Poop Shute

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

Yesterday, my friends, was a sad day.

Last night I saw Steven Lynch & Mitch Hedberg in concert. Something I was really looking forward to.

Steven Lynch was up first and was in rare form. He sings and plays guitar, but his songs are painfully hilarious. I've seen him on Comedy Central before, and I've downloaded some of his better bits. I've always enjoyed his work, but tonight was great. Honest to god. Some points I laughed so hard it hurt.

One new song was a delicate love ballad. Imagine soft, major chords picked on the guitar with lyrics like these:

If I had a hammer
I'd build a house for two
If I had a ship
I'd take a trip with you

Then he goes on to list more romantic if-then statements until the end when he says (paraphrase) But I don't have a hammer, and I don't have a ship, and I'm not a poet, and I'm not a painter...

Now picture the song reaching a feverish crescendo and then the big, dramatic, final high note is:

and I also have herpes!

Great stuff.

Then came Hedberg.

Oh man.

Oh man, was it bad.

On his way up to the stage he was spilling from his drink cup. I noticed it, but didn't think anything of it. I figured maybe it slipped or something. Then he opened his mouth. A string of slurred obscenities came out of it.

"Oh my god" I thought. "He's drunk out of his mind."

Even without the slurring I would have known. Anybody who has seen his act before knows that he doesn't cuss much. I mean, yeah he does it, but not habitually. Not every other word, and certainly not even every joke. He was cussing like a sailor up there.

At first it was kind of cool. Kind of endearing. He was still getting the jokes out okay. The delivery was a little off, but in some cases his slurring and strange pitch modulation added to the punchline. To his credit he dropped some new ones that I loved. Like this one: (paraphrase)

Dr Scholls is a Doctor.
He went to medical school.
But it doesn't take a doctor to figure out that walking on a cusion feels good.
He wasted a lot of time in school.
I mean, I would buy them from a Mr. Scholls.
Or maybe even a Senor Scholls.

But that was at first. Eventually all the cussing began to muddy the jokes, some of which I had heard before, and liked less this way.

As the night continued he got worse. He eventually laid down on the stage and began mumbling what jokes he could manage, but mostly saying things like "I f**ked that joke up cuz I forgot it" or worse things like "I missed a gig in Pennsylvania a couple weeks ago 'cuz I was drunk."

He called out for Zanex from the audience. A couple pills landed on stage near his already prone body.

He took them. Chased them with the contents of his red party cup. Lord knows what the pill actually was or what he washed them down with. I can only guess.

Later he ended up sitting in the front row with this lady that had been standing up and down all night (she too was clearly drunk). As he went to sit with her, we were all shouting "no" and "boo" to tell him to stay away from her ass. She had been annoying the rest of us all night, and we had a clue what might happen. Hedberg mumbled something like "it's cool, it's cool" and sat down.

He put his head and her lap and kept mumbling. Then she lifted his head and began to make out with him. He fumbled out of her grip, stumbled on stage...actually rolled back onto the stage and said one of the funnier things he said all night: "you guys are right, she's f**kin' crazy! That was the sexiest, ugliest thing of my whole life!"

People had been walking out in a steady trickle for a while. I held out hoping that maybe it would get better, maybe he could pull out of this and make it better somehow. Now I know how women in abusive relationships feel.

At this point he laid there on the floor bitching about the show going badly and wanting to do a good job, and wanting to be funnier. It was sad. Really, it was heart-breaking.

If I had not been so pissed off I would've been in tears.

I'll watch him on TV or video again, because at least then I have the comfort of knowing somebody else taped this and felt it was good enough to sell, BUT I will never spend a dime to see him live again.

Will it be a good night or a bad night?

At 30 bones a pop it ain't worth the risk.