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Taste the Lightning

Auggie Smith

Stand Up! Records · Album · 2023

A fast-paced comedy album full of loud, sarcastic rants.

Listen on Stand Up! Records(opens in a new tab)

Auggie Smith spends this audio hour leaning hard into the sputtering, rapid-fire rant style he developed early in his career to cut through the noise of dive bars. Released by Stand Up! Records in 2023, the album captures a veteran club comic adjusting to fatherhood and middle age, trying to reconcile his old-school liberal views with the exhausting friction of modern life.

The material swings from parenting complaints to highly specific setups, like a bit weighing the tactical benefits of encountering a circumcised versus an uncircumcised home invader. Later, he tackles the Emergency Broadcast System, noting that the warning sound resembles a fax machine sent by a pterodactyl fighting a bear, yet remains a comforting constant in a chaotic world. Throughout the hour, Smith pairs his loud, sarcastic delivery with tight, efficient writing, keeping the energy high without letting the jokes dissolve into simple screaming.

The set list

6 bits

  1. Emergency Broadcast System

    Points out that the system relies on near-dead technology sounding like a fax sent by an anguished pterodactyl fighting a bear armed with a klaxon and a sledgehammer, arguing that it working as designed is proof that consistency is what people need

  2. Comedy is Better

    Argues that comedy is getting better rather than worse because people 'can't say stuff' anymore

  3. Parental safety and mysterious pills

    Questions whether a parent would taste test a mysteriously gnawed-upon pill found with a child for safety

  4. Home invasion defense

    Questions whether one should be circumcised or uncircumcised while trying to thwart a home invasion

  5. Bears who are drug dealers

    Ponders appropriate names for bears who deal drugs

  6. Food Allergy

How it plays

Tone
Sarcastic, manic, satirical
On stage
An old-school liberal father prone to manic, sarcastic rants against modern absurdities
Pace
Rapid-fire, loud, manic ranting style
About
Parenting and family life, Modern cultural absurdities and generational shifts, State of comedy and political correctness, Technology and consistency

Backstory

An old-school liberal father of three navigating a zoom-school era and parenthood

Details

Released
Where
Stand Up! Records (album)
Topics
Before
Smell the Thunder (2022)

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