Fresh from a stint in America, (land of the free, home of privatised healthcare), Jonny and the Baptists kicked off their Rock the Vote tour in Oxford, quite appropriately, on the night of the seven-party ITV leaders’ debate. Their act is probably best described as political musical comedy…and with recent appearances as the house band for the Alternative Comedy Memorial Society, with Mark Thomas on his 100 Acts of Minor Dissent tour, and on Radio Four’s The Now Show, they’re gaining in momentum.

Musically, Rock the Vote is great – a really high-energy performance, with Paddy Gervers on guitar, and Jonny Donahoe on lead vocals (and occasionally keyboard). They glide with ease between musical genres, ranging from a sort of acoustic rap (“Upper Middle Class Gangster Children”) through heart-felt love songs (“Angela Merkel”), to a rousing call to revolution (“British Revolution”). There’s a mixture of old and new material in the set tonight, and those who are familiar with the band’s output may notice a re-purposed rendition of “Quentin Blake”.

The real highlights of the evening are when the duo take risks. There are songs which are formally inventive (such as “Hey Dad”, one side of a dialogue with a father, or “The Daily Mail”, an a cappella rendition of tabloid headlines), along with songs that test the boundaries of the audience - such as “Daddy’s Other Family”, a brilliantly dark tale of children, pillows, and revenge which was, for me, a stand-out of the evening.

If there’s any criticism of Rock the Vote it’s that, satirically, it doesn’t go far enough. While there are some genuinely caustic, incisive lyrics, many of the targets of the evening feel quite ‘safe’. There’s nothing particularly daring in pointing out that Farage (and UKIP) are intolerant, that politicians’ efforts to seem normal come across as stilted, or that the British are generally perceived as polite. Indeed, some of their songs might be accused of straying into the observational (a bad thing in my mind, but subjectively, I suppose, some people enjoy musings on gastro pubs and inappropriate reactions to friends’ children).

They may not have the bite of Bourgeois and Maurice, but Jonny and the Baptists are an incredibly talented duo with a catchy and (relatively) satirical canon. If you have a chance, I’d highly recommend Rock The Vote – and so would the downloading public; at one point, after their altercation with Paul Nuttall, Jonny and the Baptists occupied both number 1 and number 7 on the iTunes UK Comedy Charts.

There are £5 tickets available for first-time voters at all venues.