Widespread reaction to Howard Stern’s first days on Sirius sat radio:
From Howard Reich at the Chicago Tribune:
The words tumbled out in a torrent–vulgar descriptions of body parts, bodily functions and the kinkiest sexual practices.
The speakers seemed to revel in the telling, reiterating the blue
phrases like a mantra, then laughing uproariously at each repetition.
But was it funny? Was it supposed to be?
Each listener who tuned in Monday morning to Howard Stern’s debut on
Sirius Satellite Radio answered those questions individually, for humor
remains as subjective as any other art form.
Yet to those who
work in comedy, Stern–and those who follow him into the anything-goes
realm of satellite radio–faces a steep artistic challenge. For if
anyone on satellite can say anything, will audiences be amused by
streams of profanity for long?
“My experience is that unless
you keep some kind of taboo, you lose the force of any kind of
language,” said Bernard Sahlins, co-founder of Chicago’s long-standing
comedy troupe Second City, interviewed before Stern’s satellite debut.
“If the language becomes generally broadcast, approved, misused, it becomes meaningless.
“It has neither mystery nor effectiveness,” Sahlins said.
The new Howard Stern satellite radio show began Monday with all the expected hoopla.
He
put to rest rumors that he married his longtime girlfriend, model Beth
Ostrosky — in a comment complete with a federally banned expletive.
“I
am not married. It’s a nice feeling that we get along great. We’re very
happy and I don’t want to (expletive) it up,” said Stern, who is
finally free of government decency laws on Sirius Satellite Radio Inc.
(Channel 100).
Stern has promised everything from stripper poles
to live sex on his new show. Yet he maintained his show was more about
ideas. Cursing, he said, would be part of the natural progression of
speech.
“I feel this is a culmination of dreams for me,” Stern said in an on-air news conference. “The only limit is our mind,” he said.
My take:
I’ve
never found Stern funny. He’s the obnoxious kid from school who
delights in yelling dirty words to shock people, a buffoon who
substitutes obscenity for humor and then claims it’s all about free
speech.
It ain’t. Richard Pryor was both obscene and funny. Stern
is just obscene. There’s a difference and Sirius radio, in a
to-the-death fight with the much larger XM-radio network, is gambling
that it can attract more listeners by putting Stern on the air and
letting him shout “fuck” to his heart’s content.
With luck, their attempt will fail miserably.