We Are Klang

The adventures of the Klang mob are beyond silly, but Greg Davies, Marek Larwood and Steve Hall are so likable as the useless council officers that it's hard not to go along with their rambunctiousness. Tonight there's an implausibly efficient juggler-burglar careering through town; he's even stolen the mayor's wig. He claims to have contracted a juggling virus: "What, you mean to tell me juggling is catching?" asks Greg.

This hilarious new comedy series, following the misadventures of three woefully incompetent council officers, continues. This time, the trio are faced with the problem of an elusive thief who has wreaked havoc in the town of Klangbury.

We Are Klang Memory Bucket

We Are Klang's Steve Hall reflects on some of the gigs they did back in the day.

We Are Klang Episode 1 Review

A big thumbs up for trying something different stylistically, but it counts for naught if We Are Klang isn't funny. And, personally, there wasn't much here that elicited a smile from me, beyond the odd nice line.

They're not The Conchords, they're not The Young Ones, they're not (if you're really old) The Goodies. They are We Are Klang. But their show is like someone had forced the aforementioned trio of comedy legends into a blender and pushed the dial to max for twice the recommended time. The frenzy level at the start was quite exhausting.

If this first episode of a comedy about a trio of clueless council officials was a footie match, it had a rubbish first half. But the Klangs unexpectedly hit their stride with a truly disturbing, knicker-scratching Tracy Emin spoof. Best bit was a rhyme-crazed musical extravaganza about what you do when you're a Jew (you play the kazoo), which was as mental as Yentl.

Chortle's We Are Klang Review

What TV always struggles to do is to capture the true anarchy of a live performance, and that's what hits them here. The screen can't convey the joyously unpredictable feeling of being trapped in the same room as three loveable, but slightly scary, comics who are quite happy to go off script.

A trio who are feted on the live circuit bring their orchestrated stupidity to TV, spewing out slapstick, songs, arch references and quick gags in a mashed sitcom about a bad local council. It's aggressive nonsense in the vein of Reeves and Mortimer or... I'd say Rik Mayall or The Goodies, but Klang get there first by namechecking both. They also corpse freely, gurn at the lens and feed off the studio audience, trying hard to push that live buzz through the screen. Flying out of this whirlwind are some peachy gags: "Incompetence is at its highest level since records were lost!"

As with The Mighty Boosh, We Are Klang operate in a sphere that's less comedy, more a kind of children's programming for bewildered adults. Long a fixture on the Edinburgh comedy fringe, here the three members of Klang appear as the dysfunctional council employees of Klangtown, and when the town mascot disappears, the trio embark on a vaguely surreal journey of Reeves and Mortimer-style comedy and comic song. Not so many actual jokes, to be honest, but a certain rapport with the studio audience is happily in evidence.

Idiotic, silly, funny, annoying: the comedy trio We Are Klang are all these. Their show, set in the fictional council offices of Klangbury, is part sitcom, part physical comedy as incompetent council leader Greg (Greg Davies), simpleton councillor Marek (Marek Larwood) and sociopath Steve (Steve Hall) go about their business.

Comedy circuit stalwarts get their own show. They are Greg Davies (the brilliantly hateful head of Sixth Form in The Inbetweeners), Steve Hall and Marek Larwood and you will have seen them on various TV sketch shows at some point. This six-part sitcom is set in a council office and is distinctly old skool - live studio aud, physical comedy, japes, etc. To give you an idea of the tone: at one point, a character is hit in the nuts with a hammer, and you might also notice the audience being hit around the head with the jokes. That being said, it has its moments, and if you enjoyed Bottom or The Young Ones, then this is an amusing-enough half an hour.