The Adults Only Show is the latest in a long line of events which have sought to challenge the dominance of the Erotica festival in the UK - others that have come and gone over the years include World of Erotic, FunLove. X-Sensual and many more. For some reason, even though many of these shows were far sexier and less costly than Erotica, none survived beyond a single event. Then again, even Erotica's attempts to expand into Manchester failed miserably, so perhaps the market can only sustain one event.

The Adults Only Show seems to stand more of a chance of surviving than those other events, if only because of its connections with adult industry magazine Erotic Trade Only, which already runs trade-only shows annually. And let's hope it does, because we need a bit of competition in the field!

Your humble scribe's trip to Birmingham was a suitably hellish one - not knowing where exactly we were going brought inevitable delays and it was past 6pm when we finally arrived. After negotiating the maze-like NIA (which made punters virtually circle the building from the car park exit and then was even more fiendishly laid out backstage) we finally made it in, grabbed a beer and began to look around.

There were certainly plenty of stalls, though as usual at such events, a lot of people seemed to be selling the same stuff. Outside of R18 videos, sex toys and lingerie, there wasn't much else - certainly little for the fetish crowd or anyone into written erotica.

The stage shows were variable. The worst was an entirely pointless group of out-of-tune girlies who karaoked their way through assorted hits of yesteryear in 'sexy' outfits. Such is the legacy of The X Factor, I suspect. Rather better were the dancers from Spearmint Rhino, and the on-stage topless photoshoot. Somewhere in the middle were the awkward interviews with porn stars. I believe the rest of the show had other, more fun live acts.

Out and about, typically dumbass British rules meant that no real naughtiness was to be seen - one young lady demonstrated a fucking machine (with knickers on) which was arresting for a few moments, and Linsey Dawn McKenzie whipped her tits out in front of me in order to show them off to gal pals - which might impress some people, but not me.

Still, the pornarati were out in some force. Old chums like Ben Dover, Phil McCavity, Terry Stevens, starlets Tallulah and Alysha Leigh, Chris from Hot Rod, Jerry from Strictly Broadband, and others were either selling their wares or simply catching up.

All in all, The Adults Only Show was a decent enough event. Worryingly, the crowd seemed to diminish as the evening wore on - let's hope it was busier on the saturday. It would be a shame if the event wasn't allowed the chance to grow and expand.

DAVID FLINT