FOT Forum
The Best Show on WFMU => Show Discussion => Topic started by: heliumsocket on January 21, 2011, 05:00:58 PM
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Does anyone know if S&W are fans of old school Phil Hendrie? He's another evening-time terrestrial radio absurdist, or at least was back in the day.
For anyone who didn't grow up in the Southern California AM broadcasting area, he hosted the late evening time slot on a pretty hard-line conservative talk station, KFI 640. He would act as the host, as well as a call-in guest (using a microphone, a mute button, and a telephone). He'd switch back and forth between the two, lightning fast. After setting the table for a while with some outrageous topic, he'd take calls from the stations listeners, and the screeners would generally only let through people who thought the show was for real.
In the 90s, he would never ever break character or let on that it was anything other than a generic AM call-in show. He would just TORTURE the hotheads and chumps who normally listened to the station. His mostly straight-faced parodies of Art Bell's Coast to Coast, which aired on a different AM station at the same time as Hendrie, were great. His stuff can get a little crass, but hey, he was on talk radio.
Phil Hendrie - Lord Vader (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFi6bsC2mQA#ws)
I think around the turn of the century, he devolved into a generic conservative AM radio guy. But man, I remember crying to some of his bits in the mid 90s. Just interested to hear if he had any influence on the Best Show!
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The first time I ever heard any Phil Hendrie was probably around 2001 or 2002 when we were already doing the calls on the show - Jon Benjamin played it for me. I have probably heard about an hour of the guy's stuff since then. I liked what I heard but I don't think there's any influence; probably some admiration in there. But since he devolved into a conservative radio host - correct me if I'm wrong but I believe he was scared by 'the events on 9/11' into becoming a right winger, which to me is the mark of a complete coward.
Tom.
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The caller sounds a lot like Petey.
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Phil got a bit of the Jeff Jarvis/Dennis Miller bug for quite a few years there. Despite that he insisted that he was still a social liberal and still stood his ground on environmental issues and still spoke out against things like over-reaching christian agenda in government, he still ended up pushing hawkish foreign policies.
It's my theory that Clear Channel (or rather Premier Radio Networks) pushed Phil to talk politics every chance he had. A lot of his fans think that this is what helped to burn him out the first time around. Since he left and came back to radio, it appeared that he drifted back towards something a little more consistent - the last time I heard him (in late 2008), he seemed to rip on Palin every chance he got.
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Yeah, I listened to a lot of Hendrie back in the day, and even post 9/11, he never seemed all that "conservative." He got quite hawkish, but hardly conservative in the political sense.
Actually, Hendrie was briefly on 640 *with* Coast-to-Coast, he was the lead in (talk about awkward). Then he got s-hit-canned and they brought in conservative John Ziegler, who went on to have a huge feud with fellow conservatives (?) John & Ken before himself getting s-hit canned. Hendrie also had a lengthy feud with 97.1's Tom Leykis, who -- depending on who tells the story -- may or may not be responsible for ending Adam Carolla's FM radio career.
I'd probably be the only one to buy it, but I'd love to read an oral history of LA talk radio from 1995-2009.
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Thanks for the response, Tom. I'd also love to hear what you think about Longmont Potion Castle sometime. I see parallels between your show and him. Mostly in the silly humor, word-trickery, and the overall vibe of his albums.
Mr. Spacely -- that's the kind of book that would have screaming ghosts come flying out of it every time you opened it.
One last great Hendrie piece:
Phil Hendrie - Push Number 2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baBIRe-TLoQ#ws)
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I love Longmont Potion Castle, and I love the Best Show, but I don't see a lot of overlap.
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Hah! I forgot about his wars with other hosts. But yeah, right up until the end of his first run he ripped on Leykis regularly. For all the joking he did in regards to Art Bell, Art took it in stride and at one point even did his own ribbing of Hendrie.
Another thing: Premier Radio Networks regularly created separate awkward situations with their sponsor advertising. So you had weird things like Dr. Laura advertising vitamins or something during Phil's show, even as Hendrie ripped her apart directly and indirectly through characters.
Even more awkward was Phil advertising phone cards for his "good friend" Glenn Beck during his show, when you consider that Hendrie had a serious beef with Beck over plagiarized material. Every time I was subjected to Glenn's show before 2006, he seemed to be doing a lot of bad comedy. Supposedly, he had more decent humorous material, which I came to discover was almost always ripped off from other places, including Hendrie's show.
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Is Glenn Beck's humor as awkwardly dark and creepy as I think it is?
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Is Glenn Beck's humor as awkwardly dark and creepy as I think it is?
It certainly is, but before he had a number of meltdowns in 2005/2006 it was offset with a bit of non sequitur wackiness that came off as a little forced. I think I'm going to blame his admitted and well documented years of cocaine abuse. (Edit: and I mean for both the emotional state that led to his meltdowns and his creepy sense of humor.)
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David Foster Wallace has an awesome Atlantic piece from '05 all about KFI 640. Phil Hendrie comes up a few times.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2005/04/host/3812/ (http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2005/04/host/3812/)
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I always thought the best show was more influenced by two men comedy teams like Bob & Ray, Cook & Moore, Leno & Eubanks.
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I love Longmont Potion Castle, and I love the Best Show, but I don't see a lot of overlap.
LPC uses a voice modulator
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I always thought the best show was more influenced by two men comedy teams like Bob & Ray, Cook & Moore, Leno & Eubanks.
Yeah, I definitely hear that. I also think it's very much a parody of local call-in radio shows. Anyone who sets out to parody those is going to end up with something vaguely in the same universe as Hendrie or S&W, simply because of the genre conventions being sent up.
One thing I love about S&W, though, is that "Tom" is also a character in Newbridge and has both friends and enemies. And of course, Wurster's super-heroic efforts to overcome his lack of impression skills by using weird pronunciation and syntax to set apart his characters.
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SCTV's Melonville and The Simpson's Springfield is also probably an influence on Newbridge.
Oh!And I also was going say how much Tom is hugely influenced by Fudge,but that would've been me just stating the obvious. :)
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Maybe this should go on a Longmont Potion Castle thread...
I love love love the first volume of Longmont Potion Castle. It took prank calls to the next level as far as experimentation in the antagonizing. The second volume was like a non-sequitir coda to the first volume, taking other calls, and grinding them up in a blender, so you had 10-15 second clips of insanity.
But listening to later stuff, LPC didn't have anything new to offer, IMHO. I couldn't listen to 10 years of Longmont Potion Castle.
This is totally the "their earliest stuff was better" cliche, and it's completely true with LPC.
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Wow mackro, I'm like 180 degrees from how you feel.
I love LPC, but I've always found Volume 1 almost unlistenable. I guess it's because of the mix of the uber-low fidelity recordings, and just that he was so young and barely not laughing during a lot of the calls. You can tell he's just some punk trying to mess with his teachers and authority figures, and those kinds of calls never appealed much to me. Also, the weird sound effects between calls remind me of "Life Remote Control" in Exit Through the Gift Shop. :(
Volume 2 is almost 100% him calling the meat packing place, which gets tired pretty quick, too.
I don't feel like he became comfortable and found his voice until the third album. That's when he first started messing around with long-form calls (like the vitamin salesman telemarketer who calls him -- HOLY CRAP), celebrities, three way mashups, and weird effects. That's when things started getting really surreal and interesting to me.
Volumes 3-5 + Late Eighties Vein are all classics to me, and most of the tracks from them are burned into my brains.
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Wow mackro, I'm like 180 degrees from how you feel.
I love LPC, but I've always found Volume 1 almost unlistenable. I guess it's because of the mix of the uber-low fidelity recordings, and just that he was so young and barely not laughing during a lot of the calls. You can tell he's just some punk trying to mess with his teachers and authority figures, and those kinds of calls never appealed much to me. Also, the weird sound effects between calls remind me of "Life Remote Control" in Exit Through the Gift Shop. :(
The LPC guy was totally being a brat/punk, no denying that! There's still a part of me that can enjoy that when a good prank is done well. That said, he wasn't calling teachers or authority figures as much as just other random retail locations in suburban Denver and known bullies -- which doesn't make it ethically better, granted. I guess I've dealt with prank calls when I was in college radio, and just knew how to not be bothered by them, or play along. Whereas the reactions here are very serious and enraged (in fairness, they have a right to be), especially the ones by the hyper-testosteroned bullies. ("YOU WANNA DANCE? LET'S DANCE!", is a line my friends repeat to each other to this day.) Also, LPC's approach to non-sequitirs and running with them is a talent I can never have, which is probably why it was so impressionable. My favorite ones are the ones calling Mr. Undubachy & Associates.
Volume 2 is almost 100% him calling the meat packing place, which gets tired pretty quick, too.
Agreed. It works much better as a total shuffle play mind-F more than anything funny.
I don't feel like he became comfortable and found his voice until the third album. That's when he first started messing around with long-form calls (like the vitamin salesman telemarketer who calls him -- HOLY CRAP), celebrities, three way mashups, and weird effects. That's when things started getting really surreal and interesting to me.
Volumes 3-5 + Late Eighties Vein are all classics to me, and most of the tracks from them are burned into my brains.
You know, I will give the later stuff another shot, because I like your passion for it here.
See, I had seen a video tape that came out later, and it was just a less funny version of the earlier stuff. But your descriptions infer a comedic maturity which may have bypassed me the last time I listened. Thanks for replyin'!
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That said, we might be confusing releases here. Volume 1 *cassette* is apparently quite different than the Volume 1 *CD* (or self titled) on the Vinyl Communications label, which is a best-of containing the peaks of the first three or four cassettes,I believe?
You're talkin' CDs here, correct?
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But since he devolved into a conservative radio host - correct me if I'm wrong but I believe he was scared by 'the events on 9/11' into becoming a right winger, which to me is the mark of a complete coward.
It was the events of The Cloverfield that did it for me.
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LPC: It's all pretty good on some level. The later releases, to me, seem a bit less inspired at times, and the earlier ones can get repetitive, but there's definitely gold on all of them. I could do without any of the metal interludes though.
The early cassette releases have the trippy Mr. Brainwash stuff, whereas the best-ofs are more straightforward calls. I like the cassette releases more because they seem to work better as a unit, even if you wind up skipping some gibberish tracks.
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Anyone heard the proto-Neil Hamburger CD "Great Phone Calls"? It's hit-or-miss, but some of the hits are brilliant.
"Ya got dat pick-a-potato?"
I know nothing about Hendrie's politics; I'd never heard of him before a recent episode of WTF with Mort Maron. There are a couple of podcasts that compile some of the better call-ins, and they're pretty great. His juggling of the multiple voices is impressive.
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Great Phone Calls has some good stuff. But, what does this refer to?
There are a couple of podcasts that compile some of the better call-ins, and they're pretty great.
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Sorry to steer things back to Hendrie but I subscribed to his tw podcasts and they have some good audio clips of fake callers. Does anyone know how much of the full show is a joke? Is it just these short clips?
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@fish: I was referring back to Phil Hendrie; there are two podcasts of his older "classic" phone calls.
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@fish: I was referring back to Phil Hendrie; there are two podcasts of his older "classic" phone calls.
Sorry if I was confusing. I meant what are these Phil Hendrie podcasts you're talking about, and do you maybe have a link?
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@fish: I was referring back to Phil Hendrie; there are two podcasts of his older "classic" phone calls.
Sorry if I was confusing. I meant what are these Phil Hendrie podcasts you're talking about, and do you maybe have a link?
I think you can listen on his official website. Blocked at work, pretty sure it's philhendrie.com. Or search it in the Itunes store.
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Anyone heard the proto-Neil Hamburger CD "Great Phone Calls"? It's hit-or-miss, but some of the hits are brilliant.
"Ya got dat pick-a-potato?"
I know nothing about Hendrie's politics; I'd never heard of him before a recent episode of WTF with Mort Maron. There are a couple of podcasts that compile some of the better call-ins, and they're pretty great. His juggling of the multiple voices is impressive.
I almost drove off the road once when he had on a "guy" who was petitioning his local state senator for more wagon trails and helicopter pads because he only commuted via covered wagon or helicopter.
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I still catch a little of Hendrie's show once or twice a week. He's still on in L.A. on AM1150. I was introduced to him AFTER being introduced to the Best Show. I would listen to Best Show while chained to a computer on the graveyard shift. I introduced my pal, Adam, to the Best Show and he asked me if I'd ever heard of Hendrie and we both became fans of both shows.
Tom mentioned in his post that he thinks Hendrie went right wing after 9/11, (I haven't heard any of his older stuff) but the guy definitely seems to have leftist leanings these days.
I don't think his show and Tom's show are too similar. The characters that call in to Hendrie's show tend to use a lack of reason and logic as the source of their comedy. Where as the characters that call in to Tom's show use their own despicable deeds as the source for their comedy, which is then peppered with references to nearly forgotten pop-culture icons.
I enjoy Hendrie's show because it's good for laughs. But The Best Show on WFMU is good FOR LIFE.
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LPC is the best!!! i named my band Helium Ointment in tribute.
and yeah, i say 3 + 4 are the total classics, and the rest are great too.
don't see a whole lot of overlap between that type of humor and the best show, tho.
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His [Hendrie's] juggling of the multiple voices is impressive.
Yeah it is. I was a Phil Hendrie fan back before he originally left radio for a failed television career. All I had to do was hear "Raj Faneen" arguing that Halloween was bad because it teaches "the bastards" (Faneen's generic term for pretty much anybody other than himself) to become beggars. Or Bobbie Dooley claiming she was trying to get gas masks for all the families in her home owners association but due to limited budgets was able only to get them for the wealthy families. She rationalized this by claiming the poor in the naighborhood didn't really need them as they've been exposed to every disease anyway while the wealth, being cleaner, were not.
If you want a real treat look uup clips of him doing the show... He really is an amazingly tallented guy...
Sorry to steer things back to Hendrie but I subscribed to his tw podcasts and they have some good audio clips of fake callers. Does anyone know how much of the full show is a joke? Is it just these short clips?
It can vary. Sometimes he'll play three or more parts. For example, a month or so ago he had a "guest" (of course played by Hendrie) and a "caller" Vernon Dozier, a frequent Hendrie caller. He carried all three parts and kept the voices an opinions distint throughout ten minutes or so of the show.
Anyone curious about Hendrie should just get his classixc podcast from iTunes. The full show is available only to paid subscribers...
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http://archive.org/search.php?query=subject%3A%22Phil+Hendrie+Show+Flashback%22 (http://archive.org/search.php?query=subject%3A%22Phil+Hendrie+Show+Flashback%22)
There's tons of great, classic Phil on archive.org.
Just don't tell Phil or he will get very, very angry and then yell at whatever poor sap is his producer now.