It sounds like the beginnings of a joke, but it's what you get for attempting to conduct an interview in a green room during soundcheck for the Canberra Comedy Festival.

Fortunately the interview subjects Scott Edgar, Steven Gates, and Simon Hall – better known as Scod, Gatesy and Yon from musical comedy trio Tripod – take it all in their stride.

For most comedians Canberra is an easy target, but Tripod are reluctant to bag the capital and the nature of their latest show means even the comedians won't know what to expect on the night.

"The interesting thing about this show is there could be Canberra bashing and there could not be," Hall says.

For their 20th anniversary tour the trio decided to eschew the lure of a greatest hits show for a bingo-inspired offering harking back to their improv days where they randomly select one of their 101 songs, recently published in a songbook, using a barrel full of ping-pong balls each with a number corresponding to a song.

"We don't know what we're going to be doing, it's the first time we've done this," Hall says.

"[But] if a song comes up that leads us in to some Canberra bashing then that could happen ... I don't want to rule it out."

It's at that moment their fellow festival performers, US comedian Rich Hall and Irish funny man David O'Doherty, enter the green room.

"Excellent newspaper," Hall says, when he learns he's interrupted an interview for The Canberra Times.

While O'Doherty introduces himself and shakes hands before seizing the voice recorder to make indescribable noises.

"Are you in the middle of doing an interview?" he asks.

"We're at the start," Edgar says.

"We've just moved once, we can't move again," Gates laughs.

O'Doherty leaves to begin his soundcheck but soon pops his head back in the door: "If they say anything pretentious, I'm going to come back in."

Back to Tripod. The trio admits the random nature of the show has its perils if the songs aren't quite right for the occasion, but the drama of whether or not they'll fail is part of its appeal.

"We're committing to every song that comes out even if it's a song filled with local references about Melbourne and we're performing in Brisbane," Gates says.

"When we tell [the crowd] 'We're going to perform a song that no one ever liked' ... they want to prove the other audiences in history wrong ... hopefully Canberra will do the same."

The trio are yet to be inspired to write a song about Canberra, although Adelaide has made an appearance in their repertoire.

But Edgar says if commissioned they'd be willing to give it a shot at a "very reasonable rate".

It's not the first time they've appeared at the Canberra festival.

Edgar recalls the trio performing in a school gym before winding up at The Phoenix.

"This town is changing every time we get back here," Gates says.

"Yeah now there's more than one thing to do of an evening," Edgar adds.

O'Doherty returns again, this time indecipherable on a megaphone, prompting the obvious question: what's it like backstage with a bunch of comedians?

"Sometimes it can be really fun and sometimes there are oil and water combinations," Hall says.

For their part Tripod are well behaved on tour, but Edgar admits there may have prompted a few complaints at their hotel on Monday night.

"It was just an acoustic singalong," he says.

But Hall deflects the blame and finally gives in to the urge to Canberra bash.

"You wanted some meat ... here it is: the walls in the hotel are too thin," he says.

The Canberra Comedy Festival runs until March 20 with more than 60 shows over six days. For more information and tickets visit: canberracomedyfestival.com.au.