Frank Skinner makes the point that there are currently two “types” of comedian on the UK circuit: those who thrive on observational comedy and are seen as generally more accessible, and those comedians who make more “intellectual” jokes, but whose audiences can be judged as pretentious.

Skinner himself uses more colourful language, but nonetheless concludes that he wants to appeal to both audiences.

True enough, his style does straddle the two “schools” of comedy, and it does so quite brilliantly.

Skinner has a natural conversational flow, which completely distracts from how tightly his structure runs.

At times, his audience interaction did feel forced- but Skinner does acknowledge the problems of talking to “comedy cul-de-sacs”, and saves the conversation from awkwardly grinding to a halt.

His anecdotes touch upon the usual comedy fodder: relationships, sexploits, and being recognised in the street.

However, Skinner puts his own spin on each one, and I never quite knew where the punchlines were headed.

It’s a testament to Skinner’s skill that he can keep performing for 27 years and still keep developing sets.

Even Skinner highlights this, recounting one of his first “great” written jokes, which he now dismisses as dumb- but does so with a cheeky glee of getting to tell the joke again.

There are a couple of red herrings within the set, which lead to a satisfying end punchline. His observational and intellectual mix is a genius concoction, and marks Skinner out as a comedy great.

- Louise Jones