Chris Rock - Never Scared (2005)
As a product of the hip-hop generation, Chris Rock has internalized the staccato, aggressive rhythms of rap. There’s a foul-mouthed musicality to his delivery, a pugilistic poetry in the way he circles around punchlines, then swoops in for the kill. On Never Scared, the hilarious CD companion piece to his 2004 stand-up special, Rock discourses darkly on Michael Jackson and the difficulties of being a hip-hop apologist in the age of Lil Jon, but he saves his darkest, most penetrating insights for the special hell of marriage, from having well-meaning wives arrange “play dates” for their emasculated husbands to the agony of married-people dinner parties featuring “six neutered adults.” Rock’s hip-hop sensibility extends to littering the disc with skits that wear out their welcome the first time around, but the odd skippable track is a small price to pay for such trenchant wit.
Katt Williams - It’s Pimpin’ Pimpin’ (2009)
Chris Rock is brilliant and often daring, but even he wouldn’t be willing to describe Michelle Obama as a “real nigga” who “smells like Motions hair conditioner and cocoa butter.” On 2009’s It’s Pimpin’ Pimpin’, Katt Williams goes there, while also defending Michael Vick, Britney Spears, and the tiger that mauled a kid who wandered into its cage. The 73-minute CD slips a bit at the end, but Williams’ riffs offer a perspective people may not hear unless they see him at one of the 6,000-seat venues he routinely sells out—“urban” theaters also frequented by gospel shows and the plays of Tyler Perry. Like a trip to a Harlem barbershop, Williams’ best routines make people laugh, think, feel a little uncomfortable, and reach for Google to look up some of the references.
Read the full list here:
A.V. Club - The best comedy albums of the decade
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