26 April 2006

A Laff Riot, or: Your Twat Smells Like a Baby’s Coffin

The Comedians of Comedy tour stopped by Headliners last night. Starring Patton Oswalt, Brian Posehn, Maria Bamford and Eugene Mirman, this show promises to appeal to the type of people who wouldn’t be caught dead in a comedy club. As I had interviewed Patton Oswalt for a story in LEO, I had comp tix and since it was Tuesday, what else was I gonna do?

I am pleased to report that all four performers delivered, i.e., they made me laugh out loud, which is pretty much all you can ask from a comedy show. What sets the Comedians of Comedy apart from the usual stand-up crap is the comedians’s sensibilities, for lack of a better term – none of them relied on the typical, tedious, tired airplane food or "men and women are so different -- am I right, fellas?" bullshit which makes people think stand-up is such a worn-out genre.

Oswalt was especially funny that night; I particularly liked his riff on the music used on conservative AM radio talk shows vs. NPR (“Man, I know what the kids dig! I’ve got an Ornette Coleman bootleg that was recorded in a graveyard in 1961!”). Posehn was good, delivering his material in that “is he stoned or is he retarded?” voice of his. Bamford was pretty interesting; she used this squirrelly cartoon voice for much of the set but then she would use normal-sounding voices to make jokes about her mother, sister and others. And Mirman has been a favorite of mine for a while, if only for "The Marvelous Crooning Child."

I am also pleased to report that Headliners was way packed. I haven’t seen this many people there since the Spoon show last year.

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