Silky: Indoor Fireworks

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The show may be called Indoor Fireworks but there's little explosive here. Silky is a low-key comedian, welcoming the crowd as they enter the venue, and thanking them—by name—as they leave at the end. This is a gentle hour of comedy, which might be just what some punters need amid the chaos and energy swarming Edinburgh during its festival season. Silky has the demeanour of an amusing friend telling anecdotes in the pub, and he works hard to ensure the audience is at ease.

As such he's clearly a very nice bloke, and I feel churlish wishing his material was stronger or more inventive. Drawing on contributions from the crowd he improvises a song about motor racing, which eventually finds some decent comic moments but takes a long time getting there. Another song recounts his love affair with a sheep, which contains some comic wordplay but feels like an idea other comedians have mined more thoroughly and savagely. The audience is asked to read out the answers from Trivial Pursuits cards, for which he improvises comic questions – but these are no more quick-witted or creative than those a bunch of drunken bantering lads would proffer.

He has fans, though. Half the audience has seen him before, and there's a queue afterwards to sign up to his newsletter. There's clearly space for this kind of laidback humour, and there's a crowd at the Fringe keen to find it.