Road Trip Album Picks: "NPR Funniest Driveway Moments"

WHAT: Collection of interviews with comedians and amusing interviews from NPR
LABEL: HighBridge Company, 2008
GOOD IF YOU LIKE: NPR, but don't listen to it much, and comedy new or old
WHERE TO FIND IT: Your library, book stores, online
LENGTH: 2 hours, 10 minutes

Depending on your entertainment affiliations, you may listen to either a massive amount of NPR or none at all. As I listen to a lot, much of NPR Funniest Driveway Moments had already graced my iPod through podcasts of shows like Wait Wait Don't Tell Me and others. If you permanently have your tuner set to your local NPR affiliate, odds are you've heard many of these, and the bulk of the collection is pretty timely. Some of these segments were older, some are newer, and there's a really good mix of the new generation of comedians with some of the older ones, plus a segment with Richard Pryor that sort of sticks out because he's not really involved as such. Also sticking out is a bit with Justice Stephen Breyer, who is not a comedian so much as a member of the judiciary. It's not so much a comedy thing, it certainly qualifies as amusing but it also doesn't fit here particularly well.

Since this is a collection of radio broadcasts with new segments introducing them, what you have here is essentially a perfect driving companion for fans of comedy. It isn't always funny so much as it is informative, but there's quite a bit to enjoy here if you're already a fan of the personalities on the discs, like Demetri Martin or Phyllis Diller or Sarah Silverman. Or Dame Edna. (Which we are not.) If you already have it in for these people, clearly, skip that segment-- but the whole collection is great. It's a delight to hear Steve Martin's early stories about making two cents at Disneyland, or how Mel Brooks used to play music with comedians before getting involved with Your Show of Shows.

Unlike most things I post here, this is one of very few family-friendly collections in the sense that if you're reading this, odds are you could pass it along to your parents and they probably wouldn't have a problem with it unless Lily Tomlin really pissed them off for some reason. Besides, they're going to need an introduction to Larry David, and this collection has all that and more. Heck, it's worth hearing just to hear another interview with LD, so be sure to track this one down for your next road trip. Just do it soon as it's starting to feel a little dated as some comedians go on to new things or, in some cases, retire from the business.

Road Trip Album Picks: Dr. Demento's 20th Anniversary Collection

WHAT: Collection of some of the best-known comedy and novelty songs of all time
LABEL: Rhino Records
GOOD IF YOU LIKE: Dr. Demento, classic comedy, pop culture nuggets
WHERE TO FIND IT: Widely available at better record stores

The subtitle of this album is "The Greatest Novelty Records of All Time," which is a fair description for this double-disc collection. I've had this in my possession for years, and looking at it then, a lot of it wasn't too funny. On the other hand, some of it was pretty spectacular. The word "Records" is really telling, because pretty much everything here was released during the era of vinyl and this collection dates back to 1991, when CDs were just starting to really replace tapes and licorice pizzas.

"Novelty" is another key word, because a lot of this isn't particularly funny, just required listening for young pop culture fanatics. Regardless of your opinion of the cultural value of the Rocky Horror Picture Show, you can't say that it isn't important to hear "The Time Warp" so you know what it is. The same can be said of "Surfin' Bird," which isn't a comedy track so much as it is something of a garage song that is, to say the least, likely to invite smiles.

Since some of the tracks date back over 50 years, odds are modern ears aren't going to take much delight in Spike Jones and his City Slickers or Ray Stevens due to a lack of context or the fact that they did not age well. On the other hand, the great "Weird Al" Yankovic, Frank Zappa, Tom Lehrer, and Steve Martin appear here, as does Shel Silverstein. Novelty nuggets like "Star Trekkin'" work great as a way to infuriate your fellow passengers, while "Fish Heads" may well be the greatest novelty record ever made. Take that as you will. "Monster Mash" and "Purple People Eater" can be found here too, making this the ultimate snapshot of the best the Dr. Demento radio program had to offer.

Poison tracks include:

• Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh!
• Witch Doctor
• Junk Food Junkie
• The Battle of Kookamonga

There's little in the way of sketches here, but you'll find a lot of songs you or your parents found amusing at some point in their lives. "Beep Beep," "King Tut," and "Eat It" are all cultural treasures, but I can't guarantee that this two-hour collection of 36 tracks is going to bring a smile to your face unless you enjoy watching others suffer. And really, isn't that the half of the fun when it comes to road trips?

Oh, and I would also give this album my highest possible rating as a gift to any comedy-inclined tweens you may know. They will enjoy parts of it now, infuriate their friends and family with it, and outgrow it before they turn 25 so they can move on to better music and comedy. Really, you're doing them a huge favor.

This Week in Potentially Funny Media

Albums:

Steve Martin: The Crow - New Songs for the Five-String Banjo

Steve Martin seems to have hit a point in his career where he can pretty much do whatever the hell he feels like, and this is a CD of new banjo songs, so we have further evidence to support that notion. There’s some comedy on this album, I hear.

DVDs:
Rifftrax DVDs: Little Shop of Horrors, Swing Parade, Missile to the Moon, Reefer Madness, House on Haunted Hill, Night of the Living Dead, Shorts vol. 1 & 2. – These’ll run you about 10 bucks a pop and they’re all out today. We had no idea they were even releasing these, but at that price, most of them are worth it.

Ghostbusters (Bluray) – Conveniently timed to match the release of the mega-hyped videogame. Harold Ramis was on Fallon last week and commented that this was designed to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Ghostbusters, and that it was notable nobody was celebrating the 20th anniversary of Ghostbusters II. We applaud Harold Ramis for being self-aware.

Spaceballs (Bluray) – When’s the last time you saw Spaceballs? Was it more than 5 years ago? If so, prepare to discover that this movie hasn’t aged well and isn’t really funny if you’re over, say, 10.

Dr. Strangelove (Bluray) – Some consider this to be Stanley Kubrick’s finest film, which is a pretty big claim to make, but that it’s one of the most enduring and sharp comedies of all time – still endlessly quoted and referenced to this day – ought to mean something. Some have complained about the picture quality on this Bluray edition to be a little heavy on the film grain, but hey, it’s an old movie.

What’s Up Tiger Lily - Woody Allen's first movie, rereleased to coincide with the premiere of his poorly reviewed feature-length episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm (which you can find in theaters under the title Whatever Works). Here, he redubbed an old kung-fu movie. Lots of egg salad jokes. Absolutely reeks of the 60's. Watch it while wearing go-go boots and sipping from a martini glass.

Family Guy vol. 7 - Normally we wouldn’t cover Family Guy here, but this box set contains the amazingly hilarious Surfin’ Bird episode from last season. Seriously, that episode was great, haters be damned. They should’ve ditched the lame Jesus plot, though, and just did 23 minutes of Surfin’ Bird gags. In fact, just ignore this box set and go watch the episode on Hulu or something, and skip past all the Jesus bits.

Comedy Toxic Waste of the Week:

Rodney Carrington: El Nino Loco

Doing “research” for this feature I stumbled upon this guy Rodney Carrington who has a new album out tomorrow and it turns out his entire act is comprised of novelty country songs. I haven’t heard the album outside of some clips, and won’t hear any more out of principle, but based on the title there’s probably some racist shit in there somewhere.

This is the sort of thing that gets purchased alongside a Ron White DVD and a ticket to a Fathom Events Glenn Beck “comedy” concert. There isn’t anyone who would listen to this that you wouldn’t (or shouldn't) hate on a basic human level.

The Steve Martin Brothers

The Steve Martin Brothers
Published on CD in 2006 by Wounded Bird Records
Originally published on LP in 1981 by Warner Bros.

"Well good evening, motherfuckers. You probably think of me as the happy-go lucky 'Wild And Crazy Guy' you see on TV---that's a lot of fuckin' bullshit. I just do that to earn a living. This is the real me, so fuck you."

That's from the intro to the second track from Steve Martin on this album. It seems to exemplify this release, being that:

It is Steve Martin's last comedy album.
It is just over thirty minutes in length.
It contains very little comedy, some of it written by Jack Handey of Saturday Night Live and performed by Steve Martin.
Over half the album is banjo music.

An interview with The Banjo Newsletter indicates how old the banjo music was, and Steve Martin's own opinion of the album:

Banjo Newsletter: (The Steve Martin Brothers) came out in '81, so these cuts were already 10 years old at the time, right?

SM: Yeah. By that time I was out of comedy material. I needed to put something on the record. I think I had a contract to come up with another record. I really didn't have [enough material for] one; I'd sort of moved on from standup at that point.

This album was not even published by Warner Music on CD, as was the past few Steve Martin Albums: Let's Get Small, A Wild and Crazy Guy, and Comedy is Not Pretty. This CD was licensed from Warner Music by Wounded Bird Records, which typically shuttles out re-issues of lesser known albums from artists. So, Warner Bros. didn't even want to re-issue their very own Steve Martin album. That should tell you something.

It should also tell you something that the banjo music is the more entertaining part of this album. In fact the banjo music was the entire B side of the LP, as indicated by the dual nature of martin on the cover.

As to be expected from banjo music, it has a lot of nice, upbeat tunes, some of which with musical accompaniment by flute and fiddle. It really showcases Martin's skill as a musician which is often overlooked as nowadays as he does Cheaper by the Dozen 27: Cheap Harder.

That last part segues nicely into the downside of this album, the poor jokes. The two comedy tracks on this album, creatively labeled "Cocktail Show, Vegas" and "Comedy Store, Hollywood" are obviously thrown on there with all the care of a Starbuck's worker on their third consecutive shift in five days being asked to brew an espresso at exactly 279 degrees.

The Comedy Store routines are slightly better than the Cocktail Show routines, which actually ends with Steve Martin pointing out Carl Reiner and Eddie Fisher in the audience. All of which you can't see. Perhaps it's an existentialist joke, or perhaps, as said before, Martin just didn't care at this point. You get that sense throughout the entire series of comedy bits. The jokes fall flat, the enthusiasm is faked. It's obviously still Steve Martin, but it's Steve Martin tired of stand up.

Overall, I would say get this if you are a Steve Martin fan and really want the complete set of albums or haven't heard enough of his banjo music. Which, again, is quite good.