The Legacy of George Carlin

With the exception of Karlin, no one was doing the hourly thing. He was the unusual exception. He was so unusual. Because he was doing a new one every year. I always think it's so funny how Karlin is so revered. But obviously all comedians respect him. But like during when he was around, I don't think he got enough respect. You know what I mean? He was probably appreciated for the words you can't say on television. But he was pumping out some really serious stuff. And I think the audience didn't really like some of the shit he was saying. Do you know what I mean? All these rich people in the audience, he's like, we should turn all the golf courses and give them to homeless people. People are like, wait a minute, we paid to get in here? You know what I mean? Yeah. Well, he definitely had a lot of counterculture in him. A lot of rabble rouser. He has some great bits to this day about diseases that people keep reposting. Yeah. Oh, there's not a week on Twitter where he doesn't have some clip that really kind of captures the moment. How many specials did he have? Let's just guess. 15? I think he had 20. 20? Probably. He did one for every year at the peak of HBO when HBO, to get a special on HBO, he was a standard. And I remember I saw in an interview, maybe this is, that he tried the sitcom thing and it didn't work. So he stuck with stand. I don't know what the, there's Carlin experts that were probably, could explain a lot more than me. He had some really good interviews and God, I wish he was alive while I was doing the podcast where I could have interviewed him and talked to him. Maybe he was in the beginning. What year did he die? Everything's a blur now. Everything was six years ago or four years ago. I'd say he died like 11, 2011? 2008. 2008. So it was actually before the podcast. But if I had the opportunity to talk to him, I would have definitely talked to him about his creative process. There's some pretty good interviews where he talked about that. Oh yeah. No, I remember I'm trying to just turn off my phone because I'm an idiot and I didn't turn it off before. Look at all these specials. Yeah, that's unbelievable. So he went, he had some gaps, right? Like look at that, 63 and then 67 and then 72 and then another one in 72. God, he had two in 72 and then one in 73, one in 74, 75, 77, 81, 84. So what is the total number? So for this discography for Maine, I guess whatever Maine means is 20 including that 2016 one. So the 2016 one, I kind of like it when a lot of people die, was supposed to be out on 2001 around September 11th. But it was literally scheduled to come out right after September 11th. And the name of it, I kind of like it when a lot of people die. That's obviously a bit of an issue. Yeah. But so many... HBO specials. I don't know if it's separate from that. Oh, I always thought it was every year. That's so interesting. I thought it was every year. I felt like it was too. First 12 specials. Huh. So those are HBO specials and what are the other ones? Are those albums? That's the, I guess it'd be audio albums maybe, because there's also television and film appearances and next time. Scroll down, scroll down. Where you just had up? Where it said scroll down? So what is that? Television? Oh, okay. So these are different. Okay, and scroll down a little further. So these are all spots on television shows. And then scroll down a little further. And these are the HBO specials. Yeah. And then written works and audio books. Wow. A lot. A lot. Yeah. I know that he went through a period he dealt with. I mean, you probably have interviewed Kelly Carlin probably. I haven't. I've spoken there on Twitter. I don't know her at all. But I know that he struggled with some addiction and stuff like that. He had a pill issue for a while. Really? I remember I was probably 93. I just started standup and he went on at the original improv on 44th Street. And I remember he had a tape player and he had a piece of paper where he, you know, like a cassette recorder and he had these notes and he had punch lines underlined. I mean, granted, this is 30 years ago. So maybe I'm remembering some of it wrong. But I remember thinking, God, that is just the detailing was so impressive that, and you can see it in his writing. Yeah. I mean, the wordsmith is just so extensive. Yeah. He would write out his entire special word for word. And then he would just kind of tighten it up. Yeah. That is how he did it. And he would write sober and then he would punch up on marijuana. It would smoke pot and punch it up. Wow. Yeah. That was his move. Brilliant. I saw him bomb in front of my roommates in New Hampshire in 1988, 1989. Yeah. I think he went through a rough patch a couple of times in his career. I think with new material, you know, it's like American standups versus like British standups. There is, you know, there's such a necessity to kill in America. Right. Like you can't be bad for a moment. That's why I was so impressed when I saw Chris Rock once at the comedy store, just fearlessly like, what else? What else? And he didn't get laughs for like 10 minutes. Then he's like, okay. Then he got off stage completely unfazed. Like I would be like, get me heroin, something. And but the whole thing of Carlin, just the volume was insane. And also you have to risk bombing. Yeah. He didn't work out either. Like he didn't go to comedy clubs and practice. That was actually part of one of his routine. He had this routine called and fuck this. And it was like everything was fuck this and fuck that and fuck comedy clubs. Like he literally said fuck comedy clubs. Like I don't have to work out in comedy clubs. And when I saw him in New Hampshire, he went on stage with a legal pad, a yellow legal pad. And he had all this stuff written out and he put it down. And my roommate was like, why is your reading his jokes? It's like, cause they're new jokes, you fuck.