Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

It would be easy to dismiss MC Hammersmith as a cartoonish, one-joke wordsmith. Exceptionally skilled at freestyle rapping yet without any depth beyond subverting assumptions about his white, nebbish, privately educated, metropolitan appearance, he's safe in an early afternoon timeslot, demanding mutherfuckas in tha house make some noise.

Truth be told, as a long-time resident of Edinburgh, he can supplement his improvised flow with local colour and a general cultural appreciation of Scotland that belies his West London roots. And the rhymer known to his parents as Will Naameh has a more diverse ethnicity than is perhaps outwardly reflected, though he doesn't play on that.

No, what makes MC Hammersmith likeable and ensures that Straight Outta Brompton is an enjoyably diverting ride is that he's game. Really game. At the top he requests the audience suggest physical feats he can combine together to perform whilst rapping, in the process recalling gymnastic contortions that previous mischievous crowds have demanded.

Ah, it's just a bit you intuit, he's not actually going to follow through. And yet given the limitations of his spindly frame, he really does try (to an extent), all while spitting over the mic. As a spectacle, it's pathetic but impressive, a display of vulnerability and have-ago-attitude that encourages his audience to also open up and get on board.

He's embraced technology as well, with a measured use of vocoder for the occasional refrain and a QR code link before the show begins requesting that we submit questions on our phones for him to ad-lib about and words for him to incorporate into his lyrics. This saves a bit of housekeeping faff and offers some variety in an hour of constant audience probing.

Disappointingly, though, with a small early preview crowd and only a limited number of responses for him to choose from, his tech seemed to censor one of my ruder offerings while including others of mine. Though perhaps it was just too crass.

Appropriating the anthemic, Glaswegian mob chant of Here We Fucking Go!, Hammersmith's initial rabble-rousing track focuses on the standard host's enquiries about name, occupations etc, before he gently branches out into and incorporates hobbies and the like.

Later raps find him riffing on the objects in people's pockets or bags; painting the lyrical image of a couple's long-term relationship and, having gained the requisite trust early doors through always championing his volunteers, someone's most embarrassing story. Wisely though, he puts parameters on this one immediately by stressing that it shouldn't be anything too traumatic.

Elsewhere, there's a mild frisson in the air when he chooses a male volunteer to be his mark for a seduction ballad. Yet he hastily shares afterwards that he's straight. True, no one wants to see a performer abusing his position for genuine sexual gratification. But the interjection feels like a cop-out, removing any tiny bit of edge or casual cool that the show retained.

It is an unfortunate characteristic of freestyle rapping that even as Hammersmith ups the ante of the various challenges he's set himself, as his slick improvisation skills become literally routine, his broad vocabulary and adaptability taken for granted, the impressiveness rather fades.

Yet it's replaced by respect for his powers of recall, as he calls back to and criss-crosses references and characters from earlier raps, echoing the plate spinning crowd work of a master like Al Murray. Though ironically for a rapper's braggadocio, with less ostentatious showiness about it. MC Hammersmith politely talks the talk but he modestly walks the walk too.

• MC Hammersmith: Straight Outta Brompton is on at Monkey Barrel at 12.30pm

Review date: 3 Aug 2023
Reviewed by: Jay Richardson
Reviewed at: Monkey Barrel Comedy Club