Tim Minchin - winner of the Melbourne comedy festival's director's choice award - arrives in Edinburgh trailing cloudlets of glory. The Australian comedian/ musician is popular enough to pack out one of the festival's biggest halls, and to be cheered after every gag and comic song.

It's enough to make you believe in mass hypnosis. Strip away Minchin's fretful porpentine hair, white piano and willingness to fall off the stage for a laugh, and you're left with a bog-standard stand-up with a silly voice and a few good songs, most of whose material would have seemed dated in the last millennium. He must be the last person in the world to be surprised by the spread of mineral water. When he does address more topical subjects, such as smug environmentalists, what should be bite is all gum. And I don't think I've ever heard a lamer attempt to change the subject than: "Hey, is anyone married?"

The self-satisfied gurning seems to last for centuries. Then Minchin makes the unilateral decision to give us an encore, the last thing you need in a festival where acts stack up in the wings like jets over an airport. He even congratulates himself for keeping the next performers waiting. Whatever happened to that fine old tradition of tarring and feathering?

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