Making a television show is difficult, especially one like Saturday Night Live where all the content is written and produced a week in advance before live airing.  From the looks of this video, making an SNL is a long an tedious process.  Here, they are just making a promo spot, and even though this video is edited to 9 minutes, it probably took well over an hour.  It’s fantastic to watch though.  First you have Eddie Vedder, appearing in April of 1994, a few days after Kurt Cobain killed himself.  Eddie and Pearl Jam did a nice little tribute to Kurt as you can see in the picture above with the “K” on Eddie’s chest.  That’s just a bit of rock and roll history, but in this clip you get to see a nervous and very young Adam Sandler yuck it up with Eddie, whom Adam is clearly enamored with.  You also get to see the oddly detached Emilio Estevez, famous brother of Charlie Sheen, and son of Martin Sheen, interact with these other two icons of film and music.  At one point Eddie asks Emilio, how’s it been this week, to which Emilio replies, “I believe everything’s been good, just fine.”  It was awkward, and Emilio looks like he’d rather be anywhere else then with some long haired grunge rocker and with the jittery nutbar Adam Sandler.  This video is fascinating and revealing, and an awesome time capsule of one of SNL’s golden eras.  Check it out!

Saturday Night Live is really hit or miss this days, mostly miss, but sometimes, when they get a guy in there who knows sketch comedy, like Ben Stiller, they can hit a few home runs.  That was case the other night when Ben revived his classic impression of Bruce Springsteen from his cult hit “The Ben Stiller Show.”  The bit was a clever, almost throwback comedy parody that reminded me of the golden age of sketch comedy found in the 90s.  In the sketch, Ben is Bruce selling you nothing but the stories he tells in between songs, and it’s pretty damned funny.  It was nothing revolutionary, but it really evoked that spirit of classic grunge era sketch comedy.  The next clip is a collection of all the Ben as Bruce bits from the “Ben Stiller Show.”  You get to see Bruce teaching kids how to count, delivering a baby, fighting in a bar, and warding off aliens.  You even get to see Bruce travel through time and help out old Abe Lincoln, (awesomely played by Stiller Show alum Bob Odenkirk.)  Speaking of Bob, if you catch a hint of Mr. Show whilst watching the Springsteen compilation, you’re not smellings things because both Bob and David were head writers there, and went on to make their own masterpiece of sketch comedy shortly following the Stiller Show’s brief run.  So get ready to laugh in UHN, TWO, HEE, HOOR!

I was sitting around in Portland, Maine yesterday with nothing better to do, when on came the “Coneheads” movie.  I haven’t seen in quite sometime, but its one of those movies where you just have to sit through the whole thing.  I was amazed at the parade of 90s comedy superstars appearing in one scene after another.  Not only did you have original SNL stars Dan Aykroyd and Jane Curtin in their iconic roles, you had Seinfeld stars Jason Alexander and Michael Richards, mega comedy stars Adam Sandler, Phil Hartman, and Drew Carey, and even film indie stars like Parker Posey and Joey Lauren Adams.  When the film was released, it was a commercial dud, but I’ll be damned if it isn’t a cult classic. It contains Chris Farley’s best supporting role ever caught on film, where he plays the unlikely love interest Ronnie, and its riffs on the US immigration experience and laws are spot on and brilliant.  Anyway, I couldn’t get enough of the film, especially the scene where Beldar Conehead gets a 35 mm Kodak camera filled with glorious Kodachrome color film, and shoots his life on Earth with his family in the late seventies and eighties.  It’s a brilliant sequence set to Paul Simon’s classic hit song, “Kodachrome,” from his 1973 There Goes Rhymin’ Simon record.  Bit of trivia, the song was banned by the BBC in England for its use of a trademarked commercial item in the lyrics…kinda unfair considering how much commercialism is imprinted on our lives…just ask Andy Warhol.  So below, check out a sweet homemade “Kodachrome” video someone made, as well as the trailer for the legendary “Coneheads” film….See you next zearl!

For part 38 of my youtube countdown, I have another fantastic George Harrison duet.  This time its with Paul.  No not McCartney, but SIMON!  This version of George and Paul tackle George’s incomprehensible 1969 stunner, “Here Comes the Sun.”  The occasion was Saturday Night Live and the results were breathtaking.  George hits all his acoustic marks with perfection, and Paul Simon’s voice just melts perfectly into George’s harmony.  The freaky thing about the video is how Paul Simon keeps looking at George like he wants to take him to bed, or more likely, create a new group called “Simon and Harrison.”  But George wasn’t about to be stuck with another Paul telling him what type of guitar solo to play on “Still Crazy After All These Years.”  So, instead, like with most of rock and roll history, we just have singular moments, and here’s a good one, enjoy.

UPDATE 10.20.13- YouTube/Google disabled embedding this video but you can click here to watch the performance! (Willie)

Woohoo, another comedy video sets off part 19 of my youtube countdown.  This one, “The Liberal,” is from the height of the Reagan universe in the mid 1980s.  It starts off with one of SNL’s greatest dopey theme songs sung by what sounds a chorus of Phil Hartmans.  Anyway, the political themes and jokes expressed in this sketch are utterly timeless.  Conservatives still think poor people are lazy, liberals still believe in birth control, conservatives still accidentally shoot themselves, or their friends, hunting (see Cheney), and liberals are still on the run, abused, and shamefully hiding their core beliefs so as not to offend their conservative opposition.  This all adds up to an insanely genius sketch.  Enjoy.

Christopher Walken once claimed that he speaks the way he does because he constantly keeps waltz time in his head.  It explains a lot.  But perhaps nothing can explain this incredible sketch from SNL, which is also part 12 of my youtube countdown.  Written in SNL’s golden age, this sketch is what happens when you turn Calvin Klein’s “Eternity,” into a game show.  I really don’t have much to say about this video other then watch it, watch it hard.