WTF with Marc Maron (podcast)

[Ghost Dad]

I'm not sure if Mark learning improv was a bit or not, but Matt Walsh sure just taught me more about improv than I ever would have guessed after watching many a Who's Line and Thank God You're Here.

Great segment.

Frog on the other hand... Marc's a decent straightman but you gotta give him something to work with. Maybe it's a regional bias, being from the north east and all.

Matt Walsh!!!

[A Shot Glass of Humor]

I've been burning through a lot episodes in these last few weeks. I've seen Marc Maron on Conan a few times but I was lucky enough to see him live at the Lakeshore Theater and was truly when I got see his brilliance. Either way he's becoming my favorite comic. I think he deserves some sort of Comedy Central show but at the same time, I think this podcast is a great way to let him run free.

My favorite episodes so far the Zach Galifianakis one and the Kyle Kinane. Keep it coming Marc!

[darrylduffy]

the Matt Walsh episode was great. loved the stories about acting school.

i may be completely wrong here.. but this is my guess.. was Frog played by Jerry Minor?

[Cupid Stunt]

that was my guess too. funny bit.

[ericluxury]

The most recent episode might be my favorite podcast. I was really impressed with the segment with W. Kamau Bell & Dwayne Kennedy. I've seen Kamau a few times do 10 minute spots and I wish I could see his one man show now. Also, almost Dr. Steve is a winner segment every time.

[ackbar]

great episode.

any guesses on who the "beloved by all" "famous" "alternative" comedian was who kamau/dwayne complained as gratuitously using the n-word simply for shock value?

[Berliner]

I'm not going to say who I think it was, but I definitely have one person in mind.

[ackbar]

there's certainly people in the "successful and beloved" alternative camp (sarah silverman, louis ck, etc.) who visibly aren't afraid to say things that could be perceived as racist through the use of satire, irony, freedom of speech, etc.

that doesn't necessarily make those comedians racist individuals.. but it is interesting to hear the perspective of two black people. no matter their intention, you can't ever really say it's not valid for someone to feel upset/offended/uncomfortable

[scamboogah]

I think it was Richard Pryor.

[Tairy Greene]

I noticed Marc was saying that many of the comedians who use that word (or others) for shock value are, at the same time, not taking any genuine risks about revealing parts of themselves. They use words to give themselves an appearance of edge, but don't actually put something real on the table where it's about them and the audience may genuinely not like what they're hearing. Louis CK certainly doesn't fall into that category - I do wish they'd named names though because I'd be very interested to hear if they put LCK in the same category as whoever else they were talking about. Great episode. (Loved the Dr. Octagon music to introduce Dr. Steve, too)

[drbristol]

DWAYNE FREAKING KENNEDY!! I'm damp!

I remember first seeing his special years ago and immediately looking online to find a CD for sale; he had a lightweight website (mostly "under construction") with a notice saying there would be something for sale "soon". (Still waiting.)

The more DK the better. Hopefully he chooses to go for it in 2010.

[TacoSmith]

This was a great cast. I was not at all familiar with Bell but I'm definitely going to seek some of his stuff out now.

[scamboogah]

The album, "One Nig(ht) Only" is available on I-Tunes and is great.

This might be my favorite episode so far. Completely fascinating talk with Bell and Kennedy, and the discussion with almost Dr. Steve was mezmorizing. Like listening in on the most productive and intelligent therapy session in the history of shrink-dom...

[Smiles Davis]

The Bell/Kennedy interview was one of the most compelling podcasts I've heard. Too often on podcasts, comedians almost seem afraid or embarrassed to talk about comedy seriously. There are a lot of, "No one wants to hear us talk about this" and then a topic change when analytical discussion of comedy come up. I really enjoyed having several very sharp people talk honestly about good and bad aspect of the thing they (and me as a listener) really love.

Podcasts are great because the audience is almost exclusively fans dedicated enough to seek out the material. I appreciate that Marc seems to understand this and focus on topics that wouldn't appeal to a general demographic. He has mentions that he plans to return to the subject of porn. I hope he does the same with more themed comedy discussion episodes.

[ackbar]

I'd be very interested to hear if they put LCK in the same category as whoever else they were talking about.

dwayne essentially said he's not comfortable with white people using the word at all. they both also said they were dealing with the most respected/successful/famous acts in the alt-comedy scene.. which refers to a small group of david cross, zach galifiankis, patton oswalt, louis ck, aziz ansari and maybe 5-10 others.

all you can do is speculate from that point.. but i think it's easy to exclude the acts you could never picture using that word & break it down to a handful

[Jono11]

any guesses on who the "beloved by all" "famous" "alternative" comedian was who kamau/dwayne complained as gratuitously using the n-word simply for shock value?

As I was listening to it, I was waiting for it to be the Louis CK bit about the coffee, and then it wasn't. I still kind of think it was Louis CK, though, because that bit does, to me, kind of cross the line. I think it's important to be able to talk about the word openly, a point which Louis makes in that same special, but it can go farther than is really necessary or OK.

there's certainly people in the "successful and beloved" alternative camp (sarah silverman, louis ck, etc.) who visibly aren't afraid to say things that could be perceived as racist through the use of satire, irony, freedom of speech, etc.

They get WAY too much of a free pass for that stuff, Silverman especially. Racial satire has to be either very obvious or not obvious at all, and Silverman's satire amazingly manages to be in between. Maybe that's technically skillful, but the effect of it just comes off, to me, the exact way that Kamau and Dwayne are talking about.

Satire and irony are not free passes. The more I listened to the discussion, I felt like Marc was talking almost solely about Silverman, and I felt like Kamau and Dwayne could easily have been talking about her too, if they hadn't referred to a male.

[Jono11]

By the whey, Dwayne Kennedy's Showtime special is on Youtube in three parts. It's good.

[JuanCarlos]

Very interesting podcast, and I can say it affected in the sense that before I would've just typed the n-word complete and say it's just a word. Not that I was shamed into censoring myself, but I think it's a fair point that the word means suffering to a lot of people and that it's not a bad thing to take that into account.

[Lifedough]

My point of view was always that as a white guy, that word can't really offend me personally, so it's not my call to decide if someone else should be offended or not. As long as that word is hurtful, I see no real purpose in using it. With so many words in the english language, I don't really find a need to reclaim the 10 or so words you "can't" use.

[dan telfer]

Sorry for the stupid tangential question, but does anyone remember the program Marc used to suck the music off of his iPod and put it back into iTunes when his computer died? Perhaps you remember the episode this was mentioned in at least?

My 4 year old Powerbook just shat out its vital organs and I need some miracles.