Back when I was a teenager, my father used to read these
\ncompilations of jokes published under the title
\nTruly Tasteless Jokes<\/i>. My father probably knew that I was
\nswearing like a drunken sailor by that time, so he eventually let
\nme read them so I would know what he was laughing his ass off
\nabout. And I, too, laughed… and tended to tell the wrong joke at
\nthe wrong time. (And I wonder why Princeton never returned my phone
\ncalls after that one incident.)<\/p>\n
For Jackie Martling (best known as “The Joke Man,” one of Howard
\nStern’s faithful sidekicks), there
\nis<\/i> no wrong time to tell a tasteless joke – thank God. His
\nlatest CD,
\nF. Jackie<\/i>, takes 77 minutes of obscenity, filth and
\nslander… and makes it pretty damned entertaining.<\/p>\n
In a sense, Martling is a living
\nTruly Tasteless Jokes<\/i> book. He’s able to put a voice behind
\nthe words someone would read, usually on a spotty photocopy that
\nmakes the rounds under the desks at the office, and demonstrates
\njust how funny some of these lines can be – and you might be
\nsurprised at some of the gags you find yourself laughing at.<\/p>\n
Oh, it’s not that Martling is constantly on fire during this set
\nat “The Comedy Palace” in Andover, Massachusetts. It feels like
\nMartling needs a little time to get his motor running at the start
\nof the show, spending his time ripping the audience (who eat up
\nevery single insult) before going into his “A” material. And I’d be
\nlying if I said that everything in Martling’s act this particular
\nshow had me rolling in the aisles – but then again, I’d tend to
\nthink that Martling realizes that everyone will react differently
\nto each joke, and tries to structure his act to please everyone at
\nleast some of the time.<\/p>\n
That all said, there are moments on
\nF. Jackie<\/i>, even after repeat listens, that still have me
\nlaughing out loud. Some of these moments are old
\nTasteless Jokes<\/i> stand-bys (such as the Helen Keller material
\n– I
\nloved<\/i> these jokes as a kid), some of them are modern-day
\n(including a few jokes at the expense of President Clinton and his
\nescapades a few years back), and some of them are good
\nol’-fashioned ethnic jokes that are incredibly non-P.C. today.
\nWell, you know what?
\n
\nFuck<\/i>
\n<\/b> being politically correct. If you can’t laugh at yourself (and
\nMartling even includes some self-depracating humor to prove this)
\nand each other’s foibles, then you may as well be dead.<\/p>\n
One thing which surprised me, though, was the age of some of the
\njokes. I gleamed one joke involving Superman and Batman and told it
\nto my father – and he was able to tell me the punchline before I
\ncould get to it. (I should note that my father has never heard this
\nCD – yet, since I know his taste in humor is as sick as mine – and
\nisn’t a regular listener to Stern’s show.) Does this bother me? Not
\nat all; I’m just surprised that if they’ve been around this long, I
\nhaven’t heard them at some point. The people I hang around with
\nhave the same sense of humor I do – an admission which should worry
\nmy neighbors and lower the property value of my house.<\/p>\n
Two words of advice, though. First, don’t bother trying to
\nfollow the track names to figure out what these jokes will be
\nabout. Martling works on a stream of consciousness, which actually
\nhelps keep the material constantly fresh. Second, even though
\nMartling humorously hints at it, this disc most definitely isn’t
\nfor the kiddies… unless you live in a liberal household, in which
\ncase anything goes.<\/p>\n
I actually thought I saw one or two of the
\nTruly Tasteless Jokes<\/i> books in a store a few weeks ago, but
\notherwise these things have become scarce in the age of political
\ncorrectness. What Martling is effectively doing is keeping the
\nirreverent spirit of these books alive with his stage show, trying
\nto elicit some type of response from you. In general, my response
\nto
\nF. Jackie<\/i> is this: keep ’em coming. I may not laugh at
\neverything, but I like the cut of your jib.<\/p>\n
2000 Christopher Thelen and “The Daily Vault”. All rights
\nreserved. Review or any portion may not be reproduced without
\nwritten permission. Cover art is the intellectual property of Off
\nHour Rockers \/ Oglio Records, and is used for informational
\npurposes only.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25710,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6500],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-36916","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-jackie-martling","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36916"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36916\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36916"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36916"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}