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Post by chrislc on Mar 23, 2019 14:43:38 GMT -5
Okay so how about Little Ole Man by Bill Cosby?
Even before recent developments, I heard nothing funny in this record, but it made #4 somehow. It really sounds like he is ad-libbing whatever comes into his head.
And on a somewhat related note, what about I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman? I mean WTF. Did it get airplay because it had Batman in the title?
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Post by matt on Mar 25, 2019 10:02:09 GMT -5
I think comedy and the success of these comedians depend so much on the public perception of them, and how we all viewed them at the time. Was Steve Martin funny back in the late 70s and early 80s? Yeah, he could be quite funny...but a lot of that had to do with us all seeing him as a young hip SNL comedian. By the 90s, he was playing a lot of mature, father like, family friendly roles...which change the perception of him and made his SNL stuff (including King Tut) seem more silly. (and for the record, I've never found SNL to be that funny...most of it seems like they are trying a little too hard, but the early years of the show did produce some good stuff) Nevertheless, Planes, Trains, and Automobiles still makes me laugh every time I watch it.
Same could be said for Bill Cosby. I remember laughing hysterically at "Bill Cosby, Himself" back in the 80s, but it's harder to view works like that in the same light given Bill's demise over the last several years.
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Post by OldSchoolAT40Fan on Mar 26, 2019 9:00:37 GMT -5
For a moment, I thought "King Tut" was referring to the instrumental song by Paul Hardcastle with an outer space-themed music video.
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Post by mga707 on Mar 26, 2019 15:45:03 GMT -5
Okay so how about Little Ole Man by Bill Cosby? Even before recent developments, I heard nothing funny in this record, but it made #4 somehow. It really sounds like he is ad-libbing whatever comes into his head. And on a somewhat related note, what about I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman? I mean WTF. Did it get airplay because it had Batman in the title? Looking back 51 1/2 years, I remember liking 'Little Ole Man' as a 9-year-old, but never thought of it as a comedy record. To me, Bill was just doing a 'rap' before it was such a thing, using Stevie Wonder's 'Uptight' as his musical backdrop. OTOH, Cosby was a comedy genius of his day. My older brother had one or two of his hit comedy LPs, and they were absolutely hilarious. And he appealed to both kids and their parents. As far as Whistling Jack Smith, you may have something there. Putting 'Batman' in the title probably did increase the song's airplay. Would've been even better a year earlier (spring '66), when 'Batman'-mania was at it's peak. Going back a few years earlier, in 1963-64 Allan Sherman was a wildly popular comedian, with a #1 LP and a #2 single. But even as a kid I never got a single laugh out of 'Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh'. Still don't.
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Post by mrjukebox on Mar 26, 2019 16:26:19 GMT -5
Steve Martin is a gifted comedian-If there is ever a Comedy Hall Of Fame,I'm sure he would be one of the first inductees-He's been touring the country with both his band & Martin Short who's brilliant in his own right.
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Post by slf on Mar 26, 2019 18:27:26 GMT -5
Okay so how about Little Ole Man by Bill Cosby? Even before recent developments, I heard nothing funny in this record, but it made #4 somehow. It really sounds like he is ad-libbing whatever comes into his head. And on a somewhat related note, what about I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman? I mean WTF. Did it get airplay because it had Batman in the title? Looking back 51 1/2 years, I remember liking 'Little Ole Man' as a 9-year-old, but never thought of it as a comedy record. To me, Bill was just doing a 'rap' before it was such a thing, using Stevie Wonder's 'Uptight' as his musical backdrop. OTOH, Cosby was a comedy genius of his day. My older brother had one or two of his hit comedy LPs, and they were absolutely hilarious. And he appealed to both kids and their parents. As far as Whistling Jack Smith, you may have something there. Putting 'Batman' in the title probably did increase the song's airplay. Would've been even better a year earlier (spring '66), when 'Batman'-mania was at it's peak. Going back a few years earlier, in 1963-64 Allan Sherman was a wildly popular comedian, with a #1 LP and a #2 single. But even as a kid I never got a single laugh out of 'Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh'. Still don't. In 1964, as a indignant response to Beatlemania, Allan Sherman recorded a "comedy" song called "Pop Hates The Beatles" (to the tune of "Pop Goes The Weasel"). I listened to it once over the internet; the lyrics were 100% unflattering and derogatory towards the Fab Four. Fortunately, it didn't make the Hot 100. In the "Book Of Rock Lists" the authors mention this song with a wicked rebuttal: Paul McCartney got a bigger obituary than Allan Sherman without dying.
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Post by doofus67 on Mar 27, 2019 15:36:10 GMT -5
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Post by darnall42 on Mar 27, 2019 15:44:17 GMT -5
Dont mind king tut, but i loathed Take off by Bob & Doug McKenzie when i heard it in the 80s,perhaps it was because i never saw the show .Even now having seen YouTube clips of SCTV i still find it painfully unfuny when it pops up on AT40 reruns
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Post by mrjukebox on Mar 27, 2019 16:28:07 GMT -5
Dr.Demento has played "Pop Hates The Beatles" a time or two on his show.
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Post by chrislc on Mar 27, 2019 21:54:58 GMT -5
Dr.Demento has played "Pop Hates The Beatles" a time or two on his show. I thought it was pretty good. Many older adults were really being driven crazy by Beatlemania in 1964. Any of us older than 30 can relate to that frustrating feeling of "kids don't know what is good" (a justified and accurate feeling much of the time). And the hair! I remember that being the really big deal. Obviously it was a big deal to the young generation as they copied it for a couple of decades. It's kind of embarrassing to see some of those photos now. I guess tattoos took their place. For the life of me I do not understand the tattoo thing. Okay now I need someone to help me down off the soapbox so I don't break my hip. I like Crazy Downtown by Sherman, too. He was a funny guy. Kind of like Weird Al but not as forced as Weird Al.
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Post by chrislc on Apr 7, 2019 20:22:14 GMT -5
Okay so how about Little Ole Man by Bill Cosby? Even before recent developments, I heard nothing funny in this record, but it made #4 somehow. It really sounds like he is ad-libbing whatever comes into his head. And on a somewhat related note, what about I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman? I mean WTF. Did it get airplay because it had Batman in the title? Looking back 51 1/2 years, I remember liking 'Little Ole Man' as a 9-year-old, but never thought of it as a comedy record. To me, Bill was just doing a 'rap' before it was such a thing, using Stevie Wonder's 'Uptight' as his musical backdrop. OTOH, Cosby was a comedy genius of his day. My older brother had one or two of his hit comedy LPs, and they were absolutely hilarious. And he appealed to both kids and their parents. As far as Whistling Jack Smith, you may have something there. Putting 'Batman' in the title probably did increase the song's airplay. Would've been even better a year earlier (spring '66), when 'Batman'-mania was at it's peak. Going back a few years earlier, in 1963-64 Allan Sherman was a wildly popular comedian, with a #1 LP and a #2 single. But even as a kid I never got a single laugh out of 'Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh'. Still don't. Speaking of I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman - another song from that same week - Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead - how/why was that a hit?
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Post by johnnywest on Feb 11, 2022 22:14:22 GMT -5
I didn’t think “Mr. Jaws” was that funny either when I first heard it about 15 years ago. It sounded real amateurish, like something you’d hear in a college Radio Practicum class. Then I was surprised to see it hit #1 in Cash Box.
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Post by mga707 on Feb 11, 2022 22:38:07 GMT -5
Just falling from its #20 peak 55 years ago, February 1967 is another 'period' comedy single that probably didn't get a single spin after June 4, 1968. My brother had this 45. The flip was the same Troggs hit as performed by 'Senator Everett McKinley' (Dirksen). No one today even remembers that long-serving Illinois senator, but the senator on the 'A' side is a different matter: www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LE0aToTtGY
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Post by mkarns on Feb 11, 2022 23:52:39 GMT -5
Just falling from its #20 peak 55 years ago, February 1967 is another 'period' comedy single that probably didn't get a single spin after June 4, 1968. My brother had this 45. The flip was the same Troggs hit as performed by 'Senator Everett McKinley' (Dirksen). No one today even remembers that long-serving Illinois senator, but the senator on the 'A' side is a different matter: www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LE0aToTtGY And while it didn't spin off any top 40 hits (though I think Casey mentioned it once or twice), there was Vaughn Meader's 1962 bestselling comedy album "The First Family", of which I have a used copy. It is said that Lenny Bruce kept a previously scheduled performance on November 22, 1963, took the stage, paused for a moment of silence, and then said "Boy, is Vaughn Meader f--ked."
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Post by at40nut on Feb 12, 2022 0:09:42 GMT -5
A question for those of you in your 40s or younger - I thought of this hearing King Tut. When you hear Steve Martin from the 70s do you think he was funny? Back about 75/76 I thought he was one of the funniest people I had ever seen. And now that makes no sense. I know what he was doing was very very different and new - but it now seems so so dated - a lot like early SNL. You're probably too young to remember, but in 77/78 he was like a Beatle of comedy. He was huge. Monty Python and especially SCTV still are genius to me, but Steve Martin and early SNL? No. Steve Martin's best comedy bit came in a profanity laden rant at the car rental place in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles 😊
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