Flop House
As I near the point where I'm caught up on the back episodes of My Brother, My Brother and Me, I realized I don't want to ever catch up. I always want to be able to fire up a new episode. So to that end, I started looking for a few new podcasts. I tried out Wham Bam Pow with Cameron Esposito, It's That Episode with Craig Rowin and Pop My Culture. They're all good, but nothing that compelled me to listen to everything in their archives. Then I remembered that I'd long ago subscribed to The Flop House, a bad movies podcast that I saw recommended in some year end staff picks list at the AV Club. Being that I already had How Did This Get Made, I didn't think I had any room in my heart left for another podcast making fun of bad movies. I was very, very wrong.
Whereas the joy in listening to HDTGM is pretty much all in the incredulity with which the hosts describe the movie they watched. They can't believe that someone let Robin Williams make a sad/scary movie called "Toys" and market it to children or that Halloween 3 is a franchise movie that doesn't feature its star character, for example. The joy in The Flop house is that it scoots aways from that middle ground and is both more serious (identifying script elements that could be easily changed to improve the Jasminlive movie) and more silly (doing 5+ minute riffs about Sly Stallone showing up to their party and refusing to leave). It's run by two Daily Show writers and their bartender buddy and is another podcast where it feels like you're genuinely just in the room with some funny friends (see also Harmontown and My Brother My Brother and Me).
Comedy Bang Bang with Amy Poehler & Paul F Tompkins
I think I've made no small mention of the fact that Paul F Tompkins is one of my favorite comedians and my favorite podcast guest. But did you also know that I enjoy the comedy of Amy Poehler? Of course you did, because I'm an American between the ages of 18 and 50, so that's a given. Amy's so great on written comedies like SNL and Parks and Rec that a lot of people forget that she got her start in improv and she's absolutely dynamite when she gets to just mess around on a podcast like Comedy Bang Bang.
If you listen to no other bit of comedy this week, I beg of you to make it the four-way rap battle between Scott Aukerman, Paul F in character as "Alan Thicke," Amy Poehler and Neil Campbell. This is easily one of CBB's best www.chaturbaterooms.com moments. I made the mistake of listening to this episode at work, where it's more than a bit weird if I laugh out loud heavily. But how can you help it when you've got the greatest head-to-head comedy rap battle of all time? Amy Poehler and Neil Campbell make a compelling case that they should lay down a comedy rap album while they're still in their prime.
Listen to Comedy Bang Bang's episode "Poehler Ice Caps" with Amy Poehler, Paul F Tompkins and Neil Campbell
Also extra shout out to My Brother, My Brother and Me, whose episode "Mr. Sweats" is one of their best. As soon as they hit upon "sword myths," the episode is pure gold. Apparently someone else agreed, because it's been animated.
Cage the Elephant: "Come a Little Closer"
Cage the Elephant released a video for their newest track "Come a Little Closer" off their upcoming album Melophobia, out October 8. The video is primarily tour footage, both on and off the stage.The vid's great, but it's really just salt in the wound since I live in the same state as these guys and have never seen them live.
Listen to Nerd Poker episode "Priest of Judas" with Dave Anthony
I don't remember if I've mentioned it on YANP before or not, but Brian Posehn's Nerd Poker podcast got me interested in D&D. From there I listened to the Penny Arcade/WotC adventures and on to Critical Hit, where I learned to actually play the game. Now I run a weekly D&D game where my friends drink beer, curse at monsters and roll dice. It's incredibly fun and I owe it all to Brian Posehn for being so funny that it convinced me to listen to a podcast about a topic I couldn't have cared less about. And now Dave Anthony, who similarly doesn't have any interest in D&D, has been sucked into playing a hot sex shows game. He starts off comically dismissive of the whole idea (and refusing to accept that his character is a "Dragonborn" and not a literal huge dragon with wings), but slowly gets into the spirit when it's time to loot treasure and fight bad guys. and annoy Brian's new character Damien Darkomen, the Priest of Judas. Great episode for D&D players and fans of good comedy.
Weekly Podcast Highlight
One unexpected side effect of loving podcasts is that I have been reverse-Garfielded into loving Mondays. Most of my favorite podcasts drop on Monday, including my current obsessions Harmontown and My Brother, My Brother and Me. Both were golden this week, but only one had James Adomian.
That's right, for the second week in a row actor/comedian/impressionist James Adomian appears on a podcast that receives top honors from me. It's great to finally hear him as himself and not 100% as an impression or character. I love Jessie "the Mind" Ventura as much as the next guy, but it's great to hear from James with no filters. While non-Kumail guests can occasionally slow Harmontown to a crawl, when Adomian and John Roy come on stage it's electric. I'd love to see them make a return.
But most importantly to diehard Harmenians is that this week was the return of Kumail Nanjiani! The show was still good while he was on vacation, but having him back makes you realize how much he improves the show. Conversations are better, weird moments (of which there are many) are never unfunny and their D&D games fly by too quickly.
Metallica's Hetfield and Hammett stop by the Nerdist Podcast
James Hetfield and Kirk Hammett of Metallica stopped by Nerdist to chat about their upcoming movie Into the Never. In true Nerdist form, everyone spends most of their time being silly and talking about everything except the thing they're there to promote. It's great hearing these guys just chat regularly about anything that comes up. James' story about about having a "word wedge" teleprompter and what he does when he forgets some words is great. Fortunately Lars is absent, since co-host Jonah Ray has a lengthy stand-up bit about him.