5/7 Flight Of The Conchords @ Bass

If you’re looking for what makes Flight of the Conchords so hilarious, look no further than Jemaine Clement’s perspective on the band’s comedic strategy, “We tell you lies, and if you laugh, they’re jokes.” Funny enough, that sounds about right doesn’t it? Lies or not, Jemaine, along with his partner Bret McKenzie, had everyone in the packed Bass Concert Hall laughing uncontrollably for most of their Thursday night set. We were in attendance and had one hell of a time. Follow the jump to hear our thoughts on the show and see some fancy pictures.

Our night began with comedian Eugene Mirman, who had some solid one liners that are bound to be stolen, used by me, and claimed as my own. A few that I found iresistable:

– “Dallas is about as much fun as a 24 hour CVS“. (sorry Dallas)
– “God is a 12 year old with asbergers”.
– “Religion = autisim”.
The guy is also apparently pretty pissed off at Delta because they lost some of his luggage on a recent flight. To take matters into his own hands, Eugene has printed thousands of little postcards that say “I hate you Delta” which he plans to hand out at all his shows in hopes that everyone mails them in. Well played sir.

After a 25 minute set by Mr. Mirman, the real deal Flight of the Conchords busted on the scene decked out in their signature robot costumes. After the robot/DJ version of “Too Many Dicks on the Dance Floor”, Jemaine and Brit stuck to songs played mostly on acoustic guitar with the occasional cello from friend Nigel. Songs came mostly from their 2008 self-titled album, Season 2 of their HBO series, and from their upcoming 2009 release I Told You I Was Freaky. My favorite two numbers from the evening had to be new song “Sugalumps” and last single “Business Time”, both of which had everyone falling out of their seats in laughter. To avoid just rambling on and on and exposing my lack of knowledge on good comedy acts, here’s my top 5 favorite moments from the evening:

1. Jemaine and Brit jumping into the crowd during “Sugalumps” and shaking their sugalumps in the faces of all the women in the front row. This coming right after Jemaine accused an aggressive woman of “objectifying” him when she screamed for the guys to take their shirts off…
2. The guys make a big deal about 2 seats on the front row being empty and call out the one girl who finally shows up. They then introduce the young lady to everyone in attendance and ask people to move over so she won’t have an empty seat next to her.
3. After someone screams “take your shirt off”, Britt gets on the drums with Jemaine on guitar and whip out an impromptu version of a song called “take your shirts off Austin”.
4. Jemaine gets upset when no one in the audience actually takes off their shirts after the sweet new song they came up with on the spot.
5. Jemaine gets upset again when 2-3 people throw t-shirts on the stage instead of their panties. This leads to a long conversation about panties and how maybe some people in the upper balcony tried to throw panties but they just fell on the people seated on the main level.

It was a night filled with obviously improved comedy/banter like this along with all your favorite Flight of the Conchords hits. You shouldn’t miss out on this duo if they come to your town. Thanks again to Sub Pop for helping us to attend this show. Photos are provided by the always lovely Jonathon Edwards.  Anyone else make it out?