Show Rating:

Dwight Slade's claim to fame is that he used to knock around with Bill Hicks, which should be reason enough for any die-hard comedy fan to seek him out.

But in America, he's an accomplished act in his own right, with years of experience that have given him a professional sheen and his own slick style, far removed from his old pal's dark preacher approach.

In the States, too, an hour is a widely accepted length of a headliner's act, so the transition to an Edinburgh slot can be a lot easier than for British comics weaned on 20-minute sets.

The flip side of this is that US acts often don't strive to theme a show around one grand idea as many home-grown stand-ups do. Their shows can therefore seem more fragmented, even if their time on the circuit has taught them how to pace 60 minutes without obvious structural devices. All this is true of Slade.

His material savages all the worst part's of the American psyche - the ignorance, political and corporate bullying and laziness that comes from being the world's richest nation.

The sentiments might be familiar to regular comedy-goers this side of the Atlantic, but his strength is that he always nails the point concisely and effectively. Sladeskilfully employs every technique of stand-up to drive his message home, from voices to stagecraft to physicality - most notably when he miming out a show-stopping routine about dangerous driving.

Computers, flying, driving, shopping his observations mostly remain safely mundane, and he never really offers any fresh insight, despite the occasional aside that hints at some deeper thoughts, which are never delivered.

Slade's forte, though, is expressing his ideas so passionately that he spellbinds the audience, who listen, and laugh, intently. It's an object lesson in pitch-perfect delivery.

He may not be a Hicks, but he remains one of the more accomplished American acts to have graced Edinburgh this year.