Radio Top Five (Guests we have loved)

The Subcity on the Fringe radio show is going great guns: pop over to the website to hear our latest interviews and idiosyncratic musical choices (for some reason, That's Life has been our theme tune this week). Yet certain shows have managed to impress us in ten minutes of live chat.

Guilt and Shame provide the perfect end to a day at the Fringe: Up All Night pits a gay virgin and a heterosexual slut up against one last Big Night Out in a late night comedy show at the Underbelly. Their musical selections speak of their enthusiasm for the populist disco (Daft Punk had us leaping around the studio) and their flyering technique has been honed into a quick soft sale that might be for their show or their own love lives. It might be comedy, but Up All Night uses those techniques of serious theatre that I love so much: written from experience, Guilt and Shame are a bit like their real life personalities, with added frustration.

Underbelly, 2 -26 August



Countryboy's Struggle is part of a hip hop movement that has recently become far more mainstream: theatre. Maxwell Golden, writer and performer, has worked with the London legend Jonzi D, and tells the story of a rural rapper hitting the big smoke. He threw down some rhymes live in the studio - switching styles and flows, revealing how disappointment is easy to find and the drive towards art often hides a sadness and failure to adjust.

Golden has been rocking Countryboy round the nation for a while, giving the production a polish that removes it from being just for hip hop heads: his shout outs to the other hip hop shows prove that he is still of the scene, but not stuck there.

Pleasance, 3 -27 August

If you have children, don't take them to Auntie Myra's Funshow. When she arrived and insisted that her introductory music should be The Boss, we realised that here was an act not in the habit of taking prisoners. Having teased taxi drivers on her way into the studio, she went off to her late night slot to attack decency and try and finish a few jokes.

Myra Dubois has developed her passive aggressive routine over the past few Fringes: once part of Scottee's crew of cabaret reprobates, she's gone solo to find a new audience for her northern, scathing wit. There's frightening puppets, dark snarking and a collision between gruff Northern Club and hip London scene.

Voodoo Room, 3- 27 August

I had a couple of Summerhall based companies in the studio later in the week. Clout are showing How A Man Crumbled in the afternoons, which comes from the writings of a man who hated children, despite surviving by writing stories for them. The absurdism of Krem's life is matched by the physical stylings of Clout, who allow a bunch of buffoons to foul up the play's attempts to reveal some kind of truth.

Summerhall, 3- 26 August

And since I haven't mentioned them for five minutes, let's hear it for Zar. Caesarian Sections is happening in a specially built black tent: their artistic director spoke movingly of his interest in ancient sounds, the connection between music and the human self, the hidden tragedies of recent history, before recalling Camus' thoughts on suicide. This is the  foundation for Caesarian Sections, that the thought of suicide offers the limits of human freedom and that to take life seriously is, at least once, to consider suicide. Cheerful as this sounds, it is wrapped in exquisite singing and the silence is as composed as the voices.

Summerhall, 13- 20 August