Ryan Coffey is only half-joking when he tells the audience that the opening night of Beat is going to be a tech run. He can’t decide what setting to use for his microphone, he forgets the lines to several of his half-developed songs and steps on the wrong button of his looping pedal, disrupting the rhythm of his tunes. Those errors sound like they might make for a bad show, but they don’t, because Ryan Coffey is a brilliant songwriter and a master of turning his own mistakes – be they the personal follies of his life or the technical faults in his show – into self-deprecating, uproarious comedy.

In Beat, Coffey restlessly jumps between short bursts of stand-up and comedic musical numbers. Armed with a guitar, a looping pedal and one hell of a powerful voice, Coffey’s songs are deceptively complex. He’ll open with a simple guitar riff or a vocal refrain, add layer upon layer of melodies to establish a solid rhythm, then deliver a fistful of punchlines that’ll alternate from crass sex jokes to hilarious double-entendres in the space of half a verse.

Coffey firmly subscribes to the notion that the best comedy comes from tragedy – he says as much early in his set, when he jokes that “there’s no misery section in the Fringe program.” But Coffey is an expert at walking the line between sadness and satire. Even when he’s decrying his shortcomings as a boyfriend, a friend or a man, his firmly avoids the trap of self-pity or sentimentality. Even his more tragic material, like his penultimate song about unrequited love, seamlessly merges heartfelt sincerity with endearing jocularity. If a tech run is this funny, the real thing’s going to be a riot.

Ryan Coffey – Beat runs at The Imperial Hotel’s Parliament Room at 10.30 every night until October 2. Tickets are on sale now through the Fringe website.