Ballsy, bold and brash - sometimes a little too brash - this loudmouth Canadian import is impossible to ignore.

But nowhere in the comedy rulebook does it say you have to be likeable, it's funny audiences want. And in this, Lasarev succeeds - well, at least some of the time.

His opening routines about being a foreigner abroad are on the money, and delivered with laser-guided accuracy, and much of his other observational material is equally strong

However, he also has large tracts of laddish, lowest-common-denominator rants about pornography, sex and watersports that are crushingly unexciting.

His hyper-aggressive, turned-up-to-11 delivery redeems the weaker material to a certain extent, but such apparent arrogance is more likely to alienate an audience than enliven them when the material wanes.

Only when all his gags are up to the quality of the best will he have earned the right to trample over the normal niceties. Even then, I suspect, audiences will have no choice but to like it or lump it.