MC MR. NAPKINS

Well HOWDY, chums!!!  2010 is going to be quite a year for everyone’s favorite pineapple-headed comedy rapper —- your fave and mine, MC Mr. Napkins!!!!  His forthcoming album is all nice and recorded with a red shiny bow on top – now it just needs to be edited, mixed, mastered, artworked, and distributed.  That’s going to take a few months, but you gotsta gotsta gotsta be patient, cause when it DOES drop (finally!!!!!), it’s going to have all the good stuff you’re a-hungerin’ for, from studio stunners to live loveliness to radical remixes. But it CERTAINLY won’t have any HIDDEN tracks!  (Which is exactly what I’d say if I were trying to throw you OFF the track….sneaky sneaky!)

It’s gonna be quite a year!  As Napkins said to me at our falconry lesson last week, “Gettin’ plenty done, yo, in twenty-one-oh!”

Killin’ it,
-Chef

See my schedule page for a full listing, but here are two awesome shows you should check out before I leave for LA:

MC Mr. Napkins at Club Passim
Saturday, 12/26 at 8 PM
$10 ($8 if you’re a member) – buy tickets here

MC Mr. Napkins at the Comedy Studio
Thursday, 12/31 at 8 PM
Tickets $10, but contact me by 12/22 if you want on the guest list

Yesterday, I reconvened a group of singers who have not performed together since 2001: five former members of Company B, Brandeis University’s oldest a cappella group (of which I was a member for four years, president for two).  These smooth crooners were laying down some background vocals for the album I’m currently recording.  From left: Olinde Mandell, Mark Lipman, Brendan Gannon, Staci Hopkin, and Michelle Zeitler.  Rap hands!

Here I am in a Boston Herald article about the local comedy scene.  Thanks for the props to my boy Rick Jenkies of the Comedy Studio, who could have also mentioned Joe Wong (and likely did).  So far this year, Joe has appeared on both Letterman and Ellen and will be performing at the 2010 White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

In addition to me, Rick name-checks Myq Kaplan and Shane Mauss, two of my favorite comics (and two of my closest, most inspiring comedy pals).  They both just taped a half hour special for Comedy Central, which is a huge and well-deserved career milestone for each of them.  If you are looking at my website but don’t know who they are, do yourself a favor and know.

Just a quick thank-you to all the people and animals who let me stay in their guest bedrooms or on their couches or floors during my 19-night LA junket:

Steve Puzarne & Buster (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
Ben Broidy, Jenny Simpson, & Princess (6, 7, 14)
Rob Turbovsky & Jeff (8, 9, 10, 18)
Brian Volk-Weiss & Kaji (11, 12, 15, 16, 17)
Joel & Randi Levinson (13, 19)

This is a picture of Dave Chappelle performing at the Hollywood Improv.  But this venerable comedy club houses more than one performance space: in addition to the main room pictured above, it is also the home of the Improv Lab, a more modest cabaret stage next door.  My friends the Walsh Brothers produce(d) a show there called the Great & Secret Show, on which I was scheduled to perform on Thursday, October 1.  

But then Dave Chappelle showed up.  Read this account of the evening, which also happens to say nice things about me, and let’s meet back here when you’re done reading.

OK, finished?  It was indeed a fascinating event – it’s worth getting bumped to see Chappelle do such a weird show in such an intimate setting.  Most of all, though, it sucks that there was some collateral damage: the Walshes got their show suspended indefinitely for letting Chappelle go up.  I don’t know the Improv management’s position on the incident, but Dave and Chris are terrific guys and the G&S is a great show.  I hope they come back there, or someplace else that is a better fit for them, especially since G&S East is now defunct.

Check out the “Video” page to see clips of “Street Cred” and “Plush Pig.”  Enjoy!

Hot off the BCF, I am now performing in the BIF – the first annual Boston Improv Festival, which is being produced by ImprovBoston.  They should have called it the “Boston Improv Festival at Improv Boston,” because then its acronym would be BIFIB, which is a palindrome.  OK, ok, ok, o – come see me perform at the following times:

Friday at 10!
Saturday at 11!

I’ve advanced to the semi-finals of the Boston Comedy Fest.  Semifinal Round 4 is this Friday, 9 PM, at the Hard Rock Cafe in Faneuil Hall.  Come support!  You can get tickets here.

This weekend I’ll have the privilege of opening for David Alan Grier.  He was one of my boyhood sketch comedy heroes when he was on In Living Color, and now I’m going to get to do some raps so that audience members will be more ready to hear his stand-up.  Grier and I last crossed paths at the Montreal Comedy Festival in July – here we are with comics Shane Mauss and Maggie Macdonald, as well as Shane’s little brother Justin:

DAG and I will be at the Chicopee Comedy Connection on Friday night, and the Wilbur Theater in Boston on Saturday.  Come to our (his) show!