Comedy
No more results on this page
So I think the review title says it all. The Flight of the Conchords were great. I'm sure this had more to do with having played festivals and to large crowds before. Dave is a funny guy and I appreciate his humor but I think playing to such a large crowd doesn't work for him.
All the comedians killed it. Brody was an awesome host on the second stage. Having drink vendors on foot everywhere was super convenient. That said heres the bummer list. The food options were pretty lame. The sideshow people were pointless due to them being away from everything. They should have been on the stage between sets. No one wants to miss the stand ups and no time was allotted between sets for them. The t-shirts were really generic, overpriced and nothing special. Which was sad because I was ready spend. All in all it was a great time.
What a huge disappointment. Hannibal Buress, the best act by far, got a 15 minute show. Chappelle, the worst by far, got an hour and a half. He didn't have a single piece of material. He just complained about his life and said, "you guys have no idea what I've been through" over and over with a little joke in the middle.
Overall, I thought it was good, but there were some factors that made my experience not so great. First off, one of the main stand up comedians, Chris D'elia did not show up. I'm sure it wasn't completely the festival executive's faults, but it was a real let down. The main problem wasn't the fact that a comedian never showed, or the blistering heat, but the venue itself. The staff was unhelpful, unfriendly, and incredibly disrespectful. I would really like to see Flight of the Conchords in concert again, but I know for sure that it won't be at the Austin 360 Amphitheater, because even the performers were complaining about the service. If the Austin Amphitheater were a restaurant, I'd write a seething Yelp review, even though one of the comedians joked about doing just that. It was a nice show, but if it hadn't been for Flight of the Conchords and some funny comedians, it would have been terrible.
Show was phenomenal! The venue is really nice. Great food and drink options. Clean bathrooms.
This venue was really bad with planes flying overhead distracting the comedians. It is also really far away from Austin. Also the jumbotron kept malfunctioning making seeing the comedians very difficult I thought most of the acts were quite good, but Chapelle appeared unprepared. The 11 minutes he had was really good, but he just slept walked through the other 34 minutes of the set. Not worth the price of admission for the headliner.
Hanibal was awesome. His parody of rap music content was fresh and real. Dimitri Martin was someone I was really looking forward to seeing and he was the biggest disappointment of the night. He seemed like he did not want to be there. Flight of the Concords was exceptional. Dave Chappelle was obviously under some influences, however it was great to just see him again. His own line of " 11 minutes of material in a 45 minute set " was actually very accurate. However the 11 minutes was uniquely funny and personal.
Information, information, information! For weeks prior up to the inaugural show everyone on the Funny or Die Facebook page for this festival asked for information concerning the lineup and when things would start. They even posted a "are you ready!?" picture 5 days prior with NO lineup info. They did respond to my question but only replied, "We should have some info soon." So basically per the email THE DAY BEFORE we get there at 5pm when the doors open...only to be told in the 100 degree Texas summer heat that the lawn & seats wont be open until 6pm. So my wife & I took shelter as many did in the shade behind food vendor buildings. So we go to sit at 6pm ONLY TO BE TOLD THE ACTS dont start until 7pm!!!...nor was anyone explained about the Second Stage versus the Main Stage. I don't know why they didnt announce this info prior. I could have gotten there 2 hours later and in less Texas heat! When I asked one of the ushers when the acts would start, he pulled out a sheet a paper with the info. I dont know why that info wasnt public. They had it on a sign at the venue but nowhere was it public prior. Concerning the sun, it was hot. Many of the acts referenced how how it was. I was surprised how this venue didnt have more places for shade. So the sun set at about 730pm or so and most of the acts were great, Al Madrigal, Kristen Schaal, Hannibal Buress, Demetri Martin was ok (he's pretty dry anyway so it took a while to warm up to him again) and Flight of the Conchords was amazing and hysterical. Dave Chappelle....the headliner, who didnt even keep to the alloted start time went on and....I'm a Dave Chappelle fan and this was not his best set. This was not a set. It was him shotting the breeze for 45 mins or so. He himself reference he did 11 mins of an act in 45 mins. If thats true and he had 11 mins of new material, it felt like only 2 or 3 of it was decent, not good. I hope the other cities get a better show out of him. Had he been the only person performing, I'd ask for my money back or be highly disappointed. I expected more from him. Overall I gave the show 3 stars because it was hot, the venue was unorganized, the seats were not great, but 3/4ths of the act made up for all that. I wouldnt recommend this outdoor venue/show unless you can stand the summer heat and really REALLY like all those comedians and not just Chappelle.
Man o' man was this awesome. I recommend this event to anyone in search of a fun night full of laughs. The entire crew is unforgettable from FOTC to the incomparable Dave. FIVE STARS all around. Fantastic.
Hannibal, Flight of the Concords and Kristen were fantastic!! and Jeff Ross did great job as the MC. Dave started off good but somewhat flammed out near the middle to end. Maybe it was the August Texas Heat for an outdoor venue. The other talents were fair at best.
I LOVED this show! I went for chappelle and flight of the conchords; I was pleasantly surprised that every single act was funny, even demetri martin! The only thing that sucked about this show was the camera nazis kicking people out.
Circuit of the Americas is a great venue, well-run, well-organized. Parking is too expensive, and food/drink is all about $1-2 more per item than it should be, but the place is great. The Oddball Festival, however, was not good. I think an outdoor summer festival works for live music, because the audience just sits back and absorbs all that energy from the stage. But 5 hours of comedy isn't like that. The comedian needs energy and laughter from the audience, but we were all sweaty, dehydrated, exhausted. So they mostly flopped. Flight of the Conchords was great, but all their songs were so low-key that it put us to sleep. They desperately needed to play Hip Hop Oppotamus, but they didn't. Dave Chappelle needed to be sober, focused, and have more than 11 minutes of material (by his own admission), but he didn't. These were the two headliners, and they simply didn't deliver what they said they would. We are all entitled to at least a 50% refund for not receiving what we paid for. I still love Dave, and I wish I had never seen him perform so poorly. There was only one bright spot. Hannibal Buress was hilarious. He was prepared, energetic, witty, smart, organized, and had the same heat challenges as all the comics, but he pushed through and really earned his pay. He is awesome.
The supporting talent on the main stage was average. I'd say Hannibal had the strongest set. The FOTC set was pretty weak. As a fan of the show, the humor didn't translate well to big stage. Hell, standup just doesn't translate well to such a large crowd. Chapelle was easily the highlight of the show, and his material was brilliant. However, as he outright admitted at the end, he really only had 11 minutes of material for a 45 minute set. He's talented at filling in the rest will mildly entertaining banter, but really - as the headliner he needed much more material.
This was my first trip out to the Austin360Amphitheater so I was pretty excited about checking it out and seeing some good comedy on a Friday night. I'll start by saying this was the first stop on the Oddball Fest tour so there were bound to be a few rough spots. There were some pretty funny opening acts. Hannibal Buress and Demetri Martin were probably the highlights of the night for me. Flight of the Conchords was good but there were a lot of quite moments in the performance and they messed up on a song or two (probably from it being their first show). I think an hour was asking a little too much from them. Dave Chappelle was really disappointing. It didn't feel like he had enough material to work with. His jokes were disjointed and he spent more time talking to the crowd than doing his act. When he finished with "Let me see if I can think of a good story to end on" I made a b-line for the exit.
Normally, I just scroll through the "comments" sections underneath online news articles and read sexist, crude, and backwards remarks in order to feel sad about humanity. This time, I joined a bunch of people out in the heat and watched it live. Why pay money for something I can get at home for free? Martin and the Conchords were funny but both only had about a 15 minute set. I usually like Chapelle, but at this show he stumbled out, eyes glazed, and basically rambled. He didn't seem to have a set, other than fixating on female anatomy for a good ten minutes. Jeff Ross was a one-trick pony who basically made fun of people in the audience by using the same 5 dirty jokes over and over again. I walked away very disappointed in the way comedians seem to treat women and their bodies, and wondering whether anyone else out there felt the same. "Comedy" seems to undermine everything women have been working to change.
Really good event. Traffic was kind of chaotic but to be expected with the first show and the headline acts.
Overall the show was a good experience, the local comedians did great, and Flight of the Conchords was fantastic. Dave Chappelle however, was a major disappointment. He had a good opening and a few funny bits throughout, but 75% of the time he was just standing there lighting cigarettes while the audience yelled at him to do something. It seems like this was just a paycheck to him, if you are a huge Dave fan sit this one out, he is not worth the admission, the other comedians are funny though
This is an incredible line up of comedians. Our jaws were sore from laughing. For us, Hannibal somehow stole the show even though everyone was in fine form. We were grateful to get to see Dave Chapelle perform live.
You would think that bringing the top comedy acts together on one stage on a Friday night in Austin, Texas would be a sure thing. Well, you'd be wrong. The comedians all fell flat throughout the night, and the most likely culprit was the venue itself. Comedy goes well with alcohol, and laughter reverberating throughout a theater tends to entice more laughter from the crowd. The Austin360 Ampitheater is an open-air venue that seats several thousand people, and it makes for the worst place possible to catch a comedy road-show. It takes WAY too long to go get a drink due to the long lines and distant bars, and the laughter simply gets lost to the open air. You can't hear the guy from twenty rows away roaring with laughter, so you don't laugh as much either. On top of that, only a fool would book this event at the end of August in Texas. The temperatures that day peaked in the low 100s, and the exhaustion from the heat showed with every comedians set. The comedians were sweaty, slow, tired, and uninspired. Again, these are the best comedians of the day, but they could not overcome a terrible venue choice. If this had been held at the Austin Music Hall, Bass Concert Hall, or any other enclosed and air-conditioned venue, this would have been the comedy show of the decade. Instead, it was simply a show of how a great idea can be destroyed by poor logistics. A real shame. And an expensive one at that.
Dave chappelle was good but didn't meet my expectation. He seemed a little put out. Other acts were hilarious. Humidity and heat was difficult. Besides $10 beers and the heat it was a great show. Circuit of America's is a bad ass venue.