Comedy review: Jimmy McGhie's Tribal Gathering

Edinburgh Festival Fringe: For anyone who hasn't seen one in Edinburgh yet, this is a stand-up comedy show.

Laughing Horse @ The Pear Tree (Venue 257)

****

After a bit of wittering about having no offstage mike and only a curtain separating us from the rest of the bar, Jimmy gets stuck in to one of the most accomplished hours of comedy you will find here this month. Or, to be honest, anywhere, any time. He is on the free fringe this year after lack of audiences and crushing financial losses over seven years in Edinburgh in August left him with a three packet of Haribo Tangfastic a day habit. Jimmy is Generation Y, and his heydays are, he thinks, behind him, given that his hangovers now last thre days and he has lost the taste for current music styles. All his friends are married with kids while he shares a flat with a ghastly sounding pseudo left wing, pseudo-environmentalist he found on Gumtree. Dodgy tattoos, Brazil’s Global Brand, avocados and quinoa, coke and ketamine, babies and the horror of finding your island paradise overrun with millenials are the stuff of his hour and I am hard pushed to remember a moment without laughter in the room. Jimmy is posh and he knows how to use it. Few comics could wring such comic jeopardy out of a club sandwich. He is also a clever actor and the other characters that pop up as he herds us through his hilarious hour are pitch-perfect. He is wonderful with audience interaction, smartly self-effacing and I cannot think of any possible reason for his not being a huge star. He is white, male, posh and straight, and so ticks no boxes any more, but he bravely overcomes all that to be very, very funny. It is actually a relief to have an hour of pure funny with no deep meaning, no narrative arc, and no political message. At any moment, were he not so hugely talented, he would just be another cocky little sh*t with a mike, but on the contrary, he is a brilliant talent who really ought to be much better known than he is. Queue early, his room is deservedly packed. And forgive his appalling bucket speech, this is first attempt.

Until tomorrow. Today 4pm.