Jim Gaffigan is obsessed with food.
The majority of his stand-up routine is based on jokes about food — his love of it and his thoughts on America’s consumption of it…but mostly his love of it. This has been his M.O. for years. He’s filled live albums and a best-selling book with his thoughts on food. You’d assume that after all years food jokes would become as stale as a Chinese fortune cookie. This routine has to stop being funny after a while, right?
And that’s the brilliance of Jim Gaffigan. He’s able to take material that he’s talked about for years and make it fresh, hilarious and insightful.
On his latest release, Obsessed, the self-proclaimed “fat” comedian is breathtakingly funny. He will literally have you gasping for air with his thoughts on food, weddings, food, bars, food, having a lot of children, food…and food. Yes, that point has been beaten into the ground that he talks a lot about food, but it’s almost mind-boggling that he absolutely kills it with every food jokes.
The reason Gaffigan kills it with these jokes is because they are absolutely relatable to every single human being out there. We all have to eat to survive. Food is in our lives everyday and Gaffigan has found a way to make everything from shellfish to kale to donuts absolutely hilarious. His thoughts on shellfish, particularly his descriptions of oysters as rocks with snot in them, and his hatred for kale, might be the best bits on the album.
Gaffigan’s performance on Obsessed is something to be noted. His famous high-pitched voice that he uses to imitate the crowd’s reaction to his jokes, which became a bit of his calling card on the last two live records, is used extremely judiciously. Instead, we get a supremely confident Gaffigan. He tells his jokes beautifully and his various voices and intonations heighten every joke he includes them in.
Fans of Jim Gaffigan may actually be surprised that his new record is eclipses his classics King Baby and Beyond the Pale. Those albums are such seminal parts of his comedic canon that it might be hyperbole saying Obsessed as his best work to date, but frankly, it is.
So, picked up Obsessed. Laugh hysterically. Then eat something because you’ll be starving by the time this one is finished.
http://youtu.be/3aL9qqWRm7E
