Joe Rowntree burnt down his dad’s coal shed when he was younger after trying to make a flaming spear.

Six fire engines later his father was still coming to terms with his sons’s inquisitive nature.

“He still reminds me of it to this day,” Joe says.

But while most of us grow out of the chemistry experiment stage, Joe has made a career out of it.

Coming to the New Theatre on Monday, Brainiac Live is an explosive voyage of scientific discovery and madcap experimentation, as seen on Sky TV, culminating with a caravan being blown up on stage.

“We had to evacuate Liverpool Theatre last week,” Joe laughs, “because they usually have operas and lots of la-di-da stuff there and they just weren’t ready for us.

“So when we blew the caravan up, there was all this smoke and all the fire alarms went off so we all had to leave the building.”

In short, Joe is doing everything that small and grown-up boys dream about.

But while it all sounds like fun, does Joe ever worry he might blow himself up?

“Well, I don’t have much body hair left,” he joked.

“In fact, I burnt the hair off my arms this week when I held on to some gunpowder for too long. And yes, it is scary but it’s fun too.”

The 26-year-old also takes Brainiac into schools to show schoolchildren that science can be fun, so being a stand-up comedian by trade must help?

“Yes because you have to engage the audience from the word go and it’s basically about entertainment isn’t it?” he asks.

“So many scientists are geeky, bespectacled and dull and switch you off within seconds.

“So if you inject a bit of humour it helps and it keeps the adults happy as well,” he says. “And there’s nothing else like Brainiac out there at the moment.”

But if Joe can make science so attractive, why is it still unpopular at school? “I think it’s our celebrity culture,” he says.

“I ask kids what they want to be when they grow up and they say ‘famous’. When I ask them ‘famous for what?’ they don’t know. They just want to be famous without having to do anything or discover anything.”

Luckily Brainiac Live is anything but boring, especially as Joe’s experiments often go awry.

“It just makes the show look more genuine when things go wrong,” he laughs.

“We do one sketch on ‘how quickly can you spin an office chair’ using CO2 cylinders and rockets, and the chair came apart while I was still strapped in, so I was flying across the stage.

“Fortunately the audience thought it was part of the show, but most of the time we’re fairly in control.”

The tour culminates at The Hammersmith Apollo in March, where Joe has been watching shows for the past 15 years. It’s an amazing and huge venue, so to be playing there will be just amazing,” he says.

See what I mean about living the dream?

Brainiac Live comes to Oxford’s New Theatre on Monday. Box office on 0844 8471588.