On Second Thought with Sean L. McCarthy, a Laughly exclusive series

The past two times I visited Austin this spring, Laughly was all over the place — first as the official partner of the Moontower Comedy Festival, and then last month exclusively live-streaming the Funniest Person in Austin finals.

It’s no coincidence you’re probably starting to see and hear more about Laughly, too.

Laughly is one of a few new comedy apps getting into the game in the past year, and calls itself “the Pandora of comedy.” Which helps if your official head of content, Kelly Anneken, came over straight from Pandora. And Mark Seman, aka Mark Says Hi, aka a longtime friend and colleague of mine, is Laughly’s head of programming and content, after a decade on the microphone at SiriusXM and a short detour over at The Laugh Button. They’ve convinced me enough that, full disclosure, I’m launching a new original program on Laughly myself.

Drum roll, please…

If tragedy plus time equals comedy, then comedy plus time equals what now? We answer that question and more…ON SECOND THOUGHT with Sean L. McCarthy.

Any joke you hear on a comedy album has been refined and reexamined by the comedian hundreds if not thousands of times before recording it for posterity. And yet, comedians are never done tinkering with their bits. So to speak. In fact, some jokes get much better and funnier after the version you hear on the album, while others lose their punch due to the passage of time and how we might think about the subject years later. Sometimes the comedian himself or herself gets tired of a joke or has a complete about-face on the subject. So if you hear the recorded album version of the joke on Laughly, this is their chance to explain themselves. We invite comedians to talk about the jokes they’ve retired or since had second thoughts about. ON SECOND THOUGHT with Sean L. McCarthy.

My first two episodes are available to preview/listen to now.

Gilbert Gottfried kicks things off by reminding us what kind of comedian he was before 2001, why he decided to launch into “The Aristocrats” at the Friars Club Roast of Hugh Hefner for Comedy Central, and how it completely changed the arc of his career. Check out this podcast episode “EP 01 Gilbert Gottfried – “Aristocrats”” on Laughly”! https://laugh.ly/sKMp/tNTGTR1sOD

In Episode 2 of On Second Thought, Chris Gethard walks me through how his story about a life-changing experience at the Bonnaroo festival changed as he retold it, from its appearance on “My Comedy Album” to his half-hour Comedy Central special, to how he tells it in his new HBO special. Check out this podcast episode “EP 02 Chris Gethard – “Bonnaroo”” on Laughly”! https://laugh.ly/sKMp/cl63Zv9sOD

Upcoming episodes feature Roy Wood Jr., Jackie Kashian and Costaki Economopoulos.

They’re short and sweet, or sometimes bittersweet. Depending upon the comedian and the track which he or she chooses to reflect upon in hindsight.

Look for new episodes weekly on Laughly.

Laughly CEO Dave Scott founded the app last summer, after having served as a CMO for Silicon Valley tech companies Livefyre, Gigya and Foresee, and after spending some time performing stand-up in Bay Area comedy clubs.

Here he was last year at 2016 TechCrunch:

“From the fan perspective, it’s often difficult to discover content from up and coming comedians unless they have already been discovered,” explains Scott. “For comics under the radar, there are streaming apps with discovery engines, like Spotify, Pandora and Apple Music, but they mainly focus on music. Laughly wants to amplify the voices of all comics, both established and emerging, allowing promising joke tellers to get the exposure and break they deserve.”

Laughly is a free app on your phone or tablet, but a paid premium subscription allows you to listen offline, ad-free.

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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