The Best Comedy Albums of 2009

It was a very tight race for the number one spot between the Patton Oswalt album and Let Me Put My Thoughts In You, the second stand-up album from comedian Dana Gould, but in the end I've got to give it to Gould. His is my favorite kind of comedy: bewildered by the world, slightly hostile towards it and forever applying logic where no one has bothered to apply it before (it's the kind of comedy that the greats like George Carlin and Bill Hicks trafficked in). It's the kind of album you could listen to once a month and always find something new to laugh at. If you don't already know and love Dana Gould, let Thoughts be your introduction. This is the best comedy record of the year.

The third album from Patton Oswalt finds the great comedian evolving and covering some unfamiliar territory, with riffs on being a new husband and father, coping with depression and getting older. Though it's a bit different than what we've come to expect from Oswalt, it's still a masterpiece of language, geekery and hilariously extrapolated concepts. Some of the anger has gone away (though he does open the album by announcing that "he hates"), but that's not to say he's softened -- merely refocused in different arenas. I love this record.

The debut album from 26-year old comedian and Saturday Night Live writer John Mulaney is an incredibly polished and assured collection of stories and musings on everything from drag queens to the differences between The Godfather and Scarface (it's like lobster and Skittles, he suggests). A routine on Law & Order makes the album worth listening to alone, but luckily there's not a weak bit in the bunch. It's a great first record, and one of the most consistently funny you'll hear this year. I can't wait to see what Mulaney will do next.

This third stand-up album from the adorably odd Maria Bamford isn't for everyone. It's heavy on character comedy (Bamford is a whiz at voices -- not impressions, mind you -- and creating a host of entirely different personalities on stage) and routines that don't seem to connect, until you realize that the whole album is a reflection of Bamford's insecurities and neuroses. But, then, what stand-up album isn't? For those looking for something challenging and original, there's no better album this year than Unwanted Thoughts Syndrome.

The second album from Paul F. Tompkins opens with nearly 15 minutes of giddy, free-association riffing, as the usually laser-focused Tompkins deconstructs traditional stand-up. It's both very funny and a fascinating departure for the comic. The remainder of the album, however, is where it's really at; Tompkins brings his deadpan-absurdist worldview to routines on scary movie cliches, aggressive dogs, new fathers and the value of smashed pennies. He takes seemingly banal ideas and stretches them to their breaking points by forcing us to really scrutinize them, and the results are hilarious and brilliant. Come for the odd experiment that opens the album, but stay for the genius that is Freak Wharf. (Freak Wharf is available from AST Records.)

Jim Gaffigan's latest album is yet another scathing critique of American excess disguised as the deadpan ramblings of an everyman schlub. You wouldn't know that funny routines about bacon and camping are actually social commentary, and Gaffigan is never pretentious or self-important enough to even hint at that fact. That's part of what makes King Baby so enjoyable; taken at face value, it's another collection of great Gaffigan runs on food and gluttony (complete with his trademark "voice of the audience" thing), but it can also be read as something much more subversive. Either way, it's incredibly funny. That's enough to earn it a spot as one of the best albums of the year.

Doug Benson's Unbalanced Load is a deceptively simple-sounding album; it's only with repeat listens that you realize just how clever a lot of its wordplay and structure really are. Few comedians are as off-the-cuff funny as Benson, and Unbalanced Load shows off how quick he is while always seeming utterly at ease and genial. It also sounds like he's having a great time on stage, and I can't think of another comedy record released this year that reflected the artist's joy of doing stand-up as well as this one.

I underestimated Greg Giraldo's second album when I first watched it in special form on Comedy Central, but hearing it another time really brought me around. It's nearly as great as his first record, Good Day to Cross a River, and filled with the same kind of angry social commentary and sharp, foul comedy we've come to expect from the comedian. If you only know Giraldo from his brilliant performances on the Comedy Central roasts (seriously, he's the only guy that kills it every time), get busy and pick up Midlife Vices.

Sure, this list is heavy on so-called "alternative comedians," but what can I say? -- these comics put out some great records this year. Master of the absurd Eugene Mirman's third album finds him once again viewing the world through a cracked lens and coming up with routines ranging from the silly (a bit about made-up online banner ads) to the sublime (a great bit on the Classmates.com survey, which Mirman has filled out and reads his responses; it's the highlight of the record). There's actually a lot of computer-based material on the album, making Mirman a kind-of spokesman for the techno-geek set -- though that label doesn't do him or the album justice. It's a very funny listen.

"Not everyone's gonna enjoy this CD," says comedian Doug Stanhope as he kicks off his seventh comedy album with a routine called "The Funny Thing About Child Porn." He's right, too; From Across the Street isn't for everyone. Stanhope is one of (if not the) darkest, rawest comics working today and his latest album is as dark and raw as it gets, whether he's talking about mankind's propensity for violence, Americans' need for/abuse of health care or a suicide that followed one of his shows. It's tough stuff for the casual comedy fan, but real comedy nerds willing to go to those dark places with Stanhope (what he calls "fetish comedy") will find the album worth the trip.