"This is as close as I'll ever get to playing Wembley Arena," says Mitch Benn, Radio 4's comic-songwriting stalwart. On this evidence, that frustrates him. Tonight, backed by his two-piece band the Distractions, he is so much the stadium wannabe that his lyrics are often lost in rock noise. That's a shame for Benn, because (as he keeps telling us) this is a major date on his tour that he wants to get right, and for us because his lyrics are frequently a delight.
Take his song about size zero women: "If beauty's only skin deep, then she's beautiful all the way through." Or his birthday hymn to the Iraq conflict: "The world is better without Saddam Hussein/ Repeat that over and over when you think you're going insane." The set splits between these original compositions and feats of musical mimickry, whereby Benn transforms his voice and sound to replicate Coldplay and Duran Duran, the Rolling Stones and James Blunt ("the only man alive who is his own rhyming slang").
At his best, Benn is a rock'n'pop Rory Bremner, reducing music's great and good to their essential tics and mannerisms. It's a twofold thrill to hear Benn re-create and deconstruct a band's sound at the same time. "So we all sing the chorus together," runs his boy-band pastiche, "cos we can't do harmonies yet." This self-reflexive songwriting is a neat trick, but Benn overuses it, inviting the same formulaic charge he levels at the likes of Blunt and Chris Martin.
Nevertheless, the unheard lyrics are a shame tonight, as is Benn's uncomfortable between-song patter, which suggests this musical shape-shifter has yet to find his own voice. But as this evening's highlights (his classic Eminem/Macbeth rap; a rock-opera version of The Very Hungry Caterpillar) prove, Benn in Bloomsbury playing to his strengths is as much fun as the Stones at Wembley any day.
· At the Assembly Rooms, Ludlow, on Friday. Box office: 01584 878141. Then touring.
