"There are people at the back eating while I'm trying to smoke!"

Stewart Spaull First up onto the Malarkey stage tonight was a bonus last-minute act, Stewart Spaull.

Stewart has changed his style twice during his stand-up career so far. First off he did a character act, Brockley Spears, followed by observational material. His latest style is deadpan one- and two-liners. Some of the gags are more obvious than others, and some require a bit of thinking (which is no bad thing). There was a lot of clever material in there which really should have got a bigger reaction from the crowd. His stage manner is definitely improving with each gig - he's into the final of the Best of British competition at the Frog & Bucket so that speaks volumes.

R & B Next on, making their debut at XS Malarkey, was double act R & B.

The thing that really confused me about R & B is that why were they a double act? The material could easily have been delivered by a single comic, and the main problem was (apart from weak material in parts) was that they tended to step on each other's lines at the wrong time and the whole thing sounded unrehearsed. Perhaps given time they could improve, but to me they came across as an Aldi version of Electric Forecast. There were laughs in places but at 14 minutes it was too long for an open spot.

Rob Riley Next up was an act with a delightfully sick sense of humour, Rob Riley.

Rob was doing his first paid gig at Malarkey's which is a good a recommendation from Toby as you can get. His set has come on leaps and bounds and he had some new material tonight as well as the tried and tested stuff. A likeable and confident stage presence combined with some great punchlines including some fairly near the knuckle stuff, which was great. I reckon Rob is going to be one of Dominic Tighe the new generation of Manchester comics who are starting to go places.

After the break came the main support act of the evening, Dominic Tighe.

Dom had quite a slick stage presence, bags of confidence and material that was good, if not great. There was some observational stuff, delivered in a faintly sarcastic way, which reminded me of Mike Tombs a bit. Quite a solid set, which, if it didn't set the room on fire, certainly went down well enough with the crowd.

Jamie Mathieson Headliner was a comic who's played XS Malarkey once before, Jamie Mathieson.

Jamie had an affable, fairly laid-back style and started off with a bit of banter about an incident where he interrupted someone having a shit in the Malarkey bogs (there was no lock on the door). There was a bit of stuff about the war, followed by blow jobs - not exactly original but presented in a funny enough way. There was some good improvised stuff involving sperm in the eye (you had to be there), and a variety of gags, observations and audience banter. A good, solid set from a competent comedian.

See you next week.

Spider.