Customer Reviews

Something to Take the Edge Off

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

ALSTTTEO is up there with Hicks' "Relentless," Kinison's "Live From Hell," Bruce's "Lenny Bruce is Out Again," and Pryor's "Supernigger." I mean, this thing is a classic.

Whereas "Sicko" mainly just chronicled Stanhope's smutty lifestyle, ALSTTTEO takes that lifestyle and applies the lessons one can learn from it to the Big Picture. And trust me, no one else but Doug could take such deviant practices and not only make them feel universal, but also mold them into incisive analogies that leave the listerner feeling an ironic sense of enlightenment.

5 stars isn't enough...

I open with this quote (which, to me, sums up Stanhope's art) because I did not want to open with a banality which happens to me all the time.

This is possibly the most accomplished of Stanhope's CDs so far, and not only because of the beautiful guitar background track (it was tried by many comedians, and most of them failed to enhance the effect - even Bill Hicks in his Arizona Bay, although personally I quite liked the background there).

The CD flows back to back and an hour of act feels like maybe 15 minutes. It does not get boring for one second, and Stanhope proudly displays his biggest strength: wild, ornate, all-stops-pulled verbal imagery. He starts building an image before your eyes, and then adds an extra gross and revolting feature, and then another one, and then another. He piles them high and after each layer you think - now I've heard everything. But wait - there is more! And more. And more. Until the image before unwraps before your eyes, like a bizarre medieval painting, where Flemish artists surpassed themselves in inventing incredibly convoluted, complex - sometimes disgusting - picture of inferno and the Last Judgment.

Stanhope is an accomplished professional and God only knows how long he has to work on his act to get this perfection of delivery, where the pinnacle of the punchline is delivered - always - with just the correct volume of breath, enhancing the feeling of the culminating crescendo.

And the closing tracks about Excess in Moderation and about Bobbie Barnett - listen to them again. They can sum up an entire life philosophy - only for those, of course, who happen to agree with it. But hey: this is like animal porn. It's not for everybody.

Have never bothered to write one of these reviews before but felt obligated to in Mr Stanhope's case. He is not only incredibly filthy, but brilliantly funny with it. Plenty of comic's are filthy but Doug elevates his filth with genuine wit. Favourite bit was where he drew a comparison between the crowds a rock star commands and the crowds a stand-up comedian commands. Asking the audience, "By round of applause, who came here to see Me specifically tonight." A smattering of applause. "Okay, who came to see whichever douchebag happened to be standing behind the mike and couldn't care less who it was?" A massive cheer. For my money, the best comedic voice since Bill Hicks (a comparison I'm sure he's sick of) and an actual satirist, rather than just someone doing blue material. Well worth spending your hard earned money on. Buy this one and then buy the rest after you're sold on him. A truly brilliant mind and a great crafter of jokes. See him before he drinks himself to death for your entertainment.

It's a bit less good than Die Laughing, I think- but I'm giving out 5 stars anyway because ish this raw is a rare treat to be savored... yummie yum yums...

This guy is a comic genius, along with his Man Show (yeah, the show is ok- don't blame them, considering the constraints under which they have to operate- it's still damn diggetty) co-host Joe Rogan, those two may be the sickest most profane individuals working in stand up. And thank God for 'em. (As Stanhope says on this release, "This is stand-up comedy folks...it's a dead sport...")

Both revel in the awkward, tortured basenessof humanity and turn our collective cultural ills into comedic gold. If you are tired of the same old tame, Comedy Central stand-up (admittedly, they have to go with the PG-13, cuz they're cable) observationists with their piddling coyisms: Get this. It will burn the scales from your eyes, and lead you out of Plato's cave, laughing like a tard the whole time.

Less revolving around the stories of 'Sicko,' though Doug can still milk a yarn for every ounce of meaty sanguine flava, Doug's jokes and observations really come into their own on this one. I prefer his 'Die Laughing' the most, and a couple of bits from this (Suicide most obviously) are streamlined on Die Laughing. That's another plus: many comedians recycle bits like a mutha hubbard. Stanhope doesn't do that much at all, so each CD packs new whallop!

Also there is this guy, Henry Phillips, who accompanies Doug with acoustic guitar playing throughout the whole CD.... Worried? Well, It doesn't get in the way of the funnies. I thought that would really grate on me at first but at times it works well- during the freakshow bit he plays that little circus jingle... They play off each other nicely. Don't let the guitar disuade you.

At any rate- Buy Stanhope's CDs, buy Rogan's (one, C'mon duide the people are jonesing for a new one!!!!) CD, get old Pryor, get old Carlin, get some Bill Hicks, and check out Kinison's stuff starting with the oldest (GET LIVE FROM HELL ON VINYL OR CASSETTE!!!!) and moving forward up until Leader of the banned which you just want to avoid... They will give you mounds of great stuff to steal when you're sitting at a bar, trying to be the funny guy because you're lame and unoriginal and have no soul of your own with which to lure under-age gals- you be the veriest Aristotelian conception of slave- to wage, wife and whatever else... Ohh! I don't think amazon has it -but if you go to eatabullet dottie commie, you can get Jim Norton's CD 'Yellow Discipline.' Also great, also dark, also evil. Also HILARIOUS.

I recently came to the conclusion that this is without a doubt the best Stanhope money can buy. He really won the crowd over on this one and you can tell he's having a good time. Some of the most hilarious bits he's ever performed are on here too, like "Big Rubber Fist", "Live Life", "Destroying Your Body" and also what absolutely has to be one of the best closers i've ever heard on any comedy album which is "Bobbie Barnett". I also like the use of the acoustic guitar all throughout the performance. Overall, this is a more "intimate" show compared to his others, which I think really holds up for repeated listenings more than more than most of his other albums.

This will go down in history as one of the greatest comedy recordings of all time. With this album Dougie graduates to the class of Bill Hicks and Richard Pryor. His previous work contains some of the most hysterical stories ever told however; with this work he has blended his incredible story telling abilities with insightful instructions for living. After listening to this album I was ready to throw away my 10 years of sobriety for one last power binge resulting in ridding the earth of my mother and putting my miserable existence to rest with the long awaited and much over due murder/suicide.

This fellow is very refreshing... I had no problems getting into the material even though it is in audio form and not video. Stanhope gets' naked... and somehow, manages to touch the heart with intence honesty.

Not for the weak. This stuff is crass, but then, if you've been paying attention, so is life!

Anyone who is easily offended will NOT like comedian Doug Stanhope. In fact, chances are that something he says on any of his CD recordings will enrage just about every listener. Shock comics don't come much more extreme--or brutally honest. On "Something to Take the Edge Off" Stanhope experiments with having accoustic guitar music played in the background during his performance. It's an interesting gimmick (also tried by the late Bill Hicks), but it hardly smooths the comedian's edges.

This CD marks the turning point in Stanhope's career when he transitioned from telling mostly (sexual) stories about his life to overtly political (libertarian) rants. His broadsides against vice cops, social conservatives and religion are worth the price of admission alone, but there are also plenty of hilarious sex bits like "Big Rubber Fist." Overall "Edge" ranks with "Die Laughing" as one of Stanhope's two best recorded CDs.

What more is there to say about Doug Stanhope?

Very little...other than that this album finds him on top form and spewing mirth, filth, bile, invective and intelligence in equal measures.

He really is firing on all cylinders here and is living proof that the best and most honest people in this world really do appear to be doomed to labour in obscurity or lie passed out in bars at three in the afternoon. But then in a world which venerates the likes of platitudinous mediocre crap like "Oprah's Book Club", "Avatar" the music of "Lady Gaga" and "Twilight", can you really blame Doug and his fellow misanthropes for being unwilling to aspire to anything much beyond being left alone to sigh resignedly in the dark with their cigarettes and their opinions? Nope. Me neither.

If you, like I, also think that, for the most part, the world is a crass, badly thought-out, moronically run battery chicken farm largely populated by frightened, exploited sheep and run for the benefit of a small group of self-aggrandising, bovine, pituitary morons who will sacrifice happiness, liberty and humanity in pursuit of the highest possible profit margin by pandering to the lowest common denominator - then this is the album for you.

I will warn you now though - the "Offensive To Midgets" skit has caused me to cry with laughter on public transport.

This is stand up comedy at its finest. I have almost all of his CDs and DVDs but I always give people this CD first when I'm introducing them to Doug Stanhope. While he's always funny, he was definitely really "on" when "Something to Take the Edge Off" was recorded.

Stanhope has a rare gift - he can find the humor in just about anything (suicide, for example) and then tell you about it in the funniest possible way. His perspective on life seems to be the product of brutal honesty, cynicism, healthy doses of psychedelics, a keen eye for how people delude themselves and an unflinching fascination with the darker side of life.

You gotta love a guy who tells women honestly what they can expect from him in the sack: "by the time you find out how small it is and how bad I am with it, it's too late... I already c*me. my personality's gonna keep me out of the second date no matter how good i am. sure you'll tell your friends but I don't know your friends. Plus, how much pu**y do you get on referral?"

I'm a big fan of Bill Hicks, George Carlin, Richard Pryor and Sam Kinison. Stanhope is every bit as good as these guys and he's still around doing shows. This is a great performance by a great comic. This CD gets my highest recommendation.