"People who go to Las Vegas, you've got to question their fucking intellect to start with. Traveling hundreds and thousands of miles to essentially give your money to a large corporation is kind of fucking moronic. That's what I'm always getting here is these kind of fucking people with very limited intellects."
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| Some call it a
blog, that's fine by me. The restriction of opinions on morning
radio have banished me to my own website to give you my two
cents on whatever is on my mind. I may not be right, I may not
have a clue. It may just be pointless babble. But it's just my
two cents.
Scroll down for some recent blogs. Click the link to go into the archives. |
| TWO PENNIES' ARCHIVES |
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The Stripper Pole and the Ugly Kid July 4, 2008 |
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LAS VEGAS- The place where
I’m staying has a stripper
pole. I’m not really sure why it’s here but it’s distracting as hell. Shot out to my man Mike P who books the “These Nuts” Comedy Show every Friday night in Caesars Palace. If you’re in the area you’re missing some damn good comedy. The booker said “I put it in there for all ya’ll boys who wanna bring the action home wit cha.” No thanks. |
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I don’t want to bring the action home. The action should stay in the strip club where it belongs. I don’t care for strippers and damn sure don’t care enough to order one to go. The crazy thing about it is that the pole isn’t even clean. Which for some reason has me a little pissed off. Not because I want strippers on a clean pole…but the fact that housekeeping didn’t care enough to clean the pole.
I changed rooms one time because there was old coffee in my coffeemaker. I don’t really drink coffee so the cleanliness of the coffee maker shouldn’t bother me…but if they didn’t clean out the coffee maker then they probably didn’t clean out something in the room that is important to me. None the less. I’ll just deal with it. There’s no polite way to go down to the front desk and say… “Hey Um… my stripper pole isn’t clean. I’d like another room.” I tried to enjoy the room but the graphic designer from the radio station in Birmingham has been hassling me all night for a baby picture of me and a picture of me as an adult for a billboard promo they’re doing for our morning show. I sent him these two pictures….
Doesn’t seem relevant now. But just stick with me.
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Burn Notice is probably one
of the best new shows on TV
right now.
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But that's not important
right now.
You know what I’ve always respected about George Carlin… He never quit doing stand-up. It was CLEARLY his passion. It wasn’t some stepping stone to get his foot in the door on some other shit like a sitcom or acting. |
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I ordered a DVD box set
containing all 14 of his HBO
Comedy Specials. I check my
mail box every day as if
it’s Christmas day. I can’t
wait to get it.
The greatest thing about Carlin is that he didn’t retire his comedy to the Vegas Strip. Las Vegas is where great comedy goes to die. |
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The airport is littered with signs promoting all of these great comedians who have year long shows in Vegas. 5-6 nights a week.
On any given night you can see the likes of Bobby Slayton, Louie Anderson, or Carrot Top (* Say what you want about Carrot Top but I challenge you to name me another prop comic in the game that’s on his level *). All these cats are hilarious. As a child I remember watching George Wallace long before I ever thought of doing comedy. He and Sinbad were the only two comics I could watch in the house because their humor was clean. Now I'm sure that George Wallace makes good money to put on what I’m sure is a great comedy show. But for the most part people have to come to Vegas to see him.
It all goes back to my theories about rich people not needing the therapy of comedy as much as poor people. If a couple can afford round trip airfare, a hotel stay, cab fare, gambling money, and the $60 ticket to see Las Vegas Comedy…they’re probably doing okay in their lives. I saw Chris Rock on a Monday Night in Birmingham AL. $40 per person. Even if the tickets were the $70 that Seinfeld and Dave Chappelle charged the city when they came, a family of two could afford that before they could an entire trip to Vegas. I don’t know George Wallace or any of the other comics that work the strip, but I do know the body of their work… and it’s damn good. I’m sure there’s upsides to being in Vegas. No more airports, no crappy hotels, you don’t have to do morning radio to promo the show, your room has a stripper pole. Vegas is a more stable gig which means you can have somewhat of a normal family life. (*Something all comics long for yet very few achieve.*) |
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All the comics on the strip doing regular shows have over 2 decades each in the business so maybe they’re sick of the road. I’m sure they all have justified reasons for being in Vegas and being there has done nothing to take away from the quality of their comedy. But At the end of the day I feel like we as comedians are unlicensed therapists and it’s our job to make house calls. And George Carlin Delivered. 14 HBO Specials strong…He Delivered. 23 Comedy Albums strong… He Delivered. Touring EVERY SINGLE YEAR…he delivered. |
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And he’ll always be remembered for that. Carlin tried to do Vegas for a year or two but was fired from the MGM Grand for snapping on the crowd during one of his shows. He didn't like the kind of people that Vegas attracted. On stage George said. My point exactly George. He should've done Mike P's room here in Caesars Palace. Probably the only audience in Vegas completely comprised of locals. I personally think I’m too young to think about how my comedy will be remembered. If I died now, I’d just be another dead comic who “had a lot of potential and some funny prank calls”. There would be no legacy for people to reflect upon.
I came to this realization
last month in Norfolk,
Nebraska. About 2 hours
northwest of Omaha is the
birthplace of Johnny Carson.
I was in town for the Great
American Comedy Festival. As
part of the festival they
took us around to various
museums and all of them
honored Johnny in some way.
We saw his birthplace, a cancer center at the hospital named after him, a street named in his honor, and a museum containing over 30 years of ‘Tonight Show’ History. Hell the High school he attended named the theatre in his honor. I took a lot of pictures but didn’t bother to look at them until later. When I got back to Birmingham my buddy picked me up from the airport and I started looking through the pictures. And all I could think to myself was… “Damn. The man left quite a legacy. His comedy touched people and reached the masses, he was ground breaking. He dared to be different….I wonder what my legacy will be.” As I said this I looked up and just off the freeway in Birmingham is this billboard… |
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 That’s a picture of me… on a billboard labeled… “UGLY KIDS” I laughed for the next 3 exits. I called Billboard designer and he instantly explained to me the concept of the billboard. It’s baby pictures of everyone from the Buckwilde morning show. And then a few weeks from now THIS will be the new billboard in the place of the “UGLY KIDS” billboard.
I'll believe it when I see it. At the end of it all, the billboard just showed me how much further I have to go in my career. Thanks for the inspiration George. |
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