Not content to just see one comedy show on a Friday night, I hightailed it back across the 520 Bridge from having seen Greg Behrendt at Laughs in order to get to Pioneer Square, near downtown Seattle, for the late show on Friday to see Jim Short.

Jim Short, an Australian who has lived in the US for many years...and a former winner of the San Francisco Comedy Competition, is one of those consistently strong headliners that the Comedy Underground brings in a couple of times every year. You may have seen him on Letterman, Ferguson, etc...but what I love about him is that he is able to incorporate absolutely current events and use strong joke crafting skills to fold those elements into his well honed act...and he always makes it sound as if these were things that Jim just thought of in that moment...

I think any comedian hoping to improve upon what they do should, if given the chance, see Jim Short perform regularly...as he's simply a solid example of how to keep yourself fresh and strong.

Full disclosure, I did not stay through the entire set of Jim's because it was a small Friday late night crowd with some loud talkers near the front, and at some point Jim took it upon himself to try to quiet them down...and I simply wasn't in the mood to watch someone I enjoy diverted from doing the things that I enjoy him doing. BUT, what I did see was as strong as ever...

Before Jim was Eddie Brill--who, perhaps, is best known as being the man who decides the stand-up comedians who get to perform on Letterman. Eddie is also the person who decides who gets to go to the Great American Comedy Festival in Norfolk, Nebraska (from Seattle, it will be Gabriel Rutledge--who certainly deserves it, both as a strong professional comedian but also specifically from the strong audition set he delivered at the Seattle showcase that Eddie arranged.)

Eddie, as a comic, is a little bit old school--but by no means out of touch. His material is up to the moment--stories from his life, opinions about fast food and organized religion--but there is an element of classic "comedian" about him...and seeing him work is like what I imagined New York-style stand-up comedy would be before I had any knowledge as to what stand-up comedy really was...

It was nice to see him work a small crowd, as he was able to relate to the group on a more personal level...rather than see him try to splatter the back walls of the club with tons of energy and attitude. (That's not to suggest that it was tame...as you don't mime whipping out your dick and pissing on a stool that represents organized religion in a "tame" set.)

Hosting the show was Eric Lincoln Hurst--one of the purest masters of ceremonies you'll ever get a chance to see. He truly understands what it means to "host" a show. There were also two guest spots: Kortney Shane Williams, who...as always...was refining new material. (He reminds me a lot of Ty Barnett who has a similar drive to constantly get stage time and work on new stuff.) The other guest spot was Mr. Mookie, who is always a bit of a wild card on any show...when he connects with a crowd, his outlandish stories can explode...but when he doesn't connect with a crowd, he can leave a crowd bewildered and unsettled. On this night, he connected...and it was probably one of the best sets I've seen Mookie offer up.)

pg--I know that late show Friday crowds are typically rather thin, but boy did the whole of Pioneer Square seem particularly dead last night.--seattle