Brothers and Sisters, It's the Reverend Obadiah Steppenwolfe III

Review by Vonny Moyes | 31 Mar 2014

“He’s a wrong ‘un, isn’t he?” a worryingly drunk punter gleefully imparts into my ear as we’re treated to a clunky rendition of Amazing Grace from a bum-clenchingly awkward organist. It’s half five on a Friday in a packed Stand as the gladiatorially obscene Rev takes to the stage to pontificate to his faithful parishioners. Jim Muir is squirrelled away underneath a dodgy wig, cheap aviators and a badly-fitting suit; a uniform befitting of Scotland’s most deliciously depraved televangelist.

Five minutes into the chat show and Aberdeen’s already been dubbed ‘Viking Rape Camp #4,’ and Malaysia and Crimea get a swift kick in the teeth, setting the tone for an unapologetically grody hour hell-bent on mining the very depths of poor taste. Foolhardy front-rowers are easy targets for his casual vitriol, glorified by choruses of ‘Amen!’ from the room.

The format is looser than the Rev’s morals, and essentially morphs into he and Brendan Burns, sitting on a couch and shouting at one another – with Burns’ recent acquisition of hearing aids proving too tempting to ignore. Canadian newcomer Bobby Mair makes an appearance later on, but at this point the show has abandoned any form of structural intergrity. It’d be easy to gloss over this with the flavour of an 11 o’clock audience, but at such early doors it feels a little lax.

Supping on a glass of chilled Buckfast, if there was a line he’d be too razzed to see it; unless it was chopped up on the table in front of him. Inevitably the slew of feculence gets weary. There’s only so many shock skits you can handle before you get battle-numb. The crowd laps it up, but you leave feeling a little bit worse about the human race.