Nick Swardson keeps the party going with “Seriously, Who Farted?” (DVD/CD review)

Comedians like to party just as much as you do, if not more so. Trust me. And yet, you don't see too many comedians who bring their party persona onstage. If you want a party comedian, Nick Swardson continues to be your guy.

For Seriously, Who Farted?, Swardson's new hourlong special (available in different versions on CD or DVD via Comedy Central), he had opening act Beardo and Dirt Nasty (aka Nicholaus Goossen and Simon Rex) riling up the theater crowd in Austin earlier this year with seven minutes of "singing" about getting drunk, doing drugs and having sex. You can see on the DVD as a bonus feature. By the time Swardson took the stage, the Austin fans were hooting and hollering for anything to do with drinking and drugs — to the point where they "woo-wooed" when Swardson started a story about alcohol poisoning ("That's not applause-worthy," he chided them briefly) and booing him when he mentioned that to obey the law, they had to have fake pot on the set of Grandma's Boy.

Nick Swardson - Seriously, Who Farted?

"I never thought about being a stand-up as a kid," Swardson said, introducing a funny bit about boys who want to be ninjas, and wondering what would happen if we ended up becoming the first thing we wanted to be. Roll the clip!

Watching this reminded me how I once confused Swardson and Dane Cook for each other when they first entered my comedy consciousness (and possibly yours) in 2000. At the time, they both liked to get nostalgic and use physicality to describe their nostalgia. Of course, Cook has become the biggest touring stand-up, staging party atmospheres for 10,000 or more fans at a time. But he famously doesn't drink or smoke. Swardson, meanwhile, jokes at length about his drinking and the exploits it has gotten him into over the years.

TEE Whereas many comedians will mock the summer blockbuster, Swardson has a bit specifically taking his tsking friends to task. I'm guessing that his notes don't harmonize with the recent comedy chorus against Ed Hardy shirts and the guys who wear them — I'm guessing this because Swardson not only is wearing his own custom Triumph United T-shirt, but also selling it online (and fans in the front row of his special are seen wearing them!?).

Swardson also jokes about his upcoming Comedy Central project, Gay Robot, and the fact that "everybody thinks I'm gay, which is understandable." What's almost as courageous for a comedian in 2009 is seeing a comedian make a joke about MySpace that's not about how MySpace is 2000-late. Instead, he talks about MySpace's sexual preference choices. Not sure? Roll the clip!

The DVD offers more than the CD, including a fake interview in which Swardson imagines himself to be timeless, with visions of how he would have done stand-up in the silent 1920s, swinging disco 1970s, Miami Vice 1980s and Def Jam 1990s. You also get a horror parody called "28 Days Later" and "A Very Terry Christmas," based on Swardson's gay roller-skating character on Reno 911! Although you can watch two of these things right here if you'd like…

28 Drinks Later – watch more funny videos

A Very Terry Christmas – watch more funny videos

Sean L. McCarthy

Editor and publisher since 2007, when he was named New York's Funniest Reporter. Former newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News, Boston Herald and smaller dailies and community papers across America. Loves comedy so much he founded this site.

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7 thoughts on “Nick Swardson keeps the party going with “Seriously, Who Farted?” (DVD/CD review)

  1. Hahahahahahahaha! The 28 drinks later gets me every time! 🙂 Seriously, this DVD is a must purchase.

  2. Sounds like he’s pretty sure he’s not sure! MySpace would do that. This DVD definitely pushes the awkward! High fives.

  3. This DVD has everything on it! 28 Drinks Later for Halloween and A Very Terry Christmas for the upcoming Holidays! Come on now…you need to go out and buy this!

  4. Yeah, except he is gay. So, not actually as courageous as he could be. In fact, it’s really weird and sad that he goes to such lengths to deny it.

  5. Nick Swardson is right up there with Dane Cook and I love that it’s not like a clone of what other comedians are doing. This DVD is funny and the bonus clips are interesting to say the least!

  6. This dvd is so funny. The 28 drinks later bit is hysterical. If you haven’t bought this yet, I would definitely recommend it!

  7. First of all, I used to work at a country club at which Adam Sandler is a mbemer. Whenever he showed up with some of these guys, we would say, Ahh, looks like Chris Rock is gonna be in the next movie . . . I guess David Spade and Rob Schneider got the nod. When just about every one of them showed up one day, we were like, What mega-movie is going on now? Turns out it was Grown Ups .First of all, David Spade and Chris Farley were not going to make each other stars. In fact, Farley’s last two movies were so bad, Spade is lucky he wasn’t in either of them.Chris Rock just brings the black demographic into the theater. Otherwise . . .Nick Swardson can be funny off-and-on. But a Gay Robot movie? You must be f-ing kidding! Listen to the old Gay Robot comedy skits from the Adam Sandler CDs. THAT Gay Robot was funny, always trying to use naive tricks to get someone to have sex, desperately horney, and downright vengeful when things didn’t go his way. They changed all those brilliant traits to some f-ing Emo piece of crap. Gay Robot should be a borderline rapist, hellbent on jizzing on someone. And he should have legs, like the original.

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