#oj patterson

Hulk Hogan refuses to lose to a bed in this clip from On This Very Screen via Clammr (a social podcast sampling app). Source.

Sunday April 12th - *6 PM START

OJ Patterson

Hat: Pepples Donut Farm in Oakland 

Polo shirt: Macho Man polo from prowrestlingtees 

Denim: Old Navy

Coat: Guess, a gift 

Follow OJ here and his Bay Area comedy blog Courting Comedy 

Okay. I'm on full on shill mode for this, BUT, I'll give the Courting Comedy audience insight the latest episode of the Blackstronauts!

We went on the expedition on June 8th 2014. We released the album on September 8th 2014. [Space Serendipity! Laziness]

Jane Harrison hounded me three different times to put the episode up, proving that it takes someone's forceful support to get me to do ANYTHING

After the spa we drank and talked on Jane's roof. San Francisco is a beautiful city.

Ash Clayton (aka Areospace Systems Hub), Sylvan's resident musician and sound engineer, was not present at the recording of this episode (despite it taking place in his bedroom at SylvanHouse)

Ash and I edited the show. I wish recorded that as well because we're constantly finding filters and features that amuses the shit out of us. It often leads to things like this.

I skipped lunch at my real job to post and promote this episode. Isn't my possible termination worth a listen?

I quit comedy on July 7th 2014. It was glorious. Upwards to twenty people underlit by candles in a Mission-Protero eatery: the Rite Spot Cafe. Despite years of yearning, I had never played there, so, I reached out to my friend, hilarious rapscallion Trevor Hill, and he put me up to, ostensibly, put me out. I did well on a show chocked with loved peers and luminaries. The room was rough all night but I got them, I fucking got them. I had played the Rite Spot the week before. I did terribly. I tried to work "new" jokes to a sleepy, sparse audience. The next comedian, super smooth Gary Anderson, had the set of the night. I felt horrible.

Good thing I had a contingency show. My farewell show. 

Comedy years are like dog years. After six months you feel like pro, after two years you feel grizzled. That grizzle refreshes. It's a license to complain, to spat, to tell tired jokes, to side-eye newbies and hope-eye clouted colleagues. You can burn yourself out on that. Not me. I went bonkers. I was ubiquitous. I was jubilant. A sprinting, spewing, evangelizing, all-encompassing embodiment of my absolute desire. 

Like all great things, something changed. A lot of things changed. Hard comedy living was my post-collegial grad school (where I basically did all the things I should have done as an undergrad). I laugh at the idea of "maturing" through the most juvenile time in my life, but I did. In the midst of growing, I felt a shift, a push. I fell in love. I dove. I cannonballed. 

I don't know who I am anymore. When you elect to lose yourself in somebody, you indeed, by my experience, lose yourself. It's amazing.

It's also frightening. My identity as a comedian was forged longer and spoke truer than any other ideology in my life. After a while I became less and less (less mics, less supporters), changed more and more (new job, new apartment) and then, BOOM: I'm not the comedian I want to be, not the comedian that puts in the work, not the comedian touring on planes, trains and automobiles, not the comedian hanging in the back, hanging at the bar, hanging at the house party, not the comedian producing shows, or hosting mics, not the comedian spreading the most accurate information (shouts to Matt Gubser). Most of the aesthetics I covet as a comedian requires a lifestyle I no longer have (or, arguably, no longer need). So, in order to claim my chaos, to protest my irrelevancy, to break the cycle of weekend warrior compromise, I said goodbye. 

I quit comedy on July 7th 2014. It is liberating. I love telling people that I quit. It bums a lot of fellow comedians out. I love seeing them squirm at a maniacal reflection of their creative mortality. No, I will not covet your stage time! No, I will not do your show! No, I will not cover for your mic! No, I will not roast you! No, I will not be rejected by your comedy club or your festival or whatever else inspires semiprofessional jealousy. No, I will not be the characteristic laugh during the awkward folly! I will not! I will not! I will not! I'm dead! 

Three things makes "quitting" the funniest thing in the world. One, fuck me, right? Who gives a shit—in a macro sense—about San Francisco comedy as a lifestyle. Two, in comedy, you HAVE to quit. Most people fade out, few make a show of, and those who do are (usually) using a false finish as a promotional stunt (shouts to Justin Scales). Three, it's a legitimate satire. The great times were good, but the good times weren't that great. Comedy is self-righteous suicide. I killed myself thrice over to chase the dream, but, in a city with little industry, having no transportation, little capital and less business sense, I got as far as I could professionally/financially. Maybe that's good enough. 

Assigned to salvage a lifeless wreckage of botched discovery, the Blackstronauts make a revelation that will change Station 713 forever…

Join David Gborie, OJ Patterson and newly appointed Blackstronaut Richard Toomer as they immerse and reeducate themselves with a youthful exploration.

Engineered by A.S.H. Clayton.