Andy and His Grandmother CD review

Genius. Mimic. Prankster. Retard. Man Child. Conceptual Artists. Surrealist. Major Alpha Male. Aggressively Annoying Prick. DEAD?! Screw it. Such simple name tags that have applied to Andy Kaufman have either burned off or faded away decades ago. Whatever symptoms and reasons that motivated the man and his mania have placed a painful rug burn across pop culture and comedy forever, forcing us to deal with the smell and endlessly talk about. The closest you might come to him without getting burned is Bob Zmuda's 1999 "tell-all" book 'Andy Kaufman Revealed'….and this damned CD, 'Andy & His Grandmother' on Drag City Records.

(BTW: I'm not including that Jim Carrey bio to the above paragraph as Hollywood and Andy has had a tempestuous relationship and it seems that the movie was the town's revenge against him)

Simply put, without getting too deep in the hype (which will be a challenge. Thanks, Andy), this CD contains pieces of the vapor trails from his micro-cassette collection he secretly recorded between 1977 and 1979…all 82 hours of it! I'm sure you've heard about the story and the technical details behind this production; Andy's fateful discovery of the micro-cassette technology, his plans for an album out of this mess and how it all landed on someone else's hands three decades after the SOB died. Typical…..

This is a short set, but it's never lesser the level of intensity, hostility and drama Andy is known and feared for:

Hear Andy making surreal demands of hookers, fighting with cab drivers, pitting one (supposed) girlfriend against another, playing animal noises over the phone and so on. Then there's a couple of tracks featuring his grandmother: him telling her of causing a fight in a movie theater (and THEN playing the actual tape of this performance….yea, I said "performance"! What are you [and I] are gonna do about it!?) and the poor granny riding shotgun while Andy lets go of the wheel while speeding and THEN getting arrested afterwards all in front of her are indeed great and freaking hair-raising. Is it funny? Let me know when you stop yelling f-bombs from experiencing some of these tracks…….

There are a couple of brief moments on stage where Andy proves to be more hard-core and trippy than his new-found audience might be accustomed to in their normal hipster lives. In between some of the tracks are people (girlfriends? family?) begging him to stop before any serious harm will happen. Of course, all these innocent sincere warnings (amongst other things) is the fuel that drives him.

Finally, the set ends with yet another girlfriend (or hooker?) demanding Andy's precious tapes with threats of physical violence. Once this hostile marathon is over, he calls up Bob Zmuda and, as if he was suddenly possessed by a little child, joyfully recounts the conversation. Zmuda shows brief concern, but then, gets caught up in Andy's man child moment and suggests that he should fake his death should she harm him.

Needless to say, there's either a sudden cold front flying over your gut or Andy kicking you in the balls from the grave as this dark humorous dramatic point passes.

Congratulations, even by reading this questionable and amateur review, you have entered Andy's Funhouse and Your Hell. Good luck with the damned CD and smell…..