I really enjoy a good bit of stand-up comedy — emphasis on the good — and so it was with some delight that I recently discovered the work of Louis C.K.

Louis C.K. is someone whom I’d heard mentioned before — mostly by my American friends — but I’d never checked out his material before. I’m always oddly wary of American stand-up — I think it’s because I’m conscious that a number of stand-ups from the British Isles have struggled to make an impact in the States, so I find myself wondering if the reverse is true, too. Past experience — the best example I can think of being Bill Hicks — has demonstrated that good American comedy can very much still be funny on this side of the Atlantic, though, so I’m aware I’m being irrational; it’s just one of those things.

Anyway, Louis C.K. is extremely funny. I’ve watched two of his stand-up shows on Netflix and the first episode of his TV show Louie to date, and all of them have had me properly laughing out loud. He seems to strike a good balance between shocking — his discussion of the words “faggot” and “cunt” during the opening section of one of his shows is a particularly good example of this — and witty, intelligent, observational comedy with just a touch of cynicism. Meanwhile, Louie appears to show that he’s a good character actor, too, with some wonderfully deadpan scenes throughout — my favourite being “…can you stop smiling exactly the same way at me every time I look at you?” “…No.” — coupled with just the occasional dip into absurdity. I’ll have more to say about that when I’ve watched a few more episodes, I’m sure.

The reason why discovering Louis C.K. is such a pleasure is because I feel UK comedy isn’t in a particularly good place right now — at least not the stuff you generally see on TV. There’s still stuff like Dara O’Briain and Russell Howard being shown on repeat-centric channels such as Dave, of course, but the main face of British comedy right now appears to be Russell Kane, whom I just simply don’t find particularly funny. I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting older or simply because I don’t like his style, but I find the show he comperes — BBC Three’s Live at the Electric — fairly excruciating to watch, not only for Kane’s sequences, which are by far the strongest element of the show (which isn’t saying much) but for the truly dreadful, painfully unfunny sketches and skits that punctuate the format.

Louis C.K., meanwhile, has a style that I very much like. There’s an air of seemingly defeated cynicism about a lot of it, with occasional crescendos into furious anger about something or other. He never seems to take it too far, though; the rants tend to stop before they become too preachy, and any tension built up through the yelling is usually defused nicely by a pithy comment or a reminder of what he was talking about beforehand. It’s a style I really like.

Anyway, if you’ve never checked out the comedy of Louis C.K. and you’ve been meaning to, I’d encourage you to do so at the next opportunity. I’ve really enjoyed what I’ve seen, and I hope there’s more material out there to discover. In the meantime, I’ll be enjoying the Louie series.