The Croydon Advertiser described their Kraftwerk-style tribute to the city’s tram system as the town’s answer to international YouTube hit Gangnam Style.

“Croydon has such low self-esteem,” says Susi O’Neill, better known as Ms Hypnotic, the theremin player and Teutonic vocalist of the pair.

“We got 2,000 hits on YouTube and they thought we were going to start taking over – first Croydon, then the world!”

O’Neill formed the comedy electronica duo with Warp Records producer John Callaghan to try to take away some of the humourless image attached to techno music.

“People think techno is so po-faced,” she says. “We want to get people into a style of musical comedy that isn’t just a guy sat on a stool playing guitar.”

Eccentronic’s first Brighton Fringe show, We Won’t Rock You, saw them attempt to put together a West End musical.

This follow-up – their first ticketed show – sees them set their sights on an even greater prize: Eurovision.

“We play on that idea of what makes a classic Eurovision song,” says O’Neill. “The six people onstage, with big hair, the power ballads with the dodgy rap and key change.

“It also has a political dimension – we look at what it means to be British in a homogenised world.

“There are quite a lot of fun songs about the different aspects of being British, the East meets West divide of being from the Midlands and a song about Llanfairpwllgwyn- gyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch [the Welsh village on the island of Anglesey which boasts the longest place name in the country].”

Playing a big role in the show is O’Neill’s virtuoso skills on the theremin, which she uses for most of the backing.

She first came across the 125-year-old electronic instrument while she was a student in Birmingham.

“You can play a variety of styles,” she says. “You can play psyche and surf music, mix melodies with swoops and glides, and do sci-fi sound effects.

“The theremin is part of the psychic connection of the show – it’s important we play the theremin so we can try to take over the brainwaves of the world...”

The show itself features puppets, Callaghan’s take on Heston Blumenthal and a selection of tracks from Eccentronic’s back catalogue.

The songs include a tribute to wasting time in the style of The Smiths, imagining what would have happened if Jarvis Cocker had gone to catering rather than art college, and the aforementioned Psy-botherer set on Croydon’s public transport system.

The audience will play the role of Eurovision judges, continuing the pair’s experiments in audience interaction.

“When Eccentronic started in Nottingham we used to ask the audience to vote for different things,” says O’Neill. “Whether they wanted us to sing a song or get covered in bubblewrap and read poetry.

“It’s bringing the audience into the show and making them part of the journey.”

There will also be the chance for a member of the audience to have a go on the instrument made famous by Brian Wilson’s Good Vibrations and countless Star Trek episodes.

“A lot of alternative comedy shows humiliate people and poke fun,” says O’Neill. “We only want our audience to look cool by doing stuff like playing the theremin in front of their friends.”

  • Eccentronic Present Neurovision is at Laughing Horse @ The Quadrant, North Street, Brighton, fron Friday, May 10 to Sunday, May 12; Friday, May 17, to Saturday, May 18; and Friday, May 24, to Monday, May 27. Starts 2pm, tickets £5. Call 01273 917272