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Brick Wall Comedy
Brick Wall Comedy

Super Retardo

Mitch Fatel

Album · 2005 · 65 min

The giggly, sweet voice of a comic telling incredibly dirty jokes.

Mitch Fatel’s signature weapon is the cognitive dissonance between how he sounds and what he is saying. Delivering dirty jokes with the wide-eyed innocence and halting, giggly cadence of a shy schoolboy, he slips highly explicit observations past an audience before they realize they should be offended. His second album, Super Retardo, leans heavily into this contrast, pairing a sweet demeanor with graphic material about sexual mishaps, prostate exams, and late-night visits to Denny’s.\n\nRecorded in 2005, the album captured Fatel at the height of his mid-2000s club momentum. Around this time, he was a fixture on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno as a field correspondent and was named Best Stand-Up at the 2006 HBO Aspen Comedy Festival. The title of the record stems from one of his signature self-deprecating premises—if society banished slow-witted people to an island, he would end up there but rule as king because he can cut his own meat.\n\nWhile the naive, dirty-minded act can feel repetitive over an hour, the set succeeds on the strength of Fatel’s audience interactions. Tracks like ‘Gay Porn’ and ‘A.D.D.’ show his commitment to maintaining a totally guileless facade while whispering some of the filthiest jokes imaginable. This record captures his club act at its peak, preserved on CD shortly before he transitioned to televised network specials.

The set list

3 bits

  1. Singling out a woman in the audience

    Repeatedly turns to a female audience member throughout the show to ask vulgar questions about her favorite sexual position and offer his 'secret ingredient', utterly disregarding her boyfriend.

  2. Internet pornography and different types of porn

    Riffs directly on internet sex, lesbian porn, and gay porn without tactful boundaries.

  3. Why women have so many shoes

    Asserts that women buy extensive collections of shoes strictly for the shoeboxes.

How it plays

Tone
Raunchy, mischievous, silly, and sexually charged.
On stage
Nebbish, geeky, and innocent delivery juxtaposed with extremely dirty, sexually obsessed vulgarity, delivered with childlike vocal tones and speech rhythms.
About
sex and sexuality, internet pornography, relationships, women and lingerie

What the critics said

Praised by The Serious Comedy Site as hilarious, kick-ass standup grounded by an endearing stage persona, while The Harvard Crimson found the lecherous, one-track subject matter crude and prone to diminishing returns upon repeat listens.

In the room: Energetic and hearty laughter from a receptive crowd that was not offended by intrusive, vulgar crowdwork directed at audience members.

Summed up from reviews, articles and listings. Sources: allmusic.com, mitchfatel.com, thecrimson.com, archive.upcoming.org, theseriouscomedysite.com, news-herald.com, en.wikipedia.org.

Backstory

Created after XM Radio offered Fatel a live showcase special following the success of his debut album, prompting him to assemble an hour of both older and brand-new material.

Details

Released
Taped
Stand-UP, NY, New York
Runtime
65 min
Honors
Most requested CD on Satellite Radio
Topics
Before
Miniskirts and Muffins (2004)

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