Review by Steve Bennett

His delivery is as slick and professional as you might expect from a North American act. He exudes confidence and control, yet remains relaxed and easy-going, but all the while ensures the set skips along at a decent pace.

It means he never lets the audience’s attention drift, even when the quality of the material wavers, as it does occasionally – such as the very poor David Attenborough impression. The only time he really has to struggle is after a segment ostensibly designed to talk about the stupidity of racism, but ends up flirting with it; portraying Palestinians as suicide bombers and French women as hairy.

But these are rare slips in an otherwise fluid and often impressive set, where even subjects you may have heard tackled before – such as circumcision – are covered with flair and originality. He has an especially fine piece of material about Post-It notes female flatmates leave each other, plus has a keen outsiders’ eye for some of the quirky traits in the British psyche.

Parts of his set are apparently filthy – too filthy, in fact, for the promoter of the gig where Chortle saw him to let him perform it, so we cannot pass comment. But on what we did observe, McLean appears a reliably funny act with very well-honed performance skills.

Review date: 1 Nov 2007
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett