'New rap', same old filth

The sky seems to be the limit where contemporary black American comedy is concerned. Stand-up Jamie Foxx recently bagged an Oscar, while on the live circuit humour is the new rap, with Def Jam's comedy packages filling arenas alongside hip hop stars.

Judging by this tour, however, the new wave of rising urban gagsmiths is as depressingly libido-fixated as their musical contemporaries, peddling prehistoric ideas that would make Germaine Greer despair but would delight a Roy 'Chubby' Brown audience.

Compere Brooklyn Mike is typical. He was initially affable, but was soon doling out gender wars clichés about what makes women different with added expletives. In his favour, though, was a refusal to glamorise violence and he did slickly nail reggae's homophobic streak.

Opener Roger Rodd was certainly different, being white and having a Seventies porn star bouffant. And his material refusing to patronise: "White people stole jazz and the blues. Black people stole my stereo" was an audacious gambit in front of a mainly black crowd and with added dick-joke attitude he surfed a wave of chuckles.

Mike Yard noted contrasts between British and American television. Back home it is all about killing, here it seems to be all about bathrooms. Inevitable lubricious comments jostled with observations on post-colonial black-on-black racism in Manhattan.

Newly-arrived Nigerian cabbies won't give Afro-Americans rides, saying "You're the ones that got caught."

Headliner Willy Robbo used his gymnastic physique to impressive effect when imagining that sex was an Olympic event, but his entirely unquotable set was so filthy it would make Richard Pryor blush. The fans loved it, although the Academy Awards will have to wait - there is not enough soap in the world to clean these acts up for mainstream consumption.

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Raw: The American Comedy Show