I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: July 19, 2025] Puddles Pity Party

I heard about Puddles Pity Party a few years ago. A giant (6′ 8″) man dressed like a clown with whiteface and everything.  Who has an incredible voice.  He’s funny, but also not funny at the same time.

I’ve wanted to see his act but I didn’t think I wanted to see him as a headliner (where does he even headline show?).  So the fact that he was opening for “Weird Al” was perfect.  An opportunity to check him out.  Sadly, two things prevented this from being a great experience.  The first is we ran into a ton of traffic and wound up missing at least half of his show.  The second is that we were pretty far back, so it was hard to get absorbed in the show that interacted with the front rows.

But yes, walking in during him singing Estoy sentado aquí–beautifully, of course–was surreal because who knew if it was suppose to be funny.  By the time we were settled he had started Come On Up to the House.  This is a Tom Waits song that is, unsurprisingly, rather sad.  So it’s kind of funny to see a clown singing it, but it’s not really funny–there’s no punch line.

Up next was In the End, not a cover and also not funny.   But again, wow what a voice.

And then there was actual comedy.  I had assumed that he wrote the fantastic Stairway to Gilligan’s Island, a genius mash up that I cannot believe was actually written in 1978 (!!) by Little Roger and the Goosebumps.  It was really funny and he had cardboard guitars that he soloed on with an audience member or two.

He ended with a tribute to Kevin Costner done to My Heart Will Go On.  His take on the song was incredible (again, that voice!) but he overlaid a photomontage of Kevin Costner.  It was hilarious but also really impressive.  The fact that he was able to someone segue that song into not one but TWO Metallica songs was a perfect capper to his set.

So he’s not entirely funny–but then, surprisingly “Weird Al” isn’t always entirely funny (his cover songs are genuine).  I think it would be pretty fun to see him in a small theater.