George Carlin has died of heart failure. He was the defining comedian of the late '60's and 70's. As the comedy boom of the 1980's exploded and brought us a stand up comedian in front of any stray brick wall, George remained not the most popular or best loved, instead he remained the comic who made us think and who challenged us the most.Toledo Window Box was one of the first comedy albums that I listened to that I could actually identify with. His other comedy albums set the gold standard for other stand up comedians in the years that followed. Carlin made his name and kept it out there by touring and writing new material, he didn't do it by appearing in dumb downed sitcoms or by making crappy movie after crappy movie. He wrote books, did stand up, and in the early days of cable he hitched his star to a then unknown pay cable company called HBO and it propelled him to comic stardom.
Carlin will also go down in history as the first host of Saturday Night Live. His humor and comic style didn't mesh well with the show however and watching it today can be at times painful. But nonetheless he was the first to guest host that now comic institution. (Note to SNL: When people describe your show as an institution, it's time to leave the airwaves. You've out lived your welcome, unlike George.)
There were a few of his older HBO specials that I didn't care for but his last one I saw he was dead on the mark with most of his material. I loved how as he got older he got bolder, that is to say he kept hammering home the stupidity of electing corporate idiots to positions of power and how religion keeps us all down. Maybe now that he's gone people will listen to George's words and we'll stop believing in superstitions and stone age mumbo jumbo and start believeing in helping and working with one another to make things better.Rest in peace George. I hope you come back real soon.
18 comments:
This saddens me on many levels.
While I don't believe in the rapture, I was kinda hoping I was wrong about that, and that some day the Rapture would take place.
I wanted to see the looks on the faces of both people like Hagee and Carlin himself, when Carlin was whooshed up to heaven and the right wing evangelicals were "left behind."
Now that'll never happen.
he was one of the best.
I was just talking to a friend of mine and we both agreed that he was certainly one of the top ten most influential people in our lives that we didn't know personally. Listening to him made me start to question many things, especially religion and political semantics. It's too bad we won't hear more of what he had to say.
Older and bolder. That's pretty much it Monkerstein. Let's be more like George.
His routines are some of the best and forever etched in my mind.
The good Rev. Shuck posted his bit about "Religion is Bullshit". Great stuff. My all-time favorite Carlin piece though was when he made a guest appearance on some day-time talk show back in the 70s - maybe Mike Douglas? Anyway, he stood on the stage and did nothing but stand there and look like he was thinking - for probably 3 minutes. It was hilarious. The audience was dying.
It takes real guts to do something like that.
I wonder what he will come back as?
My whole family listened to his albums when I was a kid. I think that as time went on, he got more biting and relevant, while still managing to be uproariously funny.
Nice tribute, Doc. Yes, this was a sad bit of news for today. (The happy bit of news was that my congresswoman became a co-sponsor of the articles of impeachment. Yay, Tammy!)
He was simply the best. Who else could make fun of his own audience for an hour straight and have them give him a standing ovation afterward?
Agreed. 100%
He was light years ahead of his time.
He was brilliant.
I'm going to miss that guy. He gave voice to many of my feelings about thatwhichwillnotbenamed.
I loved that guy! What a great comedian! He kicked 99% of the other comedian's asses. Like you said-he didn't get soft with age he got more "radical" and kept it up against the powers that be.
We're gonna miss him!
Maybe it's silly to get choked up about someone I never knew personally, but I find the idea of living in a world without him very sad somehow.
He was a good egg, and he'll be missed. I didn't always agree with some of his points, but I always thought he was very intelligent.
i think this is yet one more way we're alike--must be something about being 46... sadly, so many don't even know who carlin was or what he did. but i've thought he was amazing since first hearing him in the 70s.
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