"Death of the Party" is the debut album of Chicago-area native Kyle Kinane, 32.
Recorded at the legendary Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in Los Angeles, Kinane's hour-long album is a hell of a debut.
A major point of Kinane's album is how being placed into a gifted class in high school is what led him to all the hard, soul-crushingly boring 9-to-5s he works.
"I'm 32 years old," Kinane says. "I have a fantastic imagination. I have no applicable job skills."
Kinane lamenting being encouraged to use his imagination all the time, at the expense of learning real skills in auto-shop or welding classes like his classmates, is a sentiment many a liberal arts grad fearing graduation will relate to.
One of the jobs Kinane tells us about is his time working as a forklift operator for an outfit that sells gourmet cake decorations.
A forklift accident leads to a desk job, where he must attempt to cold-call people and try to sell them on cake decorations he knows they do not need.
Kinane earned a creative writing degree from Columbia College in Chicago, and while he may now say that was a poor choice career-wise, I feel like it really helps him as a comic.
Kinane has shorter "joke" jokes, but some of his bits can last four or five minutes, which can be an eternity if a comic can't keep a crowd interested.
But Kinane maintains that interest, because he knows how to pace a story, and by peppering in funny details and building tension, he gives the crowd the payoff they want at the end of each story.
One of the longest bits is Kinane's riff on insomnia and how it leads many to become "midnight scientists," running hypothetical "what-if" situations through their head all night.
Kinane's experiment is based on barbecuing with a volcano. It's incredibly thorough and he wrenches every bit of humor he can out of it, and it doesn't come close to getting old.
Other highlights include an awkward recounting of having to watch his friends' kids, Sanyo's attempts to ruin his day before it starts and his imagining of the secret life of the namesake of the Trader Joe's grocery store.
"Death of the Party" is an incredibly grumpy album, and while the negativity is pointed toward Kinane's own life, it's never close to pitiful.
Many comics make their mark with clever insights into the flaws of other people, and there's nothing wrong with that, but Kinane's hilarious album is the result of an honest, uncomfortable look at his mistakes and achievements.
Standout tracks: "I'll Be With You Tonight," "Writing On the Wall" and "I Know What I Want"
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