The Great Downhill Journey of Little Tommy

There's been a jangling outcrop of shows which squeeze guitar bands into the theatre this year, including Luke Barnes's Weekend Rockstars and two separate riffs on John Lennon's story. But this slice of Americana comes closer to feeling like a gig than any of them, soundtracking a simple tale of teenage wandering with a hit-a-minute stomp through musical history.

This young Dutch company's two frontmen, Jonas Vermeulen and Boris Van Severen, are matinee idol-handsome, with just the faintest whiff of cheese to their stylish presentation of Little Tommy's story. Vermeulen takes Tommy's part, innocently bewildered by his first sip of alcohol at a moonshine distillery, and wide-eyed at the sight of tough workmen on the city's outskirts. And Van Severen does double duty as a moronic guard and hip-waggling alcoholic siren Verona: her abandoned, wailing torch song is a drag tour de force. 

What makes this performance more than a high-concept retro rock pastiche is its self-consciousness. Projected subtitles sometimes help out with, sometimes comment on the band's narrative. Sometimes they decline to translate, labelling the dialogue as "[meaningless waffle]". And there's ingenious live cartooning from Sarah Yu Zeebroek in a style halfway between Hieronymus Bosch and Viz, heightening the surreal, dreamlike logic of the story.

But these additions aren't quite enough to hide the story's unsophistication, or to make its cast of crude comic book archetypes more than paper thick. The brilliant technicolour vigour of Vermeulen and Van Severen's performances make this a riotous entertainment, but once flicked through, its story is quickly forgotten.