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Archive for the ‘Comedians’ Category

What I learned… (20) Entertainment Weekly

Posted in Constantines, Digression, Entertainment Weekly, Paul F. Tompkins, US Weekly on July 29, 2008| Leave a Comment »

I have been an off and on subscriber to Entertainment Weekly for about fifteen years. Usually I subscribe because it’s cheap and I enjoy it. Then something happens to let my subscription lapse (usually it’s when I move). And then I resubscribe some time later. I’ve been steadily subscribed now for about 5 years.

It’s been a decent magazine. I don’t really care too much about the celeb gossip or even the cover stories, for the most part. They’re just an excellent resource for stuff that is about to be released. They give release dates and lots of reviews. Even if I don’t agree with the reviews, they at least give me an idea of what the book is about or what the disc sounds like. And, even more importantly, they do lots of genres in books, independent films and even indie rock.

So, when they celebrated their 1000th issue recently, imagine my surprise to hear that their new format starting with issue 1001 would feature: MORE WHITE SPACE, and be EASIER TO READ! Now, even the people who write letters to EW (and here, you should listen to the Paul F. Tompkins “Letters to Magazines“) know that more white space means less black space. In other words, fewer of those pesky words. That’s right! For our subscription dollars, we now get not 15-20 reviews, but 3. THREE! As you can imagine, all of the indie sceen is basically disregarded now.

There’s another new feature “The Ausiello Files” with some guy who says he’s an “insider.” And we see inane questions that no one would every have really asked getting answered with “insider” information. Rather than a review of the new Constantines album, we get great stuff like “What’s the scoop with so and so’s pregnancy on NCIS??” Come on, it’s Entertainment Weekly, not US Weekly.

I am thoroughly annoyed by this new look. And one way that you know that no one likes the new look is that they haven’t even run the “I love the new look” raves that they inevitably run whenever they feel smug about themselves.

The only thing I can figure is they must have fired a whole bunch of people to be left with such a paltry, pathetic magazine. Right now the only thing keeping me subscribing is that they haven’t cut the TV section. But come fall, if they stop talking about the shows we watch, EW gets the ax for good.

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David Goldberg, Seth Rogen & Evan Goldberg–Superbad: The Drawings (2008)

Posted in Art, Comedy Album, David Goldberg, Evan Goldberg, Funny (ha ha), Graphic Novel, NPR/PRI/PBS, Paul F. Tompkins, Seth Rogen, Short Books, Smarty Pants, Superbad, The Sound of Young America on July 13, 2008| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: PAUL F. TOMPKINS-Impersonal (2007).

Since the book had no words, I figured I’d review a record with no music. We heard Paul F. Tompkins on some random NPR show one night during dinner. They played the “Peanut Brittle” skit and Sarah and I were in tears. The kids must have wondered what was going on. We could barely eat; for six minutes we ignored all but Paul.

I tracked down the CD and it is very funny. Tompkins has a wonderful delivery and a way of making asides that keep the joke going longer than it should, but still staying funny. The very premise of the first joke is seeing a goth girl running, which is funny in and of itself, but he takes it in a new direction and turns it back against himself. Some other great tracks include the hilarious “Elegant Balloons” “Genetic Engineering” (house bears!), and the so true it hurts “Letters to Magazines.” Oh, and “Jazz” is also very funny, and I even like jazz.

It is clearly impossible to describe a comedy album without retelling the jokes, but I will say that Sarah and I had both listened to the CD individually, and then on the way back from the airport we listened to it together and were in tears yet again. Now we even get to make a few remarks just to relive the hilarity.

A little research uncovers that Tompkins was a player and writer for Mr Show as well as the Tenacious D series. And, in fact he is bubbling under in many venues. I guess don’t read credits well enough to have remembered him. So, good for him, and thank you NPR.

More research uncovers that this NPR shows was The Sound of Young America. Diligent readers will know that I discovered Simon Rich on this show as well. So I have listened to this show twice and come away with new material both times. I should make this a regular listen. You can hear an interview with Paul here.

[READ: June 21, 2008] Superbad: The Drawings

Now this book has nothing to do with the Ben Greenman books I mentioned earlier. This is a collection of 90 some pages of phallohgraphics (ie drawings of penises). If you’ve seen the movie Superbad, and who hasn’t, you’ll know there’s a story about the Seth character drawing penises and getting into trouble. Well, this is the collection of all the penises that the cowriter’s brother David Goldberg drew for the movie.

What can one possibly say about this except that the book is hilarious, childish and totally obscene. From an artistic standpoint, the drawings are first rate. Somehow, he was able to draw penises that look just like McLovin, Seth and Evan. Why on earth would anyone buy this? Beats me. I know I did. I’m sure I’ll peruse it from time to time and then hide it when my kids get old enough to browse the bookshelves.

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Rick Mercer–Rick Mercer Report: The Book (2007)

Posted in Beastie Boys, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, Corporate skewering, Dennis Miller, Dip-in Books, Essays, Funky Web Sites, Funny (ha ha), Jon Stewart, Mercer Report, Nadja, Political Humor, Politicians, Religion, Rick Mercer, The Kids in the Hall on March 13, 2008| Leave a Comment »

rm.jpgSOUNDTRACK: NADJA-Truth Becomes Death (2005).

nadja.jpgSlow and low that is the tempo. Very few reviews of Nadja will quote the Beastie Boys, and that is probably wise. The only reason I do is because the quote is so apt. Nadja plays music that is very very very slow. And the notes are very very very low. Have you ever played a 45 RPM vinyl record (remember those) on 33 and laughed at how it sounded? Well, that’s what this record sounds like. On purpose. There are 3 songs. The first is 23 minutes, the second is 16 and the third is 11.

The sound is generally an ominous drone, punctuated occasionally by high hats. It’s weird to me that someone would have even thought to make music like this.

None of this is to say it’s bad, it is just such a unique sounding record that I’m at a loss when I think about it. Some relief from the oppressiveness comes at the end of the third song, where there are suddenly three minutes of fairly light almost acoustic sing-alongs (this is relative of course, as nothing is light with this band). But for the most part it’s a punishing listen.

I’m not sure when you would play this, but I think you wouldn’t want to be anywhere where this is the soundtrack.

I discovered this album because I was buying records from the mighty Alien 8 Records web site, and they were having a buy 2 get 1 free sale. So, I tried Nadja. It was a worthy experiment, although I’m not sure if I’ll be checking out their other records. You never know though!

[READ: January 2008] Rick Mercer Report The Book

Many years ago, when I belonged to the Plainfield (NJ) Curling Club, I discovered that I could get satellite TV beamed in from Canada. Since I was really into curling, and so many other things Canadian (Kids in the Hall, 1/2 of my favorite bands) I thought I’d see what I could discover with a satellite dish of my own. It was through this dish that I found out about Rick Mercer. (more…)

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