The most important thing to know is that Doug Benson's performance on the very funny Potty Mouth is funny. He actively mocks the very idea of the comedy album at every turn, with his increased use of Twitter allowing his audience to comment on the show before he does it. Comments fly from his iPhone as he performs, a quipster even sends him a message on Twitter. The comments enter a hysterical loop as his comments overlap the comments from Twitter, which eventually start to comment on the performance as it happens. Between his brief takes on CNN and the latest Morgan Spurlock goings-on, he continues to discuss what will or won't be cut from the album while letting the home listener in on a fair amount of behind-the-scenes stuff or pointing out a visual gag nobody can see now. HIs delivery is a lot looser than on previous albums, with a reasonably more focused parade of one-liners from his Twitter feed as the album wraps up.
His final track-- pre-bonus tracks, of course-- is an amazingly bizarre mash-up of jokes called "Clean or Dirty" in which he takes the cleanest joke from his act and the dirtiest joke from his act, telling them both at the same time. He does this by alternating... you know what, you just need to hear this. I don't think I've ever heard anything quite like it, but it helps to know the jokes he's mashing up, so you might want to check out his other albums first just so you're more or less familiar with the material he's twisting into the funniest joke pretzel ever baked.
The retail release has a bonus DVD which includes all 6 televised episodes of "The Benson Interruption." At about 2 hours and change, the show features some really great comedians including Paul Scheer, the Sklar Brothers, Adam Carolla, Nick Swardson, and numerous others. While their sets are heavily edited down to fit the format of a 30-minute show, it's one of the most refreshing things I've seen in a while when it comes to stand-up comedy on TV. Benson introduces a performer, and comments on it or asks questions about a story as it goes along. This prevents the comedians from doing the same routine, and shakes things up a bit for the viewer.
If you're already a fan of Benson's work, you're going to love this package. Some of the material is best suited to people who have a passing familiarity with his existing material, so it'd probably be worth your while to make Potty Mouth your second or third listen from his discography-- or just go chronological, to make things easier.
--Adam Pawlus
Augsut 26, 2011
Album release date August 30, 2011
