O’Neill has his metal tested by laughter
COMEDY ANDREW O’NEILL MINISTRY OF HEAVY METAL
PLEASANCE DOME (VENUE 23) ANDREW O’NEILL MINDSPIDERS
WHISTLEBINKIES (VENUE 158)
ONE of the great joys of the Fringe is watching someone with real comedy skills get torn into a subject they are truly passionate about. And Andrew O’Neill is truly passionate about heavy metal.
In his late-night show,
Ministry of Heavy Metal,
he gallops through the genre, together with its sub-genres, in a welter of riffs and snapshots, facts, figures and great, great fun. Metalheads, we establish, love, among other things, skulls, beer and meat-flavoured snacks. O’Neill then takes us back further than even the most devoted metalhead would imagine, to the Big Bang itself, to give us the History of the Universe in Metal Riffs.
Before long, of course, O’Neill is rolling out that Smoke on
the Water riff (although he is no Deep Purple fan) and then we are into Black Sabbath who were the first heavy metal band before heavy metal even existed.
O’Neill is a full-on metal nerd and he drags us deep into the technicalities of the days before we had distortion at the press of a pedal. We are gripped. And entertained. He turns into a chord geek and belts out the “Hendrix chord” and the chord that stops fights in Liverpool. And we laugh. A lot. At lyrics and Lemmy and leather queens and the low entry standards for becoming a metalhead.
This is a wonderful show, full of passion, both fascinating and funny. You don’t need to be a metalhead to enjoy it… but you may come out with a desire to download some Metallica. Earlier in the day, for
Mindspiders, Andrew dons something floaty and a slash of red lippy to play around with some stand-up notions on the
Free Fringe. This is friendly fun, starting with a rousing chorus
of If You’re Happy And You Know
It Clap Your Hands. He gets mindspiders, he tells us. Like earworms but just thoughts, not tunes. And he shares them. We get job application letters, voice- over commercials, things his mum said and quite a lot about missing pillows. Andrew O’Neill’s History of Heavy Metal until 24 August; today 10:45pm. Andrew O’Neill – Mindspiders until 24 August; today 5:15pm.