2 gryphon gets a break, of sorts

[Jim Demintia]

2 gryphon is going to perform at the Comedy Store in West Hollywood.

Discuss.

[threadshitter]

2 Hours of Nerd-Shrieking and boring rants about shit people don't care about.

Perhaps someone will "spike" his drink with Conway's Ego and he will tell a story about the time something happened and it was AMAZING.

[Sechs]

I wonder if his ego will be strong enough that when he bombs completely he'll say the audience just wasn't worldly and intelligent enough to understand his wit and humor, or if he'll actually own up and say "You know what, apparently I'm just not very funny to normal people".

I'm betting somewhere right down the middle. He will bomb, remove any mention of ever having been to the Comedy Store, and never speak of it again.

[LordNagetiere]

West Hollywood

Assuming he's not a complete moron he'll probably leave the furry baggage at home, pull the angry faggot card and bitch about Bush a lot.

[gnpg]

I wonder how he's going to be billed.  If he's announced as "2 the ranting gryphon" the audience will want an explanation right off the bat and be willing to heckle anyone using a weird name instead of their actual name.  If you watch a lot of stand-up, anyone who looks or sounds off-normal (weird name, overweight, etc.) - the first thing in their act are jokes that make fun of themselves.  I agree with the other poster that as long as he leaves the furry stuff out of his act, he's got a better chance of succeeding - the question is, does he have enough of that kind of material?  Chances are his set will be pretty short, in comparison to a furry convention.

[ProvincialTwit]

I don't think he's capable of making fun of himself, at least not in any meaningful (read: funny) way.

[Jim Demintia]

I wonder how he's going to be billed. 

Either in the journal or in the comments somewhere he states he will be billed as "Gryphon", which I suppose isn't too far out there for wanna-be professional stand-ups.

[Sechs]

West Hollywood

Assuming he's not a complete moron he'll probably leave the furry baggage at home, pull the angry faggot card and bitch about Bush a lot.

Which means that he goes from being "Some weirdo with that weird fetish I saw on CSI and ER" to "Oh, another one of these, there have already been three tonight."

I'm not sure that even the awesome power of clapter can save him from such a dime a gross act.

[Jim Demintia]

He wasn't on my radar until this little bit of Gryphon awesomeness (Twitter link here -- Twitter is throwing an error right now that's not entirely clear if he deleted it or if it's just more of Twitter's awesome reliability). His whole thing seems to be being abrasive, and while "fuck everybody" certainly appeals to some people, it sure as hell isn't the apex of creativity—it entirely misses the point of why ranting like he does could be funny. It's really more an excuse to be an asshole masquerading as comedy.

I'd imagine getting a break in stand-up is tough enough, and you'd better have some kind of hook if you want people to care about you. Without furry, he's just another abrasive asshole. How he's going to translate the furry references for a larger audience is an open question.

[threadshitter]

He wasn't on my radar until this little bit of Gryphon awesomeness (Twitter link here -- Twitter is throwing an error right now that's not entirely clear if he deleted it or if it's just more of Twitter's awesome reliability). His whole thing seems to be being abrasive, and while "fuck everybody" certainly appeals to some people, it sure as hell isn't the apex of creativity—it entirely misses the point of why ranting like he does could be funny. It's really more an excuse to be an asshole masquerading as comedy.

I'd imagine getting a break in stand-up is tough enough, and you'd better have some kind of hook if you want people to care about you. Without furry, he's just another abrasive asshole. How he's going to translate the furry references for a larger audience is an open question.

Bill Hicks He ain't.

[LordNagetiere]

I think deep down he really wants to be Dennis Leary, or at least a Stone Brewery mascot, but it comes off as just abrasion without humor. There is not enough wit or self depreciation (at least honest self depreciation) in his acts. He mostly gets applause from furries because he is the only show in town, and he panders heavy to the 'agree with me' type of comedy. He kind of reminds me of shitty black comedians who rely on being black, and pandering to that kind of audience. You get a lot of calls and claps sure, but removed from the context it's usually just more of a whine with profanity thrown in. That's not to say it can't be good, he just has to stop jumping up and down on the furry button.

[Sambo Rox]

Furry is all he has but no doubt will it be interesting to see how it pans out

[Sechs]

Furry is all he has

Hey now, that's not true.

He has Democrat Rage! That's so rare in a comedian after all!

As to self-deprecation, I'm sure that if you asked him he'd make some excuse like "I bitch about furries, and I am a furry, that's self-deprecating!" Neverminding that he's bitching at furries for not doing things he wants them to do or doing things he doesn't want them to do, which... yeah, doesn't much count. Or something like that.

Most comedians either make it a part of their act to have a general air of self-deprecation, or go the other way and try for an exaggerated sense of self-satisfaction. Of course in the second case, it often quickly becomes a case of the mask turning real. For 2 I'm betting that happened about two seconds after he put the mask on.

[sharki]

I don't live too far from West Hollywood, maybe I'll check him out to see how he does.  I've never listened to any of his stuff, I only know about him, through other people bitching about him.

If he's trying to do a Bill Hicks thing, he's going to have a really hard time.  It's tough to do that type of humor and not come across as just a whiny asshole.  Hicks and George Carlin could do it, and Dennis Leary and Lewis Black can do it because if you peel back the layers of cynicism they are comedians at heart and not just ranting douche bags.

The best thing about 2's post advertising his show?  It's ten paragraphs before he tells you the date of his appearance!

[MazelTovCocktail]

I was hanging out with a couple friends who are sort of involved with the fandom a couple years ago, and they popped in a 2 Gryphon 1 hour stand-up show.  I watched the whole thing, and I laughed a grand total of once, right at the end.  The reason why I laughed was because I predicted what his finishing punchline was going to be right when he started leading up to it, and I nailed it word for word.

[sharki]

I just saw a couple of his 'rants' on YouTube.  Wow!  People find this guy funny?  He's like living a Internet comment section for a Libertarian Website, rambling about how stupid people are stupid and should be killed and how the government is evil.  There's no style, no panache.

[Jim Demintia]

He's like living a Internet comment section for a Libertarian Website

An asshole with no talent and an undeservedly large ego? Pretty much.

[genericfurry]

I'm not sure if a lot of people even remember but just look up "dennis miller rant" on youtube and you'll find a lot of material that he's ripped off verbatim.  I'm really interested in seeing what happens when he gets in front of a LA crowd and tries to talk about typefucking a rhinoceros. Of course I'm not saying anything that hasn't already been said.

I think he's slightly funny in a somewhat generic drunk-guy-at-a-party way. Only furries are bland and weak willed enough to guffaw hysterically and act like he's some kind of gift from....whatever entity furries worship. Im pretty sure the 'edgy in your face' style of humor went out of style more than a decade ago.

[LordNagetiere]

I'm not sure if a lot of people even remember but just look up "dennis miller rant" on youtube and you'll find a lot of material that he's ripped off verbatim.

to be fair for a while Robin Williams made a career out ripping off other comics for years. He just got the delivery down half decent, heck Carlos Mencia hamfists obviously ripped off racist humor and still has a damn show.

Still I think 2 is leading himself up for disaster...

http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/1606145/

A bunch of furries are basically buying tickets online for him, and this caused the venue to think somehow he's good (he's already talking Comedy Central airtime at the end). Worse off, instead of a ten minute slot amongst a lot of other people, they said they'll devote it to him, put his name on the flyer/etc. if he can sell 100. So he asks the furry horde to do exactly that.

So basically instead of doing a short bit for 10 people, he's going to sell out the place to a bunch of furries who will laugh at stuff he's recycled. He honestly thinks this is him 'making it big'. I just don't think you can hit new levels of pathetic like that.

[Jim Demintia]

Which leads you to wonder about the venue, and/or what they know about him. Surely this isn't a new thing, where some "underground" comic has a bunch of friends and friends of friends buy up tickets and show up and show their support, regardless of how much the person sucks. I mean, they can't seriously think that he's good because he sold so many tickets, can they? I don't really know what the explanation is; but I just can't see them thinking he's good based on ticket sales alone.

And yeah, I don't know what he thinks he's doing trying to do an entire show for his "big break". I would think you would want a 10-minute slot, as that's a lot easier to handle and a lot less can theoretically go wrong in 10 minutes as opposed to an hour or more. He's going to be pressed for material anyway, as has been noted in this thread.

But then again, I suppose thinking that way requires some measure of modesty in how you regard yourself.