Despite having supported Ed Sheeran, winning the Hackney Empire New Act of the Year in 2010, and appearing on popular TV shows such as 8 out of 10 cats, Abandoman are a two-piece you have probably never heard of.

This is because their show is formed of improvised musical songs and sketches based on interaction with the audience. The performance, therefore, hinges on the audience’s offerings and what rapper/comedian Rob Broderick can do with them. For example, the duo opened with ‘what’s in your pocket?’ where audience members hold up the strangest object in their pocket and Broderick instantly makes up a rap using these objects. While I can imagine this can be a struggle if a crowd is uninventive, the audience sat in the Wardrobe were an interesting bunch including one woman who happened to have a knitted boob in her pocket, which gave a new meaning to soft-core.

The audience provided Abandoman with interesting material to work with: the mysteries of moon cups, the slippery slope that is OXO cube addiction and an interesting anecdote told by the man sitting to my right, where he confessed he once had a shit in a B&Q display toilet.

Yet I feel that Broderick and musician/singer Sam Wilson would make even the most mundane things funny (and chatting to them after the show, this proved to be true.) The energy, uptempo beats and the fact that the show is improvised makes it impossible to get bored as you hang on to every word in anticipation of the punch line and wonder at the speed that Broderick’s mind works.

Emma Dutton

Photo Credit: lovemusiclovelife.com / whatsonlive.com