Music and comedy. They go hand in hand as two of the best things on the planet. They are how I spend almost all of my day – Listening to music from 10PM-7AM and watching Comedy Central from 10AM-2PM. Musicians and comics are who we can all thank for providing us with the music, the memories and the laughter that keep us from tying that noose ever so tighter. However, I would never want to be a full time musician or a comedian. Why? Because they just seem to have the average life expectancy of a African man in the 1800’s… or I guess today for that matter.
Well, it saddens me that we lost another one 2 nights ago. Mitch Hedberg, my favorite stand up comedian, passed away the age of 37, most likely due to a combination of a bad heart and years of drugs. I heard about it on Stern yesterday morning, but didn’t want to believe it. It must have been too early and I couldn’t find a more credible news source, so I went to bed hoping that I would wake up and find out it was just a publicity stunt or something. I woke up to a comment and link proving that that wasn’t the case. No one could quite match his observational humor and the way he spit out his one liners with his laid back, almost stoned, staccato of a delivery. I always seemed to miss Mitch live and now that I had a steady home, I was going to try to be sure to catch one of his shows. Seeing Jeremy Hotz 2 weeks ago revived my want to see more live stand up, and I had been checking Mitch’s website for added shows daily. It seems as if that will never happen now. We are all left however with probably the best Comedy Central Presents performance ever, some smaller TV appearances and a couple CDs, one of which I just got a copy of this weekend. Mitch never made it to the mainstream, and I doubt very many people will remember him in 10 years. It’s a real shame… He was so close; there weren’t many people funnier.
You’ll probably never read, “Scientist dies of drug induced heart failure in West Hollywood hotel.”, or, “Shoe salesman dies in plane crash after flying too close to another doctor’s automobile.” This stuff just doesn’t happen to regular people. Drugs and freak accidents are way too common in the life of entertainers… so common that you have to ask, why would you want that for yourself? Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, John Belushi, Randy Rhoads, 2Pac and Biggie, Chris Farley and now Mitch Hedberg. I look at that brief list, think about what could be if they were still around, and I say to myself, “Just keep your day job you dumbass, just keep your day job.” I’ll leave you with a few of my favorite Mitch Hedberg quotes. And go check out his Comedy Central Presents if you haven’t seen it yet. If you have seen it, go check it out again. It just never gets old.
I think Pringles initial intention was to make tennis balls…
But on the day that the rubber was supposed to show up, a big truckload of potatoes arrived. And Pringles is a laid back company, they said “Fuck this. Cut em up.”
I think Bigfoot is blurry, that’s the problem. It’s not the photographer’s fault. Bigfoot is blurry. And that’s extra scary to me, because there’s a large, out-of-focus monster roaming the countryside. Run. He’s fuzzy. Get outta here.
and the quote that started it all:
What I’m listening to: Silence