Bill Bailey is coasting - but few coast better. His new show, Part Troll, derives in part from his recent lengthy stint in the US. As ever with Bailey, the musical routines are the biggest treat. He has written a song about the fact that Americans' annual expenditure on pornography could cancel out third world debt: "I will not look at titties for a year." He has set George Bush to drum'n'bass. He is instructive about how music works, and cheerfully exposes the manipulative agendas of the CBS and BBC news theme tunes.
There is a sharp mind, then, beneath those druidic locks. Bailey's gig may meander from anecdote to surreal waffle, but all the material is animated by the same disconcerting intelligence. His climactic shaggy-dog story, which concludes a running subversion of the "three blokes walk into a bar" formula, is a masterpiece of high-concept silliness. Where else would you find the Holy Ghost playing an arcade version of The Remains of the Day? There is also a terrific riff on the theological implications of the insurance get-out clause "act of God".
For all Bailey's refreshing erudition, the tunes are the thing. Having decided that "there is more evil in the charts than in an al-Qaida suggestion box", he pens his own fabulously overblown pop song to show today's chart-toppers how dramatic music should be. Then there is his new national anthem for glum old Britain: a trip-hop Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah, complete with theremin. This is absurdly well-worked-out noodling - and all the more enjoyable for it.
· Until August 25. Box office: 0131-556 6550.
