"I'm used to it now," says John Sawicki, "but at first it would be the simplest thing like the blinker in my car.

"I'd turn the signal on and all of a sudden I'm tapping on the dashboard and I'm hitting the break on my car and my car's grooving back and forth and people are beeping at me to get a move on but that's just making music with ya too. After you perform with or see it you do just hear music everywhere."

Sawicki is talking about Stomp, the unique amalgamation of theatre, dance, comedy and percussion which began in Brighton in 1991 and today is performed by five companies worldwide.

Having been with the show for nine years (he auditioned after his parents bought him a ticket to see it), Sawaki has no difficulty explaining the appeal of a piece of musical theatre which relies not on dialogue or melody but on the universal power of rhythm.

"You could be five years old or 95, from Pakistan or Texas, and still understand Stomp," says the American. "Everyone can relate to rhythm. 99 per cent of the world likes to go out and dance sometimes.

Everything that we do in life is rhythmic - we talk in rhythm, we walk in rhythm, our hearts beat in rhythm. It's second nature."

Founded by Brighton's Luke Cresswell and Steve McNicholas, who met in the street band Pookiesnackenburger, Stomp takes the clutter and junk of everyday life and transforms it into a pulsating theatrical event.

Brooms, paint buckets, plungers - anything and everything including the kitchen sink - are converted into percussion instruments.

"We even use zippo lighters," says Sawicki, proudly. "There's the sound when you open it, the sound when you light it and the sound when you shut it.

And when you have eight people doing that at different times it makes a song."

Tightly choreographed and orchestrated, there is nevertheless a lot of room in Stomp for the personalities of its eight performers to shine through.

And Sawicki, who describes himself as "220 pounds, tattooed, with a Mohawk," reckons "there's not much difference between my everyday life and the role I do on stage."

"I'm a drummer," he explains, "and Stomp is drummers' paradise. When I was in Grade School I used to get in trouble for tapping on the desk and using my pencils to make noises. Now I get paid for it."

"In some ways though," he continues, "the best part is when you get off stage and go into your dressing room and you see the people leaving the theatre. They'll be banging on the trash bins and trying all the things we did on stage and it's like, Okay, we did our job, everybody understands now'."

Starts at 7.30pm,Wed & Sat mats 2.30pm. Tickets cost £12-£24, call 01273 709709