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Episode 058 PAIN – Patrick Holbert: “Who is doing the emotional lifting?”

The delightful charm monster, Patrick Holbert, joins us to pick away at PAIN in stand-up comedy. We talk about how pain is the source of much of stand-up, both physical and emotional, and how usually the audience needs to know that the pain is ultimately “ok” in order to laugh. We cover generational pain, the occupational hazards of talking about pain, how to refocus personal pain onto a “shared” experience rather than just making it about you, and how Patrick went about talking about his painful experiences the first time. It’s a fun talk with old friends about a major element of comedy as a whole, and stand-up in particular, which we trace through a few key bits from Patrick’s own material and a seminal late night set by Gary Gulman.
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Episode 054 CLEAN (2 of 2) – Steven Rogers: “Mastery: when you’re such a genius, you’re an idiot”

In this second part of our CLEAN comedy interview of the pathologically nice Steven Rogers, we jump right into great material. We listen, laugh, and geek out over it through the lens of everything we explored about clean comedy in part one, so if you haven’t listened to the first installment, do that now. The bits we picked are fantastic–you’ll get some legendary Ray Romano, a taste of the genius Finish comic, Ismo Leikola, and some early hilarity from the brilliant buffoon that is Nate Bargatze. And we listen to Steven's appearance on the The Late Show with Stephen Colbert! The episode touches on about how clean comedians get creative with curse-substitutes, how clean can be just making the audience fill in the filth themselves, “I know I look like” jokes, clean comedy and irony, logical absurdity, ya know, more things.
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Episode 053 CLEAN (1 of 2) – Steven Rogers: “It’s a safe bet”

It’s hard to say whether Steven Rogers is nicer than he is funny or vice-a-versa, but with Stephen Colbert and Brian Regan giving him their official thumbs up, the formula works. Steven will hate this description, but he’s so neighborly, let’s call him stand-up’s young Mr. Rogers. As such, Mr. Rogers, Jr., joins us to discuss CLEAN as it relates to stand-up comedy, and we get some great insights as Steven shares his experiences of opening for Brian Regan and doing The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
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Episode 052 PRESENCE – Bret Raybould: “Don’t give a fuck if this goes well”

The way-too-likable, philosophically funny comic, Bret Raybould, explores the role of PRESENCE in stand-up from a makeshift recording studio inside Bret's private plane. We break this topic down into "being present" and "stage presence", touching on the stages of learning, flow state, body language, not giving a fuck, and knowing your act. Bret tells us how dealt successfully with following SNL's Leslie Jones after she brought down the house. We dig into these aspects of presence and a lot more via bits by Brody Stevens, Patrice O'Neal, and Dane Cook. All this while we eat gold-crusted caviar off the backs of Bret's devoted team of silent manservants.
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Episode 048 THE SETUP – Geoffrey Asmus: “A master of trickery”

Undeniably funny, whitely awkward Geoffrey Asmus joins us to explore THE SETUP in stand-up comedy. Like most things in life, most of the work goes into setting up. If the punchline is the slide, and the setup is the stairs to the top. What is a setup? How can you rework a setup to fix a joke? And even more comedy nerd questions! We also have a great time listening to and frog-dissecting material from two opposite ends of the stand-up spectrum: Rodney Dangerfield and Ari Shaffir.
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Episode 047 JOKE THEORY PT. 2 – Harrison Greenbaum: “The secret algorithm of comedy”

Harrison Greenbaum shows how he actually applies all his theories from part 1 of JOKE THEORY to his stand-up writing and performance. We go step-by-step through some of his best material, laughing and geeking out the whole way. It's fucking awesome, so just listen to it. But make sure you've heard part 1 first, ok? (I'm so cranky, I've been working through technical fuckery on this second half for days.)
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Episode 045 COURAGE – Brian Enck: “You have no option but to succeed”

Nationally touring, Brooklyn based comic Brian Enck examines COURAGE in stand-up comedy. It takes courage to start and to keep going. It takes courages to speak your "truth" or to speak candidly about your flaws, mistakes, or personal weirdness. It takes courage to look the fool. Yet it's that vulnerability that can yield some of the most powerfully funny comedy experiences. What are some tricks performers use to get the courage to act despite those fears? We cover this and a lot more via bits by Dave Chappelle, Tig Nataro, Brian Enck, and Jeff McBride.
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Episode 043 ANECDOTES – Kate Willett: “Just let me be an idiot”

Newly-minted Netflix "specialist" Kate Willett gets down and dirty with us on stand-up ANECDOTES. Anecdotes are distinct from storytelling, usually lacking the storytelling framework--beginning, middle, and end. They're "pointless." There's no emotional journey. Lives are not changed by an anecdotal incident. Yet these flimsy, insubstantial retellings of inconsequential events are the backbone of a lot of the best stand-up comedy. We explore this and more via bits by Brian Regan, Maria Bamford, and Kate herself.
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Episode 042 SELF-DEPRECATION – Jacob Williams: “That compliment really hurt my feelings”

Jacob Williams (MTV's Wild 'N Out, Colbert, America's Got Talent, & a lot more) KILLED it in this episode! We absolutely could not stay on topic, and so what? This conversation was UNDENIABLY funny! Between all the goofing around, we hit every angle we could think of on SELF-DEPRECATION in stand-up comedy via bits by Adam Sandler, Demetri Martin, Tom Segura, David Cross, and Jacob Williams himself.
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Episode 041 PACING – Joe Zimmerman: “It has to be 3x funnier than it is them learning”

Fresh from a set on the Late Late Show with James Corden and just two days after dropping his new Comedy Central Records album, “Innocence,” the highly credited and ridiculously funny Joe Zimmerman graced us with a wide-ranging discussion loosely focused on PACING in stand-up comedy. Also of note, Joe responded to John Mulaney’s fervent public wish that he could steal one of Joe’s bits.
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Episode 39 THE ROOM – Norlex Belma: “I know you, now listen to these jokes”

Carolines Breakout Artist Series headliner, Norlex Belma, breaks down THE ROOM in stand-up comedy. When comedians talk about the room, they're referring to a lot of performance parameters: the feel of the crowd, the kind of venue, the demographics, the kind of comedy scene, and the setup of the performance space itself, plus a lot about how he constructed his hour. Lots of comedy craft!
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Episode 035 HECKLERS – Luke Touma: “Warm but jabbing”

Boston-forged comic Luke Touma tackles HECKLERS to explore why people heckle, different kinds of hecklers, and how to deal with them. What specific tactics, tricks, and attitudes work best? We talk about the instigator, the attention whore, the homophobe, the hater, the moral authority, the fact checker, and more. We share comedy war stories and have a blast listening to explosive heckler take-downs by Chris D'Elia, Joe Klocek, and Arj Barker. This episode was fun as fuck, and fuck is FUN.
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Episode 031 ANGER – Gianmarco Soresi: “Am I imploding or exploding?”

Multi-talented, very funny and passionately neurotic Gianmarco Soresi explores ANGER in stand-up. All three half-Jewish white fellas share temper problems, so we talk tantrums, yelling, when anger goes wrong, and why impotent rage is so damn funny. How do you make things ok so people can laugh while you're expressing genuine anger? We laugh and analyze through bits by four VERY different comedic anger styles: Bill Burr, Sam Kinison, John Mulaney, and Mary Mack.
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Episode 027 TABOO (pt. 1 of 2) – Tristan Smith: “I’m a goddamn teddy bear you piece of shit!”

Absurdly dark Tristan Smith wades into the nasty, deep end of the comedy pool: TABOO feat.This is one part craft and comedy theory and one part societal debate, all marinated in total fuckery. We dive right in with some David Cross, followed by the great "Kramer Meltdown," Dave Chappelle's response to it, and then George Carlin's seminal bit from the 90's about taboo words and their context. And we argue the bejesus out it all.
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Bonus Episode 005 – Sandip, Harrison, and Jeff from the archives

We’ve got more episodes on the way, but it’s summer. Weddings, relationships, shows, etc. In the meantime, have a listen to a comedian Sandip Sen, Harrison Tweed, and Jeff McBride just geek the fuck out about the sadly deceased comedy genius, Greg Giraldo. We listen to his closing bit, called “Happy Birfday” from his 2009 album "Midlife Vices." We’re so giddy over it that we don’t even have a decent analysis between three of us. Then we listen to one little joke from George Carlin that shows what you can make funny once you’ve been doing it for four decades.
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Episode 008 WORD CHOICE – Casey James Salengo: “Every day it’s like I never learned anything before”

Casey James Salengo is a New York stand up comic, writer, and actor. He's a lovably funny guy who likes things simple and hilariously acknowledges his refusal to learn from his life experience. He is the very essence is laissez-faire, and it really works for him. He's a master of carefully selecting the right words to compliment his theatrical comedy style, and some very good things have come his way recently. So this episode explores two themes: "word choice" in material and "opportunities" in show business.
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Episode 007 POLITICS – Jason Chatfield: “In America, I’ll wrap my values in cheese”

Jason Chatfield is a standup comedian, voice-over actor, cartoonist, and illustrator based out of New York City. The scope of his talents is irritatingly impressive. He made his name in his native Australia as a political comedian, but since emigrating to the USA, he's "closeted" his politics temporarily for the good of his career. Since he's still a very political person, this episode is dedicated to political comedy, a theme the podcast is sure to revisit many times. That podcast artwork? Yeah. Jason did it. He's kind of a badass.
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Episode 000 – Jeff and Harrison Introduce The Podcast

This is the inaugural episode. Harrison said, "Dude, we should talk and stuff about stuff." Jeff interpreted that to mean that the hosts should record an episode that explains who we are because, without the backdrop of our characters, Jeff seems like a real ass, despite actually being quite harmless. Then we talk about sets!
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Bonus Episode 003 – Patrick Holbert

Jeff McBride and Sandip Sen host this early episode, and they have a blast diving into Patrick's bit about how he is keenly aware of his desire for attention and how he can relate it to a very taboo subject...but no spoilers.
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Bonus Episode 002 – Kevin Froleiks

Jeff McBride and Sandip Sen hosted this early episode, and they couldn't get over how clever Kevin's abstract associations were in his bit, "The Boys From Brazil." They talk about how long it can take to make those connections. They then joyfully tear down some Brian Regan and John Mulaney comedy gold.
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Bonus Episode 001 – Ben Rosenfeld

Ben Rosenfeld joins Sandip Sen and Jeff McBride as they dig into work by George Carlin and David Cross. They also touch on writing material from outrage and working toward funny, through which Ben's dark humor "shines" with incisive analysis about smart comedy, learning your style, and gently misanthropic perspective from his early years in Russia.
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