The Best Show on WFMU

the caller from the pretaped show last week with the story about being a kid and realizing that the colorful cartoon character shorts he'd been wearing to school and church were actually boxer shorts, oh man

caller: "i've gotten over it."
tom: "no you haven't."

and because i want to have a thread to talk about the best show every week

lol

I need to carve out time to listen to the actual show, but man that's tough to do for such a long stretch. I really start to fade fast on podcasts over 90 minutes or so. I mean I've heard bits and pieces over the years and I listen to the Best Show Gems, but I feel like I miss out not hearing the full show more often.

i get that. i listen at work while i'm doing boring mindless stuff.

i can't be the only ilxor obsessed with this show

I used to listen to it a fair amount when my job involved a lot of driving. I like it. Not as good as seven second delay imo.

ha i was heavy into 7sd for a while but haven't listened in a few years

very into it but it's hard to find the time for the whole thing. esp love the running gags in wurster's calls - stuff like always getting ap mike's name wrong or referring to prison as "the hut"

you know, out near where the lady foot locker used to be

hahaha

- the "voice modulator"
- WFMU is a high school radio station
- the death threats
- "yeah. why?"
- "whuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut?"

etc etc etc etc

i will confess i have never listened to the whole show :( only the "gems"

Four Loko Christmas specials have been my fave bits, just for the general buttondown unhingedness of John Hodgman when he's drunk

Or when he'll Bad Company his own friends

the bad company thing kills me every time

i get that it's a long show and the wurster calls are the obvious highlights but listening to the whole show is like watching a baseball game, there's something great about sitting down and watching a whole baseball game instead of just the highlights. they're both fun but it's different kinds of fun.

I feel similarly about seven second delay actually, there's a great zen anti-comedy to the show that you miss if you just listen to "the funny parts"

like andy's show ideas are not just funny in themselves, they are funny because he takes like 20 minutes just to get them going

I feel like I'm the only person who doesn't like Wurster's calls.

I love the first hour but I rarely last for the whole three hours.

feel like gary the squirrel is a good addition to the cast of characters

#snacks

the bad company thing kills me every time

I only listen to a full episode once a month or less but so glad I happened to catch the first Bad Company episode

and when the other caller verbed it: "oh, you're not going to Bad Company me are you?" as it was already swelling underneath him. "No of course not, you're good," says Tom as he quickly fades it down...

well this thread was a nonstarter but the ever-expanding sound collage blob blows my mind every week

andy's show ideas are not just funny in themselves, they are funny because he takes like 20 minutes just to get them going

absolutely.

that and the way he can put a rape joke into a Pete Seeger advance obit.

Wait WHAAAAAT? No thread for Scharpling and Wurster?

Friends of Tom forum thread on identifying the pieces used in the sound collage

Comedy Jamz!

It's been really fun hearing it evolve from random Frankie Teardrop talk to where it is now. It's to the point where it's beginning to sound like a Negativland mix.

Would love to hear a comp of just Frankie Teardrop talk. One of my favorite little moments from the past year was Tom's fantasy of DMX's dogs mauling DMX but not before one of them tuns on an iPod with its snout to play Frankie Teardrop in the background.

I sure hope he's on tonight...seems like he's been out more and more lately. And why Depravity's Rainbow doesn't sub for him is beyond me, I can't deal with "Hatch"

Ending on Dec. 17:
http://splitsider.com/2013/10/after-13-years-the-best-show-on-wfmu-will-end-in-december/

When I first saw that the show was ending, I assumed it was because Tom had specific alternate plans, but it doesn't sound like he does. I haven't listened to the announcement yet though.

Apparently discussed on the Scharpling and Wurster thread last night.

I remember late last year he was talking about not getting any recognition for the show, over the course of a couple of shows, and it sounded like he was about to quit. Guess he's actually doing it.

makes ya wonder what the bar of recognition is these days

He's complained about lack of recognition for years, it's part of the schtick. If he was really worried about it, he wouldn't have done the show for 13 years.

he was talking about some podcast award thing. the show after he complained about it sounded like he didn't want to be there, like he was checked out. it was actually kinda sad.

when he was dropping hints about L.A. and being flown out there first class, I was sure it was for some great gig but yeah, sounded more like he didn't have something definite lined up--but maybe he does and he's not ready to pull the trigger on telling.

I guess at least I have like 11 years of unheard archives to tide me over for a while.

I've been thinking that.

but it's not the same :-/

maybe now i'll finally check it out. the length of one show seems overwhelming, much less all the archives + new shows.

Best Show Gems can be a good entryway to the show though as noted upthread there's a certain pleasure to listening to the full three hours.

Last week's episode was a really good one, despite only having a short Wurster call, if you're looking to start somewhere. Though I don't know how much sense the sound collage will make to a newcomer, and that's like 20-30 minutes of the show.

He's working on the Chris Gethard show for IFC, "Stupid Life."

is that actually a go? hope so. <3 gethard too

Josh Kantor ‏@jtkantor
"The Best Show on WFMU" is going off the air. I'll play their theme song on organ at the World Series.

I listened for the first time in awhile last night, and what's overwhelming is more than 18 minutes of it

just search for his rant about post-Jackie Brown Tarantino maybe (around time of IngBast)

tried searching for "tarantino scharpling" but don't see any rants. I do see a morbs post from 2010 on the first page of results though.

kewl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9N3MacZfwg&feature=youtu.be

First thing on BuzzFeed I've ever been tempted to repost/link, kudos to Matty P: http://www.buzzfeed.com/perpetua/signs-youre-from-newbridge

Sad news (TBSOWFMU has been a pretty central and essential part of my comedic intake for the past decade) but also good if it means Tom & Jon are moving on to bigger and better things. I'm about a year behind on the show. Guess this is the kick in the seat I needed to get caught up.

Getting caught up is nice but I encourage you to listen to the live broadcast a few times instead of just listening to the archive.

Yeah I need to try to listen to some of the last episodes live.

He's working on the Chris Gethard show for IFC, "Stupid Life."

― Allen (etaeoe), Wednesday, October 30, 2013 11:52 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Word from the man himself over on the FOT board that Gethard's show was not picked up by IFC...too bad

social media suggests tom and terre aren't together anymore and he's with a different woman now? i haven't listened to the best show in a long time, has he discussed this at all?

no. he went out of his way to avoid ever referring to his marriage before, i would doubt he would discuss it now

kinda figured as much since he's been in LA for over a year now and hasn't mentioned Terre or Dogmo even in passing in about as long or longer, but yeah, it would be out of character for him to mention anything about it directly on the show since he had (has?) that running gag about being married to Jillian Barbarie for so long to shield against personal talk.

I also just assumed this was the case because of the move

His new squeeze posts a fair deal of him/them on her IG.

His new squeeze is the creator of Netflix's "Twelve Forever" and was an animator on Powerpuff Girls.

Not being in New Jersey anymore is an even bigger shock to me.

I was truly sad to hear, at the end of this week's show, that regular caller "Kat from Raleigh" had passed away. Kat always seemed liked a genuinely sweet person, and I was always happy when they showed up on the program. RIP.

As an update to my post from yesterday, Cat's family (I had the spelling wrong yesterday) has set up a Go Fund Me for a memorial scholarship at North Carolina State University: https://gofund.me/41c5f0cc

the fb group had some very nice remembrances of them in the comments

i didn't preorder tom's book and now it appears to be backordered everywhere except amazon :/

I ordered mine from Amazon due to a gift card I got for my birthday (and my being out of work til the Fall). Hasn't shipped yet.

Yeah, I saw the same thing when I checked a couple of independent stores so I bit the bullet and ordered from Amazon. Mine showed up in less than 24 hours, so there is that...

Didn't realize the preorder was shipping a full week before the release date! Started reading before the holidays and just picked it back up. Some dark and revelatory stuff in there.

nabbed mine off the shelf at an indie store, guess i got lucky. no spoilers but two distinct "holy shit" revelations for me (both within the fist 100pgs iirc?)

My biggest “holy shit” moment came exactly 104 pgs in.

Yes, although that bomb was softened somewhat by the ones he dropped in earlier pages.

I've started relistening to the earliest episodes this week after I finished reading Tom's book. The first episode is indeed very rough but I wish he wasn't so insistent about it never being heard again because it features the first Todd Billups call, which is an all-time Wurster character imo. Not sure how far I'm going with this (having already heard all of the WFMU episodes) but it's interesting to hear some of this stuff with hindsight.

Just an aside: it's, uh, pretty impressive that in 2001, when people were fishing for info on the as-yet-unnamed second Star Wars prequel, Wurster (in the guise of a psychic) got the name of the third prequel exactly right, four years ahead of its release.

(He also predicts that Dick Cheney would refuse treatment for typhoid and start intentionally spreading it. So he may in fact have access to some hazy window into the future.)

Got about 65-70 pages into it last night, really enjoying it.

Wish a verified purchase of the book could earn me an unblock from Tom on Twitter tho :/

Finished this Sunday night, absolutely loved it and I cannot recommend it highly enough, even to folks who aren't already Friends of Tom. Just as funny as you'd expect, but more touching and affecting that I'd ever have imagined.

So Tom is following Neil's lead and yanked the show from Spotify. Glad to see it.

has anyone kept pace with this as of late? I’ve completely fallen behind by 6 months and even on catch-up I’m not that engaged as I once was. Don’t know if it’s because his material is getting diluted between this and Double Threat. Are there recent wurstsr calls to seek out?

i listen to the “bests” on the podcast but i don’t really know when they’re from

wurster remains one of the funniest motherfuckers alive to me. like i CANNOT listen in the gym, i would injure myself.

i'm still listening out of habit but youre not missing a ton, it definitely feels to be in a bit of a lull funniness-wise. the hardest i've laughed at it in recent years remains the episode a couple years ago(?) where tom switched gears mid-show and spent the whole show talking about peoples favorite nu-metal bands.

the wurster calls remain amazing though, he's been on a very good run lately with a recurring bit where he calls in as bruce springsteen.

I'm about a month behind, just listened to Wurster's second call as Springsteen. It's fine, has its decent moments. The gag of awarding points to Mike, Pat and Dudio has been kind of funny.

i essentially stopped listening several years ago, but that's more about not having time to keep up with multiple podcasts (especially 3-hour podcasts) than with the quality of the best show. i lost touch with most of my podcasts in quarantine when i didn't have a commute any more. i listen to double threat occasionally, when they have a guest or theme that sounds interesting, and tom seems energized on there by having a cohost to bounce off of - especially because he and julie klausner are obviously so simpatico.

I usually end up listening to it in 10-20 minute chunks before bed, which is why I'm behind.

I think the show is still funny, and the running Springsteen gag has had more range than I would have expected; I love when "Bruce" aired his grievances against Prefab Sprout for "Cars and Girls."

Fletchshack: A New Beginin-n-n-n-n-n-n-n

24 hour best show on twitch / bestshow4life started 4 hours ago and it's the onljy good vibes chat I've ever seen on twitch

Caught some of Nathan Fieder this morning, which was funny. Are they going to release it as one 24 hour podcast episode? I takes me half the week to listen to one regular episode, it might be Labor Day before I get through all of this one. Not complaining though, what little I’ve heard so far has sounded fun.

^^ otm, I love the idea but listening do the whole thing sounds very daunting

they've said a few times that it will all be available in some way -- not sure if that means in the podcast feed or something else?

watching it on twitch has actually been rly nice because the nature of it makes me feel like i don't need to hear every second like i do with a downloaded podcast. i might just skip around the recordings to the parts i wish i hadn't missed, whenever it arrives/in whatever format it arrives

Well Tom made good on this (even if the book isn't out in the US yet):

Who can help your guy get a copy of the Jarvis Cocker book and who can help your guy get JC on The Best Show when it comes out in the US?

— scharpling (@scharpling) May 3, 2022

this has to be available on the Twitch channel after. They've put a lot into the camera work. And the chat has stayed good from what i saw!

this one man band closer(?) is killing it

Oh man, I missed this. I do believe that one man band closer is known to many of us

Missed the end of the 24 hour Best Show by 5 minutes because my toddler got to bed late! We tried listening right before bed but Chaki was too exciting for a 3 year old at 9pm. It was a great show. I got to see Mike Watt and the end of the Jarvis Cocker interview

— stuffing and potatoes (@AllieLibrary) July 28, 2022

And lookee that:

😁😁😁 #BestShow24 pic.twitter.com/ek417w5pBq

— Chaki (@ChakiFunkWizard) July 28, 2022

Positive reviews, too

I like Chaki's vibe.

— Mike Lisk (@APMike) July 28, 2022

I'm one of you!

Chaki is kurt?

Yas

aaa! you killed it! :)

Ty 😁🙏🏽

Crossover podcast! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmNdTFbrNoE

Oz isn't just a mean POS, he's a mean POS from Jersey, not Pennsylvania. pic.twitter.com/scmvDuYBmt

— Jessica Clarice 🏳️‍⚧️ יִסְכָּה (@JeSStradiol) August 31, 2022

just thought that any fans of WFMU / John Peel may enjoy my lame mixcloud thing I started cos it was easier than sending friends CDRs.
i do detour into power rangers theme tunes, my pet Azerbaijani guitarist, and playing two records at the same time more than is advisable but hopefully there'S something in there for some of you. no DJ chat, tho. i'm shy *bats eyelids*

Well lookee what got posted https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2rONbPrU-8

xpost with On Cinema at the Cinema on ilxor.com

tim heidecker hosted best show last night. it was weird (see below). tom's hosting office hours right now! i already prefer his version of this switcheroo

there was also this very awkward moment, the most awkward, in the last hour of the show. the one best show person that tim was acknowledging (because he was in the room) was the producer, jason, and he announced that the final hour would be a "no complaints" session, in which tim would not be allowed to complain. i think this might be a best show tradition, but i'm not sure, and tbh it seemed like tim wasn't sure either. then, jason announced that the special topic of the hour for callers would be to say what they think the best work tim has made, and then the very worst that he has made, and then reiterated that tim was not allowed to complain. tim seemed very uncomfortable with this, and if he was being intentional/comedic about it, i will say it was one of the greatest, most believable and subtle performances i've ever seen. if it was fake, he fooled me. he just seemed very unsure about the whole thing.

for most of the hour, the 'no complaining' and 'say your favorite and least favorite tim production' rules were fine, with the normal people who called in. (at the same time, they were also doing a worst 20 beatles list/brainstorming sesh, so that ate up most of the conversation). but then, near the end of the show they brought back 2 of the Best Show voices, the two guys on the telephone who were very briefly included as part of the show in the first 10 minutes and then completely ignored thereafter until this very point, near the end of the show. and one of the guys just kind of tore into tim's mistreatment of him on the show, how he had been completely ignored, referencing several times about meeting tim before the show and that how nice it was, but clearly mocking it, clearly it wasn't a good encounter, before the show. it went on for a while and then tim really had no real response -- again, if he was faking it he has become a fine actor, full stop -- and producer jason reiterated that it was a no complaint hour. it was very awkward! but also very gripping.

at the end of the show as they were signing off tim was, predictably, asking for reviews of his performance (one of the best show guys gave him 4 stars, lol), and jason mentioned what had happened earlier and explained that the guy on the phone was just doing a bit and he does it to everyone, that tom would have broken, etc. but tim didn't seem to believe that at all and frankly neither do i!

lol! i am actually going to xpost this to the best show thread because they will know a lot more about all of it, i'm sure.

Only now working my way through the whole 24 hour show, can't believe how great the Mike Watt Stooges set was.

Low-key highlight for me: Chris Elliott calling in to read the convoluted instructions to the Jaws board game.