Lenny Bruce - Live at the Curran Theater
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Free Music Notes for Live at the Curran Theater
Free Music Review: Brilliant
Hit: 5 Stars
I first saw the name Lenny Bruce on the sleeve of a book in my father's library. I was ten and all I remember of the incident was the cover shot of Lenny Bruce with those Billy Joel eyes. At any rate, I was reminded of that scene when reading certain passages from Don DeLillo's Underworld last year, illuminating the author's vision of Lenny Bruce on stage toward the end of his life. I'll get to the point soon I promise. But lemme go ahead and preface this with the fact that I'm only 24; Bruce was long since dead before I was born, a year and a day prior to the death of Elvis. But enough about me.This recording offers the young person a great window from which to surreptitiously view the state of culture and the times of the early 60's. I grew up on Diceman and Bobcat Goldthwait tapes that seemed very much informed by Woody Allen bits, or schtick; don't expect that here. The Lenny Bruce evidenced in this recording has no rules, it follows no guidelines; it is the spritz style of comedy. After listening you will recognize his influence on so many others, Jackie Mason's jews and gentiles routine is a direct lift from Bruce's jewish and goyish spritz. Howard Stern's extremely personal, anything goes, boulliabase style of radio seems heavily influenced by Bruce's nothing sacred style. Bruce discusses himself, for instance his law problems and his jewishness, politics, for instance RFK's preoccupation with the mafia, and comedy itself with no fear. He'll have the crowd eating from his hand and then he'll say something that totally alienates them. He contradicts himself. He invents new syntax. He deals with issues like race and segregation, at a time when those issues really mattered, without being ponderous, heavy handed or preachy. In an age of Jerry Seinfeld and Jeff Foxworthy cd's, and Spike Lee filming black comedians whose schtick is still based of the tried and true Def comedy jam formula of "white folk do this, while black folk do that," it's really something else listening to Lenny Bruce. Don't expect to laugh every two seconds, just keep your ears open and learn.
Free Music Review: What hasn't already been said?
Hit: 5 Stars
If there's one man that will ever be an icon of stand-up social commentary Lenny Bruce is it. The comedy makes for great potatos, but the real meat was/is the perception altering words that changed the generations that followed. And not just as the inspiration of up and coming stand-up artists, but through fans and detractors alike. Any press (as they say) is good press. Many thanks Lenny!Free Music Review: A Night with the Funniest Man Who Ever Lived
Hit: 5 Stars
That's basically what this is. 2 1/2 hours of storytelling, fantasizing, and philosophizing with the funniest man who ever lived. My copy of the 3-LP set of this has been one of my most treasured posessions for years. Now you can own it too.Free Music Review: Lenny Bruce is not afraid...
Hit: 4 Stars
Rapidly running out of Bill Hicks material (he's left the building) I heard about Lenny Bruce by association and though I'd try this guy out.I wasn't disappointed. You're immediately drawn in by his intimate story telling style. Public intimacy (from outside the tribe) - Lenny Bruce is not afraid and "just wants to cook" and "free-forms it all the way" whaling out concepts as quick as he clicks his fingers and snaps his Tom McCann shoes. He has a distinct northern talking tempo, man, you know, no southern drawl here daddy-o. "I see things in a ludicrous sense and I report on that kind of a scene." A useful trait for the non-trivial events that were to follow. Lenny hilariously describes the story of the cop bust when he was laid low sick. He quips: "I call for the heat and here they are!" Even putting on his shoe becomes comic ammunition: "Did you know that if I'm not involved in it this shoe takes 40 minutes to get on?" They eventually carry him away in a stretcher having to surreally prop him up vertically in the elevator thereby giving Lenny a perfect position to observe the workings of the "Combine" as Ken Kasey's Chief Bromden would say. They even have a crash on the way to the station! Lenny tells how it is changing vocal tone when necessary to invoke the characters and linking into his fantasy sequences with strings like: "...this would be beautiful, dig..."
The subsequent "language" trials that follow come complete with the proverbial outdated parochial judge, "assimilated into nothingness" juries and bribery. Lenny has a field day and just "plays it for laughs" exposing the usual corruption and makes media headlines. But that's not his purpose: "My stick is not to thwart authority - that's just a dumb generality." All that Lenny ever wanted to do was expose the "lie" as he saw it of "respectability". It's a theme that he keeps coming back to time and time again in this gig. "Respectability is - keep it under the covers." "So when I see the lie - I don't want it to be that way." This remarkable honesty on stage allows him to easily capture the essence of his time. His "Jewish-Goyish" deconstructions (especially of the sexual attitudes of his contemporaries) are full of insight as well as wit. It's as if he's standing back from society and saying: "Who the hell sets these dumbo rules anyway?"
In fairness to his material though it does require some effort from a young crew. His mentioning of well-known 1960s characters reminds us of time and place: "I cannot equate Jimmy Dean and Chubby Checker, no, I'm 36 and I'm out if it..." But other references are more difficult to place: "Alexander King - you junkie Mark Twain", "Hugh Downsey - obsequious, over salacious toches-lecker." I wonder who were these zhlobs that Lenny spoke so highly of ;-)
Which reminds me, Bruce litters this 2-hour plus flow-of-consciousness gig with Yiddish phrases all over the joint. Mitten drennen (suddenly) he'll shlep (drag) himself up to the microphone and spritz (speak) words like naches (happiness) and gelt (money) frequently, but when Lenny talks about his critics you will hear the well known putz and schmuck creep in, and when he really wants to kvetsh (complain) he'll geshrei (holler) on about zhlobs (rude and crude people) and even the odd toches-lecker (ass licker)! It's enough to drive a goy mishigeh!
When I first heard about 'legendary' Lenny Bruce the so-called "dirty Jew" I thought I would never be able to appreciate his humor, thinking him way too far before my time. I was happily mistaken. "Is this funny?" asks Lenny at the very beginning. Yip, it sure is. Granted, some effort is required to fully dig this persecuted, suppressed, bi-lingual, ad-libbing, comic man-of-his-times in this his Curran Theatre tour de force of free-flowing consciousness. He's well worth it though. His addictive, truth telling, damn the begrudges, no fear style brings you back for more, each pass uncovering new structure and comedy. A perfect mirror on the 1960's reflecting even today. Take him or leave him at the very least he's funnier than Joyce! You know I'm still trying to figure out how to pronounce "Byhre" - Goyish or what...;-)
Free Music Review: Fresh, Alive, Close To His Best
Hit: 4 Stars
Sadly, there are only four complete Lenny Bruce performances available: This, The Curran Theater Concert from 11/19/61; The Carnegie Hall Concert from earlier that year in 2/4/61; The Berkeley Concert recorded later, perhaps in 1965; and another apparently complete set from a nightclub performance in 1962, available on the Viper's Nest label entitled "Lenny Bruce: The Historic 1962 Concert When Lenny Was Busted." This last one is an extreme departure in tone and sobriety from the 1961 concerts and foreshadows the fall to come.The rest of the original albums, travesties recorded on the Fantasy label, were released during Lenny's lifetime and are edited and spliced together from jarringly dispirit performances. So obvious are the splices, and so startling is the effect, it's difficult to listen to them today. Is it possible audiences of the 1950s couldn't hear this on early vinyl?
The Curran Theater concert is important and enjoyable. We hear Lenny in his prime, before the court battles and the drugs demented him. So confident is he here, the performance is largely ad-libbed. Think of that, a comic creating on the spot for over two hours, a net-less tight rope. Some of the routines refer back to earlier established bits, true, but this night Lenny attempts (as he admits during the performance) to fly like a jazz musician.
The concert clocked in at over three hours. What we have here on CD has been edited to a more listenable length. Perhaps this is for the best for even here Lenny at times becomes a bit long-winded and repetitive.
The performance is by no means perfect. There are lulls as Lenny searches for the thrust of his story, for the humor in what he is relating. He always succeeds, but it sometimes takes him a while to find the groove.
However, for its few faults, this recording shows us the genius of Lenny Bruce. From the beginning he talks to the audience as if they are his friends hanging with him on a Friday night. There's no schtick here, no prefabricated comedic framework. This is a comedian TALKING to an audience, reaching out and bringing it closer, breaking down the wall not only of performance versus life, but of performer versus confidante.
What this is NOT is a collection of comedy bits from rehearsed and perfected routines. Rehearsed and perfected Lenny was. But here you have a popular humorist revealing himself in a captivating, unsettling way. Understanding and listening to this performance may take a bit more effort than usual, but it's worth it. Lenny was a unique human being, an obvious precursor to George Carlin and Richard Pryor. As you listen, try to imagine what it must have been like saying these things in public in 1961. George Carlin never had to be so courageous.