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Brick Wall Comedy
Brick Wall Comedy

Rewound

Chris Knutson

Stand Up! Records · Album · 2021 · 44 min

A delayed, deeply self-deprecating hour of Midwest indie stand-up.

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

Chris Knutson operates on a theory of aggressively lowered expectations. Whether he is whittling down his partner’s standard of living until she gladly accepts a wooden proposal ring, choosing a college strictly because its jingle aired during Maury reruns, or treating his regrettable tattoos like a puzzle from Memento, he treats life as a series of negotiations with mediocrity. The centerpiece of the set is a slow-burn breakdown of the time he narrowly avoided becoming a viral news sensation. While working a shift as a pizza delivery driver, Knutson repeatedly declined to stop an active bank robbery, primarily because he was dressed in a superhero costume and wanted absolutely nothing to do with security footage.

The set was recorded live at Sisyphus Brewing in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 2015, but sat on the shelf for six years before Stand Up! Records finally released it in March 2021 on digital platforms and a limited-run VHS tape. Knutson, a staple of the Upper Midwest comedy scene and former half of the comedy-rap duo Valley Meadows, uses the hour to cement his persona as an expert in finding the path of least resistance. The tracks range from dealing with sketchy side-gigs to the title bit, where he tries to salvage a failed stand-up set by delivering the entire thing backward.

The set list

4 bits

  1. Wearing a superhero costume as a pizza delivery uniform and avoiding foiling a bank robbery

    Joking about narrowly dodging being shown on looping TV news security footage repeatedly declining to intervene in a crime.

  2. Whittling a partner down to accepting a proposal with a wooden wedding ring

    Applying the path of least resistance and lowered expectations to marriage proposals.

  3. Covering up an alarming number of regrettable tattoos

    Claiming to be trapped in a real-life Memento situation where others must help piece together clues.

  4. Rewinding a terrible standup comedy set

    Delivering a disastrous set backward to rewind into a technical glitch rather than facing accusations of racism.

How it plays

On stage
Experimental comedic identity veering away from traditional first-person stand-up, occasionally playing characters who fail to realize they are bad at comedy.
About
Lowered expectations, Path of least resistance, Marriage proposals, College education and commercials, Tattoo regrets, Renting versus buying

What the critics said

Praised by City Pages critic Patrick Strait, noting Knutson had established himself as one of the most consistently funny performers in the Midwest.

Summed up from reviews, articles and listings. Sources: standuprecords.com, en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com.

Details

Released
Taped
2015, Comedy Room at Sisyphus Brewing, Minneapolis
Runtime
44 min
Where
Stand Up! Records (album)
Topics

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