Search - Woody Allen :: Standup Comic

Problematic reissue of classic material

David Pearlman | Arlington, MA United States | 04/04/2002

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This is a single CD compilation of three albums that Woody
Allen issued on Colpix and Capitol in the timeframe 1964-1968.
It takes half a side each from two of those albums, and
the entirety of the third album. The material itself is
brilliant, as is Allen's timing. He is a natural comedian, and
this stuff stands proudly on the same narrow shelf of timeless
standup as the best of standup greats like Richard Prior,
Bob Newhart, George Carlin and precious few others. To fans
of standup, to fans of Woody Allen the comedian, to fans
of Seinfeld (which drew inspiration from largely the same
well three decades later) and to fans of laughter, this
is deliciciously required listening. So ends the 5 star review of the shows (partially) documented
on this CD. Now the two problems: 1) As noted, this CD presents
only parts of the original LPs. More significantly, the
individual comedy pieces have been edited here, presumably
to get the running time down below the maximum 80 minutes
a single CD can hold. The problem is that this changes
the pacing of some of these routines, and drops funny lines
from others. That's tragic; 2) This CD has been mastered
from mediocre sources and, in the case of the middle set,
from what is obviously vinyl. This middle set (tracks 6 to
13, from the 1965 show) is particularly
'tinny' sounding, with little midrange or bass, and clearly
no effort to even remove the pops and tics of the vinyl. THIS
PORTION SOUNDS WORSE THAN THE ORIGINAL LP!
Rhino is usually dependable, but they dropped the ball on this
one. The mastering of the other material is better, although
far from audiophile quality. The only saving grace is that
this sound quality isn't critical for a spoken word recording.
But it still stinks.Overall, the material gets 5 stars. The editing and sound
quality get 1 star. 3 stars overall. I suggest you look for the
2CD package Capitol issued as an import in 1990. That contained
a similar distillation of the 3 original LPs but not
as poorly edited. It's now out of print,
but can sometimes be found in second hand shops.If you are not inclined to do that, well, this package will
have to do. And it IS better than nothing."

Buy the imported EMI double CD

Jizmo | Boston | 02/15/2006

(1 out of 5 stars)

"This is excellent material. Woody Allen was a brilliant stand-up comedian before he became a brilliant film-maker.

This single CD, however, is badly edited (sometimes in the middle of a routine) to reduce what was originally a double LP set of 93 minutes down to single CD length.



Search out the EMI import double CD of the same. Amazon has it. I just got mine. It is complete, and funny as hell as well as sophisticated.



Even at really reasonable used prices, you'll be missing too much if you get this single disc."

What it would be like if Plato were a "Standup Comic"

steve_martini | 11/14/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I am 14 years old with dreams of someday becoming a Standup Comic. I have been collecting comedy albums for 2 years now, and by far, this is the funniest, quirkiest, most genious, and most inspiring album I have gotten my hands on yet. I bought this from Amazon.com a few days ago along with his book "Without Feathers" without ever seeing a single Woody Allen film. I only bought the book after hearing Jon Stewart's Amazon.com interview, where he mentioned that it was his favorite book and thought "Why not buy his album?"

His ideas are simple, but genious. And his stories are hilarious. Whether you are into Standup or not, this should be required listening. I went from only knowing who Woody Allen was, to being a Woody Allen fan in 76 minutes. Great, whether a fan or not, check it out!"