Two Drink Mike (note: not our Mike–he can hold his liquor)

The other morning started out as a reg­ular day at the MAN­pants office. I was eagerly waiting for my apple toaster strudel to finish crisping on the hood of the VW bus when sud­denly I expe­ri­enced a strange feeling–a feeling some­where between divine inter­ven­tion and my usual Monday morning fever dream. I felt the curious urge to write a review of come­dian Mike Birbiglia’s album Two Drink Mike. I con­tacted my audio­phile supe­riors at girl­pants and they granted me per­mis­sion to reside tem­porarily at the GPHQ while I exor­cised this review demon. Now I find myself sit­ting on a cot Joel has set up for me in their base­ment. I’ve been given a can of Italian wed­ding soup for sus­te­nance and a Royal type­writer to com­plete my task.

Mike Bir­biglia is a stand-up comic you might have seen on Conan or Let­terman (he is one of the youngest comics to appear on The Late Show). You might have heard or read his Secret Public Journal, a con­tin­uing series of anec­dotes and wisdom bestowed upon The Bob and Tom Radio Show and avail­able in easy-to-use blog form. Two Drink Mike is Birbiglia’s second album (his first, Dog Years, was self-produced). Two Drink Mike is a CD/DVD set from Comedy Cen­tral Records and it’s a birthday cake of good­ness for Bir­bigs fans and new­comers alike. Recorded at the Improv in D.C., this is an hour long set that never drags. Bir­biglia has an instantly lik­able per­son­ality, with an alter­nately laid-back and excited style. His humor is nei­ther squeaky clean nor too blue. He wisely slips in his edgier punch­lines when you least sus­pect them.

With “Whiffle Ball Tony,” his playful cri­tique of the Bush admin­is­tra­tion, Bir­biglia does in 3 min­utes what most polit­ical come­dians take an hour to do, and he does it better and fun­nier. Bir­biglia worked with the late, great Mitch Hed­berg for some time and the influ­ence is clear, but never dis­tract­ingly so. In a moment on “I’m Crazy and Gay Cats,” after segueing from a Karma Chameleon ref­er­ence to actu­ally singing a line from the song, Bir­biglia cracks him­self up and mum­bles “that’s absurd…” It’s the kind of aside you’d expect from Hed­berg, and here it feels like a brief but caring tribute.

Birbiglia’s game plan is to mix home­spun nos­talgia with modern pop cul­ture (sit­ting down to a game of Scrabble with Jay-Z), or riff on his own goofy inno­cence (trying to buy Snapple from a crack dealer). In “Hip Hop Ani­mosity,” he per­fectly sums up the plight of the average good-natured single guy with a great bit about dance club cul­ture. He also presents his under­stand­able obses­sion with pizza, a cau­tionary tale about drinking at a laun­dromat, and a curious con­cern for the sex lives of panda bears. Don’t be scared when he breaks out the guitar toward the end of his set–the three musical bits are all solid. “The Oat­meal Song” tackles (all kinds) of reli­gious rock; “The Guitar Guy at the Party” takes aim at the tit­ular girlfriend-stealing trou­ba­dour; the “Thanks For Coming Song” is a recap of the set. (There’s a radio ver­sion of “The Guitar Guy at the Party” included as well, but the live track is simply more fun.)

Let me wind this down by praising Comedy Cen­tral Records. They’ve been pumping out these fan­tastic CD/DVD sets that are pretty much revi­tal­izing an under­ap­pre­ci­ated art form. Two Drink Mike is no dif­ferent. The DVD includes Birbiglia’s five min­utes from Pre­mium Blend, his half hour from Comedy Cen­tral Presents, and a seg­ment from Shorties Watchin’ Shorties. I’m not a fan of Shorties (the show in which choice comedy bits from var­ious artists are Flash-animated), but the bit they chose for Bir­biglia is a strong one. As for the other videos, he seems a bit more relaxed on the CD, but these are still fun to watch. All in all, this is a golden set.

Rating: 5 toaster strudels (out of 5) [buy]

Try:
“Whiffle Ball Tony“
“You’d Be Surprised”

[site][myspace][wiki][label]