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The man with the Prince Valiant haircut
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This review first appeared in the May 18, 1987 issue of The Daily Aztec.
To fully enjoy Emo Philips, you must first accept the fact that he is insane, that the haircut is legitimate and that he, despite the voice, is not a eunuch. (As he pointed out on his first album, "E=MO2," "I"m a great lover ... I'll bet."
Emo's timing is, well, full of seemingly misplaced pauses that, combined with his childlike voice full of wonder and incomprehension, create a comedic experience unlike anything or anyone to ever make a living by making others laugh.
His humor is often self-deprecating: "I had an argument with my father. I argued that Plato was the father of philosophy. My dad takes the opposite position, that I should wax the kitchen floor. I said, 'Well, the kitchen floor doesn't exist. At least, not in the permanent sense that the concept 'floor' does. He said, 'Do you think the concept 'your skull' exists? I said, 'Yes,' and then he surprised me by juxtaposing the two concepts.'"
But it would be too easy to write a review by pulling the best jokes off the album, and then when you buy it you know it before you hear it.
So, let's cull jokes and other comedic tools from recent interviews with Emo, to set up the album for your audible entertainment value.
Daily Aztec editor in chief R. Andrew Rathbone [who has, since this was written, simply gone on to write the Windows for Dummies books!] interviewed Emo in the Nov. 1, 1985 edition of the Aztec, and asked him about his day while watching him dig through trash in the third-floor men's room of the Professional Studies and Fine Arts building at San Diego State:
"I had a busy night last night. I don't know what I did. I'm always embarrassed that I didn't do anything. It's amazing how the day goes. Either like you have to perform an emergency appendectomy on one of the winows at the beach or you have to, you know, trade in some bottles or something. There's always something."
Daily Aztec staff writer John Cataldo [who, like me, has not gone on to write Windows for Dummies books] interviewed Emo in the May 8, 1987 issue:
"I like puns. There's nothing in the world I like better than a well-constructed pun or a beautiful 18-year-old naked cheerleader."
Especially, one presumes, a well-constructed 18-year-old naked cheerleader.
Regardless, Emo's second album is the most originally off-the-wall comedic effort since, well, his first one.