"KISS MY FURRY TITS, YOU CHUBBY-FACED MONGS!"

First act of the night tonight was the affable Demitris Deech from Cheltenham.

Demitris started with a few gags about how posh Cheltenham is, followed by material about being on television, Etch-a-Sketches (eh? remember them?), and his girlfriend's slang names for his cock. The material was quite widely ranged (Tim Henman, and the fact that chickens can't fly) and most of it got a reasonable reaction (a couple fell a bit flat) and on the whole it wasn't a bad set.

Next on, a last minute extra act making his comedy debut, was Steve Jacoby.

Steve had a well-spoken, very measured delivery of material that, although it appeared to be scripted to the point of being a monologue, it featured excellent humour with some truly great turns of phrase and intelligent use of language, aided somewhat by the 'BBC2 History Lecturer' style delivery. It's nice to have an act at Malarkey's trying something a little bit different. Anyone who can include the phrases "leathery coccoon" and "technowomb" gets the thumbs up from me. Hopefully he'll continue to develop and do more gigs.

Third onto the stage was ginger-haired funnyman Chris Brooker.

Chris started off well with some new material about his propositioning by a student prostitute, hypothesising on the idea of it appealing to some Daily Mail reader with an incest fantasy: "IS THIS WHAT I PAY YOU FIFTY POUNDS A MONTH FOR?!" Then came material about Blind Date, followed by his tried and tested DVD porn in reverse routine. All in all it was a well-balanced, solid set which the audience responded to nicely (Chris' presence and delivery helped them sit up and pay attention).

Next up was Ashley Frieze.

Ashley started out with some material about his experiences of doing gigs in Leeds and Mosley (near Birmingham), and the moved on to stuff about a dream he had about Jordan using her breasts to hypnotise men into killing people, via the gift of her breasts. The only problem with that bit was that there was no punchline at all. Moving on, he took to the guitar for his tried and tested songs that usually go down well with crowds, and tonight was no real exception. Guitar-based acts are sometimes frowned upon for taking the easy, safe route in comedy, but I suppose if it works it works. At times Ashley can look as if he's trying too hard and doesn't really come across as convincing on stage, but in general it went down well enough.

Next act of the night, and one of my favourites, certainly in terms of performance, was Jo Dakin.

Jo was on particular mad form tonight, so much so that the audience took a little while to get used to her style. Once they had they really seemed to enjoy it, and rightly so. Jo has a fantastic use of language, in particular the bit of material about 'wacky people' in offices: "I'LL KILL YOU ALL, YOU SAD MEANINGLESS BLOODY COCKHEADS!" It's funny 'cause it's true. I have actually seen Jo do better but it was still a great gig nevertheless, and she finished off in fantastic style with a few brilliant poems.

Headline act of this very good night at Malarkey's was former City Life Comedian of the Year Jason Manford.

Jason has played at XS Malarkey (and, indeed, Murphy's Malarkey) several times, and I always thought of him as a solid, if unspectacular, act. But the last couple of times (including this one) he has played here he's taken his act up a notch, with some well-crafted material and a naturally funny stage presence. Tonight had some familiar material and some he'd tried out recently in a ten minute spot. The crowd took to him immediately, and probably the highlight for me was the tale about him almost killing his mate with a helium gas cannister. A good end to a good night.

Spider.