Hey, kids. To quote Blazing Saddles, "How are things in the clean world?"
The pic (which I hate) is my second photo with Jim--he looks thrilled as hell to have his arm around a drunken, yapping me (and Gods, did he smell fabulous); the gent in the background is Pat Oates, the comic who brought Jim on. Very, very funny men.
I am HUNGOVER. Happy and fuckall hungover. Like the last time I saw Jim Jefferies perform, the experience was a mixed bag. The gig was FUCKING AWESOME, but the shit afterwards totally harshed my high.
However, I still had three awesome hours. And that's the important part.
Like the last time, the story will be told in two parts--the review (this post) and the aftermath (next post).
On with the review...
OK, let's start with the venue. You know I have a serious fan hardon for someone if I will subject myself not only to driving to Connecticut (the Asshole of the Northeast), but even more so that I was willing to go to a casino.
I hate casinos. HATE them. Rick Riordan got it completely right in Percy Jackson & the Olympians with the casino scene (and more on that in post #2, In Which I Find It VERY VERY Difficult NOT to Strangle My Mother). For me, casinos are the embodiment of Hell. All those people, like zombies, playing the slots... *shudder*
BUT I DIGRESS!
Comix is a great room for the audience set up--liked it immediately. The staff is FABULOUS--really lovely, lovely people to deal with, helpful, pleasant and attentive, from the management, to the door staff to the waitstaff--our waitresses were a hoot (and complete with Jim Jefferies autograph tattoos. I thought about it. I really did, but I think I'll wait until I've lost another 100 lbs. & finished the firm-up on the body). VIP tix were worth the expense. Food was decent, too; coffee was passable, but then, I was drinking tequila.
Secondly, the openers... Awesome guys, very funny. Steve Lazarus (who has a book coming out about being a beer vendor at Yankee Stadium since the 70's, Gods bless him) was a hoot--told a classic joke about the Sox fan, the Mets fan and the Yankees fan that totally showed where the fans were from. I think the Sox fans showed best, but then... I'm biased.
Pat Oates... Jesus wept. AWESOME choice for the lead-in to Jim. Describing himself as the "extended leprechaun," Pat did an incredibly high energy set, giving the audience shit (including me--I got dubbed "Meatloaf," and rather than heckle, I let it roll and laughed along. More on that later), with great bits on road rage and Steelers fans. My companion for the evening, the Amazing Tess, is from Pittsburgh and totally loved it (and agreed completely). And I will TOTALLY disagree with the arse who yelled out "too soon!" about the Greg Giraldo story. It was a GREAT story, there was NO disrespect in it, and that's the end of it. Keep telling it, Pat. (Pretty please?)
I had a chance to talk to Pat after the show; the guy is a decent dude--just really supportive and pleasant. He made the point that once you've open miked, it's like chasing a heroin addiction (totally on the money); I also liked the fact that he was protective of both Steve Lazarus and Jim. It just goes in line with my philosophy that we're all in this together and need to watch each other's backs--love to see it in others. The old "neighborhood ethics" (doesn't hurt that Pat is another member of the tribe--a fellow American bogtrotter). We had a laugh over the Meatloaf bit (hey, with the way I was dressed--sporting a white shirt with a skeleton hand giving the finger--I set myself up). Besides, it wasn't cruel. He took enough shots at himself which is why I was cool to roll with the "Meatloaf" shit without heckling (aside from the fact that heckling is classless under 99% of the circumstances, and when I come up against the 1% when it's acceptable, I'll tell you. I've heckled ONCE, and it was completely unintentional, and the comic got a full apology afterwards--and I kept my mouth shut for the rest of the set because I was mortally embarrassed at being an asshole, even if unintentional). I can totally roll with a comic when it's all in good fun.
Unlike the cunt sitting behind me during Jim's set. If I hadn't been high on tequila and Jim, I would have broken my rule of non-violence and broken that hosebag's humorless jaw and taken the jail time with pride. I mean, her boyfriend/husband/fucking idiot who kept yelling, "Up, Gunta, Up!" who also needed a sledgehammer to the crotch to prevent him from entering the gene pool should have told her to shut the fuck up, and if she was having such a miserable time, to take the fucking bus home. I'm serious. Bad enough the management had to step in front of me to tell the worthless cumrag to stop taking pictures for MySpace (and her lame-ass lie about "just taking pictures of ourselves"--really, bitch?)... Argh. She was bitching during the best bits, the ones about Xtianity, Michael Jackson and American stupidity. Proving Jim's points about hypocrisy, and as long as he didn't hear her (although I would have enjoyed him taking her to the cleaners--if you've ever heard his "Hellbound" CD, he takes on a bimbo and tears her posh ass to shreds in three lines. If you're ever tempted to use fake tanner, I will be happy to play that bit for you).
Ignorant cunt aside, Jim's show was in-fucking-credible. Better than New York in October. The second Percy Jackson moment--he came on to the strains of "Highway to Hell," my personal favorite AC/DC song (although the guitar solo in Back in Black is quite possibly the single greatest guitar solo ever, ever recorded). He looks fabulous (and Jim, fat? Really? Please. I should be so fucking fat. You're 34 from a family in which you have at least one member with a serious weight problem--a slight pot [which is as big as the tiny pot the gorgeous 24 year-old walking past me has] is nothing. You're still hotter than fucking hell, to the point I had to talk down the very drunk fan who had wangled permission to fuck you from her husband from following you backstage; give yourself some credit--there wasn't a straight woman in the audience [or gay man] who wouldn't have at least offered you a blow job. Was that too honest? *shrugs* Whatever. I have a hangover, so I'm a little cranky.)
His set was a mix of bits--I'd heard most of them, but there was new material. The older material had been tweaked and added to--the "knob joke"--the joke with the great line, "My job is to get an erection; your job is to get your hole wet" that goes to make the point that a dry hole is an impotent hole (nice to see a man fighting back strong against erectile dysfunction jokes) that ends so beautifully... he breaks my heart with that bit every time, and he's taken it to new lengths of insanity. Jim has mastered the art of the digression--as someone who digresses CONSTANTLY and always brings it back to where it should be, I appreciate this--he knows how to go off on a tangent and bring it back to his orginal story and get to the ending he wants.
Artistically, I am in love. Note, I said "artistically"--this is an important distinction. I'm psyched that I stumbled on Jim's work last summer, just as he's starting to REALLY take off here in the U.S. I cannot encourage people enough to get out and see him live--this is a man at the top of his game who is only going to get better. I'm hoping to be able to interview him for the blog; note I said "hoping"--he's a busy man, and I am not exactly a national outlet, y'know?
Despite being 'faced off my ass last night--it was one of those rare times when the conditions were right with my body so I could drink and not have a bad come-down, but it's definitely back on the wagon for me for a couple of months. No whooper--I was still able to be coherent after the show. Now, as an old theatre lag, I like the backstage bit of the work. I REALLY HATE not being in the game right now--I miss being in the middle of it all, the mayhem, the camraderie, all of it. I stopped myself from slipping backstage to talk to him; he was definitely in a different headspace after the show and ethically, not one I felt I had a right to intrude on. This, however, is why I want to interview him. I don't want to know where the funny comes from--I know where it comes from. It's all about how he looks at the world and processes it. I get that--it's the same place my funny comes from. It's a combination of rage and amusement, disbelief, and the need to a) see if anyone else gets this; b) keep from self-destructing from sheer despair at the outrageousness of the injustice and sheer stupidity of the world; and c) to make a living.
That's the bit some of Jim's oikier fans miss. Yeah, he's an oik. But if that's all you see, Jesus H. Fucking Christ, but you have missed the point. You have missed the intelligence and offended decency, and, folks, sorry, but decency doesn't have to refer to sexual conduct--it also refers to ethical conduct. You can take him to task for his drug use, drinking, sexual inclination, but have you cannot fault his ethics--and if you LISTEN to him, if you pay attention, there are some deep fucking ethics in there, the kind of that demand that you actually be truthful and own up to your shit--plus an extraordinary work ethic. That's what I'm interested in talking to him about--his work ethic. I'm interested in the process, not the funny. If I want the funny, I just have to watch him or listen to the podcast.
Alcoholocaust is coming to Showtime this spring; no air date yet, sadly. I'm planning on road-tripping to Pittsburgh and catch at least one (if not two) of the gigs down there in May, and will definitely go to the show at the Wilbur in September (and I'm hoping, hoping, HOPING he'll do the brothel story at that one; I'm dying to see where he's taken that).
So, Jim, thank you again for a magnificent show. Keep it going, man. Just keep it going. I'll say it again--you are at the top of your game and only getting better.
BTW, the title of today's review comes from my novel. It's how I describe my protagonist, Rebecca Kinsale. I think I can share that title with Himself.
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