Best stand up?

[Hatta]

I've been listening to a lot of stand up albums recently. Who do you guys like, and can you recommend anyone else? Here are a few of my favorites, in roughly descending order of greatness.

George Carlin
Bill Cosby
Bill Hicks
Louis CK
Steve Martin
Stephen Wright
Mitch Hedberg
Jim Gaffigan
Louis Black
David Cross

Hey, I guess that's 10, so why not make this a top ten thread? Who's your top ten?

[jp1]

Good list..but you lose points for no Richard Pryor.

[puke_face]

In no particular order:

Richard Pryor
Jon Reep
Tommy Chong
Robin Williams
Dave Chappelle
Jim Gaffigan
Eddie Izzard
Jim Breuer
Christopher Titus
Rodney Dangerfield
Martin Lawrence

[Hatta]

I knew someone would point that out, but I never got Richard Pryor. I'm just too white or something. But to be honest, I never really listened to more than a little of his work. What album would you recommend?

[chupon]

Michael Winslow - seriously everyone. this guy has skillz.

[fastbilly1]

To add a few not mentioned:
Brian Regan
Gabriel Iglesias
Pablo Francisco
Maria Bamford

Though my two favorites of all time are Robin Williams and Jim Gaffigan. Even though Robin is so vulgar, he is beyond brilliant.

[Gamerforlife]

Bill Hicks
Richard Pryor
George Carlin
Patton Oswalt
Dave Chappelle

Those are some of the best. Richard Pryor is pretty much the guy that 90% of black comediens imitate to this very day. It's like he wrote the playback for black comedy. Chappelle is probably the funniest black comedien since Pryor. Bill Hicks was great because he was so controversial and spoke his mind honestly. He had some pretty radical ideas about politics, religion, drug use, etc, etc, etc. So did George Carlin. I view both of these guys as being very clued in to what's really going on in our world

I like guys like Mitch Hedberg, Steven Wright and Demitri Martin too for their very quirky way of looking at life. Patt Oswalt is great for "geeky" comedy. He gets major points from me too for having some decent acting roles, including one on Whedon's Dollhouse.

Lewis Black is probably the best political comic there is. Easily.

Then you have...everyone else, who pretty much just run through the same tired, cliche men vs women jokes or racial stereotype jokes that you've heard a thousand times. Not that that stuff isn't funny, but it's so typical. This is why I don't usually like black comics because they too often go through the same racial jokes that Richard Pryor already did a long time ago. Chappelle is cool though because he puts a new spin on things and he's especially brilliant when he gets away from the race stuff and just starts talking honestly about his life and opinions. Eddie Murphy had some hilarious stuff too before he became a Hollywood guy.

[Ziggy]

Another not mentioned, Richard Jenni. Watch "A Big Steaming Pile of Me."

[Hatta]

I'm with you there Gamerforlife. So many comics just do the same thing. "I'm black so..." "I'm a woman so..." etc. I will have to check out Patton Oswalt, there's not enough geeky comedy.

One other guy I should mention is Jimmy Carr. Laughed my ass off at his Comedy Central special not too long ago. Great one liners and deadpan delivery. Crude as hell too. Best Comedy Central Presents all season I think.

[Gamerforlife]

To add a few not mentioned:
Brian Regan
Gabriel Iglesias
Pablo Francisco
Maria Bamford

Though my two favorites of all time are Robin Williams and Jim Gaffigan. Even though Robin is so vulgar, he is beyond brilliant.

They say Robin Williams is a joke stealer. Don't know if that's true or not. Dane Cook and Carlos Mencia have been accused of that as well and they say Dennis Leary stole a bunch of Bill Hicks material. It's hard to really prove joke stealing I think. There are things that Dane Cook is accussed of stealing from Lewis C K that have been used by other people before Lewis yet no one calls Lewis a joke stealer. Maybe great minds think alike?

Some great mentions I've seen in this thread that I agree with are Brian Regan(the funniest clean language comic out there), Titus(the epitome of dysfunctional family) and Eddie Izzard. One of my favorite bits from Eddie Izzard is when he wonders how Noah convinced the ducks to get on the ark

Noah-There's a huge flood coming

ducks-Yeah, so what? We're ducks. So instead of floating down here we'll be floating up here. What's the problem?