' grubby hands.But the topic of most discomfort is nothing dark or irreverent but the last and biggest taboo of all: the audience themselves. Jones has been on our social networks, he's scoured our online lives and he’s using them to generate his material. Why on earth should this offend our sensibilities? It's all about power. On the internet we each like to believe we have power over our little corner, over our blogs or Twitter feeds or whatever it is we use – they are our space to shout into the cosmos. Sanderson Jones whips this power from us. He is as flattering and unnerving as a persistent but non-threatening stalker. Jones is the cosmos answering back.
