And I Am Not Lying

Jeff Simmermon lives in the overlap between traditional stand-up and public-radio storytelling. His debut album, recorded live backstage at the Black Cat in Washington, D.C., plays less like a series of setups and punchlines and more like a collection of strange, self-deprecating memoirs. The centerpieces of the set are highly specific, deeply weird personal trials, including his brief tenure in an art-rock band where he and a bandmate backed two live chickens improvising on toy pianos.\n\nSimmermon, a Moth GrandSlam champion and contributor to This American Life, was working as a digital communications director for Time Warner Cable before pivoting more fully to performance. That polished, conversational capability shows. He recounts losing a testicle to cancer, slaughtering kangaroos in the Australian outback, and a deeply embarrassing grocery-spill-turned-screaming-match over a container of Ben & Jerry’s on a New York subway.\n\nComedy Dynamics released the album in June 2017, which debuted at the top of the iTunes comedy charts and was eventually pressed onto hot pink vinyl by Dischord Records. Reviewers noted that while the hour favors slow-burn narrative tension over rapid-fire punchlines, Simmermon’s performance succeeds on the strength of his highly visual point of view.