CD Review
Ian Bagg: It Takes a Village
4 stars (out of 5)
Ian Bagg rattles off a volatile word-per-minute and it seems he makes fun of the audience during the parts of the set other comics would be breathing. Within 50 seconds he’s called the host gay and spammed four people with nicknames ending in “y,” another few minutes and he’s endearingly called a woman retarded. All of this draws in their unabated participation; entirely unique material erupts from the crowd’s response to his many ploys.
It Takes a Village achieves a communal circus, making audience members willing and then fueling the energy by returning to the planned set and super charging the laughter. Every insult he nails them with seems to be welcomed with open arms. The survey questions he poses, like “what’s the largest baby you’ve given birth to” and “what’s your favorite part of a blowjob” grant him impromptu options he pounces on with impressive decisiveness and zeal. It’s all part of an impossible to fathom scheme, the compiling of benign information, the maniacal census of an absurd village committed only to laughter.
He devises a meta-physical sound effect to accompany the experience of a boob falling out of a shirt at the grocery store. “A tit will fly out sir, a tit will fly out,” he assures. He’s nearly maniacal. He takes a bank office party to the house for attempting to keep their company anonymous, giving them a quick-wit dissertation on the fundamentals of business. Pay attention if you’re in Ian Bagg’s crowd. He harps continuously and on a first-name basis with the bank’s upper management. His cutesy malice draws them in like a douche bag college boyfriend. He alludes to a bomb that happened in the same place the night before, but you wouldn’t know it, you truly wouldn’t.
Ian Bagg’s It Takes A Village is available December 4th at IanBagg.com.
