Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Succotash Epi14: A Podcast Potpourri

We're back. It seems I'm saying that every 'sode now for one reason or another. This time we got delayed and had some technical difficulties (which are addressed by producer/engineer Joe Paulino during the show.) Epi14 has finally dropped, as they say, and it's a doozy. So much show that we allowed it to run seven whole minutes over our usual one-hour running time!

One of the main missions of Succotash is to expose you, our Gentle Listeners, to all manner of comedy podcastery, especially some of those shows you might not have even heard about, let along listened to yet. And I can proudly say that this epi does just that. There are a couple of clips from some previously visited shows but mostly you're going to hear some new stuff that hasn't popped up on everyone's radar yet. (And if it's a show you already now then congrats - you beat us to it!)

We've got a couple of Studio P visits this show. One is with the owner of Studio P, the aforementioned Joe Paulino. He pops in so I can make him plug his new CD, a delightful relaxing musical blend entitled Inhale Slowly. If you like to take a break and ratchet the madness down a few notches once in a while, this collection of meditation-inspired tracks by Joe and collaborator Tim White will get you there. Click on the link to visit Inhale Slowly and pick up a copy. We also have another Boozin' With Bill segment.

More intense than our previous encounters, Studio P has installed a functional wet bar and Bill forces your host to imbibe his latest concoction, the "Popper Stopper". (I've popped the formula down there toward the bottom of the blog.)

Before I get to the lineup, let me remind you that you can catch my blatherings in a more focused form each week: as a contributing reviewer to This Week In Comedy Podcasts over on Splitsider.com. Jesse Fox and a handful of other opinionators each pick a comedy podcast that has caught our fancy that week and we write them up.

Finally, Succotash has gone listener-supported! (Okay, so we haven't ever had a real sponsor yet...) Look over there in the right-hand column on the blog page and you'll see the shiny new Donate button. Just click away and through the miracles of PayPal, you'll be able to toss a few digital dollars into our virtual hat if you'd like to help us defay the costs of producing this fine program. We'd be much obliged and will mention your name in an upcoming show as one of our benefactors.

Ok! Enough rambling. Here's who's up in Epi14 of Succotash, the Comedy Podcast Podcast. Just click on the show titles to visit their homesites...


Improv 4 Humans
New in the land of podcasts, Matt Besser of the UCB Theater in Los Angeles hosts this foray into bringing some core elements of longform improv comedy to the audio arena. He's joined in this clip by Chad Carter and Sean Conroy.

Skeletor's Mouthpiece
What a fun discovery! Two lads from Hertforshire, England — Scratcher and Roberts – sit 'round and snipe at issues of the day. Guest Luke McFayden in this clip, where a rebuttal letter is read in response to a notice of traffic violation received by one of the boys.

CB Radio
This is our second time around with host Cameron Buchholtz, whose interviewing skills get better and better with each podcast. Here he's got pretty much a podcast exclusive with guest comedian Brody Stevens, who pulls back the curtain on his recent Twitter-perceived breakdown.

Ham Radio
Also a second visit, this time from the Northwest's Brett Hamill in the form of a commercial for one of his show's mythological sponsors. (Hey! We have one of those, too!)

Plan X Network
Here's a new-to-Succotash podcast. Not sure who these folks are or where they're from and I take 'em to task for it a little bit following their clip. I like to be able to give podcasters their due – most of us are slogging this out without a lot of recognition – but when your p'cast's homesite doesn't have much info on you (AND you sent us the clip yourself!), there's only so much we can say.

Pool Party Radio
Hosted by Parker Arizona and Jason Frisbee (great names!), PPR is one of those free-wheeling discussion-style podcasts where folks generally shoot the shit about anything and everything. In this clip, they're talking movies and get into something I can appreciate - what I call the "pussification" of classic monsters in recent films.

FUHcast
Their title stands for File Under Horrible and the hosts - Bill and Jim - toss around a number of topics that get their goats and their dander up. Even their goat's dander, occasionally. Out of Chicago, these guys channel their creativity in this clip into a sketch about Michael Jackson based recent news that surfaced regarding one of his brothers. (I don't mean to pick on these guys in particular but I hold the FUHcast up as an example of a show that could be made better simply by ramping up the audio quality - that goes for a lot of the programs out there. Nothing personal, guys - I appreciate what you're doing!)

We Hate Movies
I pretty much completely mangle my mention of the four hosts' names - Andrew Jupin, Stephen Sajdak, Erik Szyszka and Chris Cabin (well, three out of four) - so apologies, gents. I love their take in this clip about the idea for a GOOD Star Wars-based TV series: The story of Lando Calrissian in a The Wire-style telling of the Cloud City story. (I'm not a squeamish guy, language-wise, and we do carry an Explicit warning on the podcast but I don't believe these fellows could cram more gratuitous uses of the word "fuck" into this clip...)

As a kind of memorial to podcaster Adam Spiegelman's recently removed tonsils, we roll out three related offerings next...

Proudly Resents
 Adam hosts his "Cult Movie Podcast" each episode and this clip is from a recent show featuring Crystal Angel, a rare creature, indeed - she's an avowed fan of Adam Sandler's Jack And Jill movie, which has not been kindly received. Guest Judith Benezra helps to gentle roast her.

Dream Tweet
Spiegleman produces what's being billed as "The Game Show To Go", hosted by comedian Jonathan Corbett. I think this clip comes from a show that was produced in a Mini Cooper (slightly creepy) and features two contestants who are trying to guess which celebrity supplied one of a trio of tweets. The prize is five bucks. (I see a future on GSN...)

Luggage Tuesdays
This is the first time Succotash features a possible podcast. Mike Spiegleman, Adam's brother and a San Francisco-based comic, has a blog entitled Luggage Tuesdays and his sibling is urging him to turn his writings into a podcast. Here's one of the test segments so we can all get a taste of what that might be like.

Burst O' Durst
We round out Epi14 with a visit from our fave political wag Will Durst, who shines his wry light on the Herman Cain misfire. (If you're in the San Francisco Bay Area, don't miss Will's Big Fat Year End Kiss Off Comedy Show XVII -it's all over the place the last week of the year so Google it (click the title to link to the Yelp listing for the show on New Year's Eve in Alameda.)

Okay, that's it! Go pass that Succotash!

Marc Hershon







Thursday, November 3, 2011

Succotash Epi13: A Show Without Joe

It took me FOREVER to get Episode 13 of Succotash, the Comedy Podcast Podcast, dropped this time. Plenty of material - with so many comedy podcasts online, THAT's never a problem. The "hitch in the giddyup" as a old friend of mine says, was that our producer Joe Paulino, was traveling out of town. He suggested we just wait until he returned but - NO - I couldn't leave well enough alone, could I?

"Just leave me all the bit and pieces," said I. "I can put it together. All I need to do is learn how to use Garage Band." Anyone who uses GB for their 'cast knows how simple it is...after you've done it a couple of times. I got it down enough to push out Epi13, but it was like a baboon giving birth to a porcupine. Wearing a blindfold. In a hailstorm.

That said, I think I've managed to cram quite a lot into this 'sode. Pile of new clips. Couple of Henderson's Pants commercials. A joke from Larry Miller. And a brief visit with Kelly Carlin to talk about her upcoming one-person show, A Carlin Home Companion, which is hitting locally near Studio P on Sunday, November 13th, at the 142 Throckmorton Theatre in downtown Mill Valley.

In addition to reminding you that Succotash is now available through your Stitcher Smart Radio app (on whatever kind of app-y device you own), I wanted to urge you to visit my scribblings as one of the contributing reviewers at Jesse Fox's This Week in Comedy Podcasts over on Splitsider.com.

I also participated in a roundtable discussions about podcasts ON a podcast (David Nelson's Comedy-A-Go-Go) which should be dropping soon. I had a great time and two of my fellow panelists are represented in this episode of Succotash when I play clips from their shows. (But you'll have to listen to find out who they are!)

Before I get to the meat, the picture I'm using here is actually of me this time, dressed in my resplendent Halloween costume which I wore at the Grin Reapers show. It was the first go at having a bunch of San Francisco comic types being onstage but reading from works of classic horror fiction.
Here's what's in store:

Host Adam Harris has been interviewing the comics who pass through his hometown of Peoria, Illinois, for the past three years. In this clip, he bagged a pair of my old pals - Dan Chopin and John "Dr. Gonzo" Means - and we find out that a song parody joke deconstructed on HBO's Talking Funny last season originated from Dan.

Yeah, I had to look twice at the title of this podcast, too. (Even Google asked me if I was looking for the right thing!) The "Four assholes with microphones" (their words, no mine) are Drew, Pinder, Ryan Anti-Hero, and Prado God. (I love it when people are so ashamed of their podcast antics they can't bring themselves to use their real names.) These guys are doing their thing out of Staten island, New York, where their conversations cover a wide array of topics every episode.

This short, daily installment style of podcast is very appealing, although I prefer to download a week's worth at once and listen to all five in a row. Seth Morris has got a bead on his perennial sad sack character who, in this clip, shares his ever-changing "bucket list".

An export of Australia, the Dhead (which stands for dickhead) Factor is new to the podcast scene, with just six 'sodes under its belt. The main host is Jabs,, along with his mates Josh, Adrian, and Stu. At a half-dozen episodes, this laidback commentary-style show is still finding it's way. Fortunately, that Aussie accent is so charming it covers a multitude of sins.

To be honest, I'm not featuring a long clip of Larry's show, though I dearly love his program. Problem is that his stories are generally too long for me to feature on Succotash in their entirety. Fortunately, he recently told a old joke which I thought rated replay here. But catch Larry's whole show if you get the chance!

Comedian Jackie Kashian has found a great niche for her podcastery: Reveal the hidden dork inside pretty much everyone. Each guest she has on seems fixated on some field of esoteric interest, and can talk intelligently about it. In this clip, fellow comic Aisha Tyler unveils several pretty dorky areas of interest, including being very into the Lord of The Rings trilogy of books as well as anything Tolkien.

This podcast originates as an internet radio show out of Boston. (UnregularRadio.com, 8-10 PM) This was sent to me here at Succotash in hopes of being played. I don't mind playing some show's "sizzle reel" but I think you're better off with the "reel" stuff. Nonetheless, see what you tink of Big Sauce and crew.

Declared to be "TV's Biggest Fan" by TV Land back in 2000, Paul Goebel has since shortened it to King of TV. Revel in his presence. This is a very short clip he sent along - I guess kings don't have very good attention span skills.

We've actually got a double dose of political comedian Will Durst this show. Strap in for some good old fashioned contemplation on how the world is supposed to be working when there are questionable events afoot.

That's about it. Apologies for any strange sound qualities - I swear things are going to be better, soundwise, when Episode 14 rolls in because our producer, Joe Paulino, will be back in town.

Please pass the Succotash,

— Marc Hershon