Andy Parson's cabbie-like style and content may mask his comedy pedigree, but his hilarious rants are so good no-one will be calling him a taxi any time soon, writes Tony Kirwood.

With his regular appearances on Mock the Week, the exasperated, wheezing delivery and pugnacious features of Andy Parsons are becoming increasingly familiar. No surprise, then, more than 400 people turned up at Blackheath Halls to see his full-length 90-minute solo act.

Parsons’s live presence is more genial than on TV. He began by amiably joshing the front rows, making the most of the inevitable latecomers. But everyone seemed happier when he settled down into what he does best, which is ranting.

His material is topical, taking on everything from Iraq, binge drinking to Deal or No Deal. He has honed the classic set up, punch line technique to a fine art, building expectations so well he sometimes dispenses with the payoff completely.

His persona is that of the commonsense-geezer-driven-to-distraction-by-the-absurdity of-the-way-things-are-done. ‘If you see a murder, you’re going to remember it. So why those yellow police signs in the streets?’ or ‘picking Sarah Palin to vie with Hilary Clinton for the female vote just because she’s a woman is on a level with replacing Mother Theresa with Katie Price’.

The biggest laughs were for his routine about Britishness, always a winning topic. ‘Why’, he mused, ‘doesn’t the PM declare Britain Day as a surprise at 8pm on the morning?’ His delivery is very tight and hardly a joke is lost. However the rhythm of a couple of gags followed by a pause and a switch of topic felt repetitive at times. If he loosened up a little and gave some of his ideas some more rein, his set could begin to really take off.

He is also physically a little stiff, and doesn’t seem to know what to do with his non-mike hand, which remains either stuffed in a pocket or tucked incongruously behind his back in a Mr Darcy kind of way.

In spite of his Cambridge Footlights background, Andy Parsons comes across as a very funny expostulating taxi driver. It’s a persona which continues to work very well for him, so there is little chance of him having to take the Knowledge in real life.

Andy Parsons Citizens UK tour continues until May