I don't understand Hicks. Dave Chappelle, Prior and some of the others mentioned are great. Frankie Boyle tops the list in Great Britain: He is not my favourite though - my cousin is a semi-famous comedian here in England

Boyle:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvOQxeQKrdw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Df_qL...eature=related (look up Shannon Mathews on google news)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2G_0...eature=related

His gimmick is simply being the most offensive comedian ever. He does come up with some gold like the Television joke in the first clip.

To make my post about Bill Hicks, can someone explain besides him being 'ground breaking' etc why he is funny? Break one of his routines down and analyse it (even though it will take something away from it). Bill Hicks isn't funny and Bob Dylan can't sing so it amuses me when people say one is the best comedian and one is the best 'musician' (amongst other things) of all time.

WOW!! Hedberg before Steven Wright? Really? Actually, Hedberg in there at all?

Hicks might not be listed in everyones top 3-5 favorite comics, but he's no doubt top 5 GOAT.

i like hicks a lot and i wouldn't say this. hicks influenced a ton of people, and rant in e-minor is pretty excellent, but comedy is a tough business to stay on top of. hedberg's inclusion as a GOAT standup proves my point - hedberg didn't have time to go stale or make another career before his unfortunate death.

For one, Doors are an awesome band.

Hicks is pretty good, but I recently discovered the cerebral English comedian Stewart Lee (and then read his book, which is probably only available in the US via Kindle). He's my favorite comedian in the last decade.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGAOCVwLrXo

Dave Chappelle should def up there. I put him over Sam Kinison. Yeah Sam screamed and acted like a maniac. OK funny but not funnier than Chappelle. The Sesame Street bit is one of the funnies bits of all time that and the Ghetto Baby Bit.

Hedberg had a delivery that many people couldn't get enough of for some reason(same everytime, boring to me) but read his jokes in text and you'll realize how shallow his material is. I like the comedians who delve regularly into social commentary, Hedberg ain't in that group.

Hedberg and Kinison can do no wrong by me. And Steve Martin and David Letterman. For old school, I grew up watching Carlin and Robert Klein, my favorites back then.

Speaking of Satan…I was listening to Ron Burgundy the other day, didn’t Ron Burgundy remind you of one of those gay guys who likes in lay a tub while other men pee on him? Doesn’t he? Am I the only one?

Can’t you see his fat body in a tub while Reagan, Quayle, and Bush just *making peeing noises*, just stand around pissin’ on him, his little piggly wiggly dick can’t get hard?

*As Ron Burgundy*: “Uhh! I can’t get hard! Reagan, pee in my mouth!”

*Doing a Reagan impersonation with the emphasis on the "Well" like Rich Little and Johnny Carson used to do*: “Well, how’s that, Ron?”

Still can’t get hard, so they call in Barbara Bush; she takes her pearls off, puts them up his ass, then squats over him, undoes her girdle, her wrinkled, flaccid labia unfolds halfway down to her knees, like some ball-less scrotum,

*As Barbara* “Uhhhnn! Uhhhnn! Uhhhhhhhnn!”

She squeezes out a link into his mouth–finally his dick gets half hard.

*As Ron in horrid, groaning ecstasy* “Uhhhh-ohhhohhh!”

A little clear bubble forms on the end, with a maggot inside, the maggot pops the bubble, runs off and joins a pro-life group somewhere– Am I the only one who sees that, or…I’m not? Oh. Thank God I’m not alone. Thank God I had the insight to notice Ron Burgundy is a scat-muncher. He munches scaaat.

I’m so proud of that little dark poetry there. It started I came up with the word “scat-muncher” it went from there and I just immediately thought of Ron.

Jesus, Bill

(Yes, I got the reference.)

PS - How the hell is Mitch Hedberg NOT top 10!?

Because, people either love him or they hate him. Or they think he's alright.

I'm going to put a potato in the oven then read this entire thread. I'm not hungry for a baked potato right now but when I'm done reading the thread... who knows?

He has 1 Comedy Central presents and a couple of CD's. They're kinda funny, and thats about it. I've seen plenty of single stand up specials from people I wouldn't put in my Top 10 that have more laughs then everything I've heard from Hedberg combined. Steven Wright did that same kinda comedy first and he did it better.

Why does he belong in a top 10?

the normal top 3 are always bruce, carlin and hicks?? i always thought it was Carlin, Pryor and Murphy, not saying that's my top 3, just what i thought the usual list is.

normal top 3 on the internet might include hicks. thinking it's at all normal to have bill hicks as one of the top 3 standups - yeah, no.

I was listening to XM and heard that Hedberg's comedy central presents that was so popular was actually a complete fail when he did it, he bombed on every joke, the audience didn't laugh at anything and everything was flat and awkward. They just took the laughter and responses from another comedian and edited it into his segment for comedy central - but the live spot was a complete disaster.

Only in the way that breathing in is overated after breathing out.

There's an uncut release of that CCP. They started getting into him a little bit towards the end. Or that might've been the laugh-adding. It's pretty harsh.

The holy trinity are Carlin, Pryor and Bruce. Only Carlin is on my list of favorites in the same spot. Bruce isn't even on it and Pryor is between 6-8 depending on my mood.

This is ****ing insane! Am I to assume that you guys are avid Larry the Cable Guy fans, or what?

Ask any comedian out there today - any that is worth a damn, at least - and they will likely tell you that Bill Hicks was at least a minor influence. Carlin and Hicks are the dynamic duo of comedy. What is the point of any act that does not make you think? Maybe all the dislike for Hicks around here, which is ****ing uncanny by the way, has to do with the fact that you are the very people he railed against on a nightly basis. Self-absorbed sheep.

Someone mentioned that if he were still alive today that he would have no fans. I imagine that was some sort of joke. If you thought that Lewis Black rose to prominence at all during the Bush administration, Bill Hicks would have eclipsed him by miles and miles. He was truly streets ahead.

Perhaps his greatest virtue was his greatest flaw: he saw the world for what it was, and what's more he told you about it. People don't like the truth, especially when it goes against everything they are already struggling to believe on a daily basis, particularly those thoughts concerning religion or government. Bill Hicks understood that the puppet on the left and the puppet on the right were just that-puppets, puppets whose strings were both being pulled by the same ill-intentioned Gepetto.

Rather we'd just have our televisions full of shows like Survivor or American Idol, shows that require very little on the part of the viewer (unless, of course, one considers sending a text message in order to vote for his or her favorite talentless windbag doing something). We'd rather have the thinking done for us, it is a lot easier that way. Bill Hicks was a hero in every sense of the word and it is therefore easy to understand how that makes the throngs of wasted energy floating through life a bit uneasy. They might realize that they are useless and being used all at the same time, and I would be scared too.

His work is timeless. His assessment of Rush Limbaugh is spot-on and still fits perfectly today, provided you switch some of the characters around. Remember the thing with Conan and Jay Leno earlier this year? Hicks was on to Leno nearly twenty years ago. Much of what he said about President Clinton goes equally well for our current President, Black Bush.

And for the love of God, is everyone posting on this thread twelve years old? How about some legitimate insight into why you don't like him. You cannot simply dismiss him as a dirty comic. If you don't understand what he said, then just say so. Someone will be around shortly to give you an elementary lesson in why everything he said is just as relevant today as it was when he was still alive. If, on the other hand, you just don't think he's funny, well there's nothing I can say to that. I just hope you find your taste sooner rather than later.

Now I get to make a list. In no particular order:

George Carlin
Bill Hicks
David Cross
Patton Oswalt
Louis CK
Chris Rock
Jerry Seinfeld
Greg Giraldo
Eddie Murphy (he's almost been out of the game too long to be considered)
Eugene Mirman (doing some wonderful, innovative stuff)
Kyle Cease
Marc Maron
Sarah Silverman
Dane Cook (What?)
Daniel Tosh (give him time)
Richard Pryor
Dave Chappelle
Zach Galifianakis
Jim Gaffigan (*whispers awkwardly* did he just say Jim Gaffigan?)
Paul F. Tompkins
Brian Posehn
Maria Bamford
Todd Barry
Norm McDonald (saw him recently, he was hilarious)

By the way, I think Mitch Hedberg was ****ing hilarious when he was on his game, but he belongs nowhere in this conversation.

I am absolutely stunned by the lack of support for Bill Hicks, I think he is definitely up there in the conversation for greatest stand up of all time. simplicitus, you are about the first person that I have been in agreement with in this thread and largely with SquidVicious too. +1 for Stewart Lee, also I'd like to give a mention to Dylan Moran, one of my favourite standups of the moment.

squid,

I rate comedians on how funny they are, not on how accurately they can assess Rush Limbaugh. If someone expresses an opinion on politics or society that I agree with, that doesn't automatically make it FUNNY.

Bill Hicks was not funny. He was a guy who went to comedy clubs and went on psuedo-intellectual rants about politics and society. I agree with much of what he says, but it doesn't make me laugh.

You yourself didn't even explain why he was funny in that long-winded essay of yours. All you did was say that his political views are still relevant today. Is that what makes a good comedian to you? Relevance of political views?

If someone says something I agree with, I don't necessarily find it funny or entertaining. And anyone who does has what I would consider a more "low-brow" sense of humor than Larry The Cable Guy. Stupid people find things funny just because they're familiar or in agreement with them. Smart people with a real sense of humor usually want more creativity than that.

When Hicks says, for example "non-smoker nazis are dumb and annoying they should kill themselves blah blah blah" I agree with that, but it's not necessarily funny. I don't turn on Comedy Central to hear eloquent critiques of Rush Limbaugh told in an unfunny uncreative way that I've heard 1000 times already, even if Hicks was the first one to say it that way, it wasn't funny then, it's still not funny now, and I don't care.

Also, Hicks' whole delivery was just weird to me. His sense of timing was strange and always seemed to distract me from the joke itself.

And you like Dane Cook? lol, now it's starting to make sense. I guess for some people, comedy is much more about style over substance.

Squid:

considering you signed up to this board to defend hicks, maybe you could understand how people calling obama 'black bush' and ranting about how television melts minds are not the most popular viewpoints around. i am a big hicks supporter, but his comedy is not for everyone; it also contains a 'heroic dose' of wingnuttery and pseudo-intellectualism. i find his work to be really hit or miss. i understand why comics love him, because he really didn't care what the audience thought.

Bill Hicks is incestant

Thank you for proving why BH wasn't funny.

Also the Doors suck.

Saying Hicks is not funny is missing the point. Stand-up comedy was the only venue for Hicks to get his views out into the world, he was more considered with the salience of his points than the humor in his jokes. Hicks stand-up works because it is therapeutic; listening to his stand-up is a cathartic experience. Hicks is not funny in the way Eddie Murphy or Mitch Hedberg is funny, he is funny in the way Kafka is funny. The fact that people don't like him is telling, most people just want a cheap laugh, they don't care about the process or the truth behind the humor. Perhaps you all would be better listening to Dane Cook or Seinfeld or other banal comedians who focus on minutia instead of tackling important issues.