Mighty impressive line-up for Boosh

Comedy, it seems, has always been the new rock'n'roll. In the early 1970s, Monty Python were playing rock venues; in the 1980s, Alexei Sayle and The Young Ones redefined comedy as punk; and in the 1990s, Newman and Baddiel were selling out Wembley Arena and Vic Reeves topping the singles chart.

However, none of these acts ever tried anything quite as adventurous as headlining its own rock festival, a feat The Mighty Boosh will pioneer this summer. On July 5, Noel Fielding (aka Vince Noir, the perfectly coiffed Shoreditch t**t in tight jeans) and Julian Barratt (aka Howard Moon, the bearded prog-jazz obsessive) will host a mammoth one-day outdoor festival in Kent, with a hand-picked cast of bands and comedians.

To make things even stranger, they won't be in the comedy tent alongside fellow stand-ups but headlining the main stage alongside Gary Numan and The Charlatans. Making things weirder still is the fact they'll be fronting a band.

It's not really us doing silly novelty songs,' Fielding says. Hopefully, The Boosh Band will be more like an art-rock band who just happen to be funny, like Frank Zappa's Mothers

Of Invention. We'll be playing songs from the series, like Love Games. It's sung by a transsexual merman who's in love with Howard. Actually, it's a really beautiful, funky love song.'

Festival Fielding

The Mighty Boosh, as the living embodiment of the comedy-as-rock'n'roll' dictum, might just pull it off. Fielding, 35, famously hangs out with the likes of Amy Winehouse, Pete Doherty and Johnny Borrell; Barratt, 40, is a talented musician who writes the funky, slightly disturbing songs for their show. At this year's NME Awards, assembled rock royalty gave them the biggest cheer of the night when they were named Best TV Show. This autumn they'll be playing a massive tour, which includes five nights at the Brixton Academy.

Is Fielding a big festival fan? Absolutely,' he says. The last festival I went to as a punter was Glastonbury in 1997. I went with my mate Bollo [comedian Dave Brown, who plays anthropomorphic ape Bollo in the TV series].

It was fantastic. I did a bit of stand-up in the comedy tent but no one knew who I was then, so I was able to wander around with the throng, watch Radiohead and just enjoy the whole thing. Bollo's dad kitted us out in wellies and waterproofs. Everyone thought we looked mad but we were fine when everyone else was in flip-flops, drowning in an ocean of filth. It was a bit like Vietnam.'

Common ground

Noel describes the Mighty Boosh Festival (backed by industry heavyweights Vince Power and Phil McIntyre) as exactly the kind of festival he'd like to attend. The comedy tent (which,' he says, will be much more than just a place where punters skin up when it rains') features A-list stand-ups such as Arj Barker, Ross Noble, Milton Jones, Josie Long, Garth Marenghi and Simon Munnery; DJs include Jarvis Cocker and Peaches; and the artists on the main stage include synth-pop überlord Gary Numan (a recurring hero of their TV series), painfully trendy indie outfits White Denim and The Kills, baggy survivors The Charlatans, blue-eyed R&B singer Har Mar Superstar and punk-jazz mavericks Polar Bear.

If the TV series plays up the differences in musical tastes between indie kid Fielding and jazz buff Barratt, their festival choices prove that, in fact, there's a lot of common ground. I do love jazz,' Fielding says, especially John Coltrane and Miles Davis. And Julian likes punk and electro. We both absolutely adore Gary Numan and we love embarrassing prog rock such as Yes and Hawkwind. I think that comes out in the Boosh Band. We play funk, metal, punk, jazz and electro in one set but with an absolute love and respect for every genre.'

Barratt once said The Boosh's audience is a strange mix of teenage girls and fortysomething, pipe-smoking jazz fans.' What do they think the 30,000 fans at this festival are likely to look like? It's weird because our audience used to be art students and freaks. Nowadays, it's chavs and cabbies, which is great. I'd hope that change has happened without compromise. There's still a weirdness at the heart of our comedy. Frankly, the more people who can get into transsexual mermen singing gay love songs, the better.'