"It's two hours of finale, camaraderie, the interactive experience," says Brighton comic Stephen Grant.

"In a nutshell, we're trying to engineer that really special atmosphere which, in a normal comedy club, happens once in a blue moon."

For the comics involved it could be like "coming on to the pitch as a substitute and getting put straight in goal for a penalty" or "doing all the work with the foreplay and not getting any actual sex".

But for the audience at Komedia tonight it should be rather more enjoyable.

After nine years performing and putting on straightforward stand-up, Grant has decided to shake the format up a bit. And while he admits there is "an outside chance it might be an absolute shambles", he's so confident it won't be, he asks me to pretend he has trademarked the concept.

Going by the name of Tag Comedy (although, throughout our interview, Comedy Dominos, Comedy Relay and even The Most Tenuous Link emerge as rival titles), Grant's new night is based on the format of Tag Wrestling, where one person begins the fight, then tags another person in to take over.

"I'd been thinking about how, fundamentally, while the material and the performers have changed, the actual format of stand-up hasn't changed since The Comedy Store and Jongleurs started doing their nights about 25 years ago," he explains.

"In comedy there's a big culture of, 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it'. But it seemed, if somebody was going to be inventive and creative with it, why should it have to be the comedians why couldn't it be the people who actually put the shows on?"

Grant wasn't alone. When he told other acts about his new idea, he says, "their eyes began to sparkle". And so it is that, for this "pilot" show, you can see Russel Howard, Milton Jones and Ben Norris, three comedians who would normally be headlining, for half the usual ticket price.

This won't, Grant assures us, be improv. Instead, imagine a comic stream-of-consciousness getting passed from stand-up to stand-up, the hilarity snowballing as it picks up bits of each comic's routines.

"Technically, there will be some acts for whom Tag Comedy doesn't work,"

says Grant. "But it suits the conversational and the observational acts and it suits, best of all, the ones who can think on their feet - change direction at the flip of a coin.

"And those comics are the ones who tend to be most successful nowadays.

People want the unpredictability, the roughness around the edges you'll only get with live entertainment."

It sounds like Grant's on to a winner.

But with the who, what and when being determined on the night, there's always room for a balls-up.

"In which case, I guess we could revert to Tag Wrestling," he laughs, "if it weren't for the fact the acts on the bill are, with the exception of Russell, all very much more capable of beating me up than vice versa. Besides, the leotards chaff terribly."

Starts at 8.30pm. Tickets cost £8 and £6, call 01273 647100