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Chrpno
Apr 17, 2006

I live in a country where no-one's heard of Howard Stern, outside of the occasional US gossip pages and that Private Parts movie ages ago. However, I've been getting into the Sal & Richard prank calls recently, as a keen fan of juvenile toilet humour.

This leads me to Howard though. His whole shtick seems to be to endlessly rag on his coworkers/bosses/minions/random callers, focusing on one thing and totally running it into the ground. This is kinda funny but I don't know why he has become the radio superstar he is? He seems to be insanely popular, rich and well-known, yet I can't really tell why? Was he really good back in the day and then got boring? I just don't get it.

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Mattavist
May 24, 2003

It's because people on the East Coast are subhuman filth.

Smoking Crow
Feb 14, 2012

*laughs at u*

Bababooey

Dr Jankenstein
Aug 6, 2009

Hold the newsreader's nose squarely, waiter, or friendly milk will countermand my trousers.
Pretty much the whole Stern/Lange combo was fantastic, Artie Lange, when Artie Lange wasn't so hosed up on drugs, was a fantastic foil for Stern and the two of them combined could be absolutely hilarious ragging on something. They were funny as gently caress, and worked well together.

And before Lange, he was the go-to guy for something new and shocking. He was never really "funny", he was more the "go as outrageous as possible" guy. He became popular because he was doing what no one else on the radio was daring to do, and got syndicated for it. He was pushing the boundaries of what was allowed, and that's kinda why people love him. Nowadays, stuff isn't quite so shocking. You host a bra-burning and its a so-so thing, but back in the day, it was a big deal. That's kinda the problem with Stern these days. In the 80's and early 90's, stuff wasn't was still a little hum-drum, and there was still room to shock the poo poo out of people with new stunts. But those sorts of things now don't get the same shocked reaction they used to. He's got Quivers back as the "straight man" (well, woman) and its kinda like it was back in the day, only the shock factor isgone, which leaves him kinda...floating i guess. His big thing is no longer big, and he doesn't quite know what to do now that he can't shock the poo poo out of people.

Internetjack
Sep 15, 2007

oh god how did this get here i am not good with computers
Top Cop
Adding to what AA posted; The bar for "shocking" media is always being raised/pushed. Stern's heyday was a good 20 years ago.

The Simpsons used to be cutting edge. Married with Children was outrageous. South Park was over the top. Now all of those shows are ho-hum. They pushed the bar in their day, but are seen as vanilla flavored nowadays.

sugar free jazz
Mar 5, 2008

[

Mattavist posted:

It's because people on the East Coast are subhuman filth.

Ya that mostly. Also sometimes does funny stuff, like prank calls or listening to Artie slowly die on air when he was on the show, and the other morning shows are so much worse. They're so fuckin bad.

Liquid Communism
Mar 9, 2004


Out here, everything hurts.




He's an rear end in a top hat with a microphone. That used to be pretty entertaining, now we have Youtube so any rear end in a top hat can get a microphone, and he's pretty much passed his relevancy.

OneEightHundred
Feb 28, 2008

Soon, we will be unstoppable!

sugar free jazz posted:

the other morning shows are so much worse. They're so fuckin bad.
This is about 90% of it. Radio morning shows were (and largely still are) about as safe as you can get, Stern brought a sort of over-the-top SNL-esque outrageousness that was completely the opposite of that. When you're competing in a time slot that boring, pretty much anything is new and exciting, which meant Stern would have fresh material for ages.

After 20 years though, it starts to wear off for the same reason that pretty much everyone here just kind of yawns when they get tricked into staring into the Goatman's anus for the 500th time, and the Internet has pushed the boundaries so far that Stern seems kind of tame now.

OneEightHundred fucked around with this message at 21:39 on May 4, 2014

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

OneEightHundred posted:

...the Internet has pushed the boundaries so far that Stern seems kind of tame now.

Fads and trends come and go so fast on the internet today that it's easy to miss them and by the time you catch up, something new has come along. If Howard had come along in the past year or two, he would have been forgotten in a few weeks tops.

Of course, you can't tell Howard that.

SSH IT ZOMBIE
Apr 19, 2003
No more blinkies! Yay!
College Slice
I get chuclkes out of Opie and Anthony, Rover's Morning Glory, or even Spezzeno and Sandy, they are pretty local I think though.

Never listened to Stern, am I missing out?

Mimesweeper
Mar 11, 2009

Smellrose

Chrpno posted:

Was he really good back in the day and then got boring?

Yes.

Shiki Dan
Oct 27, 2010

If ya can move ya toes ya back's fine
Let's not forget that he's now filthy loving rich after selling his show to Sirius so he can pretty much sit back and not give a solitary gently caress about being interesting, relevant, funny, or shocking anymore (he doesn't).

AdorableStar
Jul 13, 2013

:patriot:


Bababooey Bababooey Howard Stern's penis

OneEightHundred
Feb 28, 2008

Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Mister Kingdom posted:

Fads and trends come and go so fast on the internet today that it's easy to miss them and by the time you catch up, something new has come along. If Howard had come along in the past year or two, he would have been forgotten in a few weeks tops.
Probably true, but not for that reason. There's a big difference between being able to make something entertaining and being able to keep putting out more entertaining content, Stern's definitely in the latter category and there are things on the Internet that survive by doing that (i.e. Zero Punctuation is in its 7th year now).

The real reason is that the Internet doesn't care about broadcast regulations or even reputation, so comedy that flouts broadcast regulations isn't cutting-edge any more. tribute.avi is more outrageous than anything that Stern's ever put on the air, and nobody cares about people riding the Sybian in the studio when they discovered Internet porn when they were 11.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

OneEightHundred posted:

Probably true, but not for that reason. There's a big difference between being able to make something entertaining and being able to keep putting out more entertaining content, Stern's definitely in the latter category and there are things on the Internet that survive by doing that (i.e. Zero Punctuation is in its 7th year now).

The real reason is that the Internet doesn't care about broadcast regulations or even reputation, so comedy that flouts broadcast regulations isn't cutting-edge any more. tribute.avi is more outrageous than anything that Stern's ever put on the air, and nobody cares about people riding the Sybian in the studio when they discovered Internet porn when they were 11.

The thing with Stern (based only on his appearances with Letterman) is that he thinks he's more important than he actually is. He still has his legions of fans, of course, but I wonder how many new ones he's picking up?

It's kinda like Letterman. Dave had virtually no competition in the 80s and even part of the 90s. but he's not the innovator he used to be and it shows.

anne frank fanfic
Oct 31, 2005
He's just an rear end in a top hat who gets off on pushing boundaries and breaking rules, thinking its "funny." Imagine if the FYAD guys had a radio show, and there ya go.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

anne frank fanfic posted:

He's just an rear end in a top hat who gets off on pushing boundaries and breaking rules, thinking its "funny." Imagine if the FYAD guys had a radio show, and there ya go.

And god forbid you should criticize him.

Bip Roberts
Mar 29, 2005
The OJ prank call is legit funny.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lP8TwjRMdS0

muckswirler
Oct 22, 2008

There's also the fact that he's a really good interviewer. He gets people to talk about things that they're uncomfortable addressing and they appreciate him for it. He's got a gift for saying infuriating things to people/calling them out without pissing them off. I'm not sure that anyone with half a brain thinks he's legit funny especially in this day and age, but when I was a daily listener to the syndicated show it was miles ahead of other morning zoo poo poo.

Now though anything Earwolf blows the poo poo out of Stern as far as entertainment goes.

Sublimer
Sep 20, 2007
get yo' game up


muckswirler posted:

There's also the fact that he's a really good interviewer.

I'll second this. I loved his interviews with Billy Joel (Not the "Town Hall" one), Paul McCartney, and even Floyd Mayweather. I have a 2 hour drive that I do semi-regularly, and I usually just put on Howard Stern and it flies by - especially if he's interviewing someone interesting.

Chinatown
Sep 11, 2001

by Fluffdaddy
Fun Shoe

Liquid Communism posted:

He's an rear end in a top hat with a microphone. passed his relevancy.

Exactly.

Otto Von Jizzmark
Dec 27, 2004
I kinda slowly quit listening after Artie left its just not the same.

Liar
Dec 14, 2003

Smarts > Wisdom
One thing I'll always remember is that I was listening to Howard Stern on 9/11. I was standing there thinking it was a pretty loving unfunny skit, and I kept hoping some good joke would come of it. I think it wound up being one of his longest episodes.

Ferdinand the Bull
Jul 30, 2006
Probation
Can't post for 15 hours!
Howard Stern is really good at surrounding himself with interesting people.
Beetle juice, Artie Lange, Bababooey...

BABABOOEY!

Bababooey is like Karl Pilkongton from NYC

Count Freebasie
Jan 12, 2006

Sublimer posted:

I'll second this. I loved his interviews with Billy Joel (Not the "Town Hall" one), Paul McCartney, and even Floyd Mayweather. I have a 2 hour drive that I do semi-regularly, and I usually just put on Howard Stern and it flies by - especially if he's interviewing someone interesting.

Thirding this. The man got Quentin Tarantino to recount a story that he and Brad Pitt smoked a chuck of hash out of a Diet Coke can together in France, which Angelina and Brad probably didn't want broadcast.

I am a long-time Stern fan, and I can tell you that he genuinely is probably one of the greatest interviewers of all-time.

Did any other interviewer get Bryan Cranston to recount that the first time he had sex was with a prostitute and then tell the whole story? Or get John Cena to admit that he fucks fat chicks when he needs to? Get that one moron from ICP to admit he was molested as a kid?

I've listened to him for years, and his ability to get celebrities to admit things they normally never would is amazing. He may be the best out there, and I say that with no exaggeration. YouTube some of his celebrity interviews and you'll see.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

Count Freebasie posted:

Thirding this. The man got Quentin Tarantino to recount a story that he and Brad Pitt smoked a chuck of hash out of a Diet Coke can together in France, which Angelina and Brad probably didn't want broadcast.

I am a long-time Stern fan, and I can tell you that he genuinely is probably one of the greatest interviewers of all-time.

Did any other interviewer get Bryan Cranston to recount that the first time he had sex was with a prostitute and then tell the whole story? Or get John Cena to admit that he fucks fat chicks when he needs to? Get that one moron from ICP to admit he was molested as a kid?

I've listened to him for years, and his ability to get celebrities to admit things they normally never would is amazing. He may be the best out there, and I say that with no exaggeration. YouTube some of his celebrity interviews and you'll see.

This right here is what most people will never get about Stern if they haven't given him a fair shot. He became known for controversial antics and sex-talk in a time when the FCC was rabid over that poo poo, but that's not where his real talent is.

The Howard Stern Interview is unique. He has frank and genuine way of speaking that seems to put even the most up-tight celebrities at ease. I think a part of it is that he spent his entire early career talking about personal poo poo that no other radio host would, and the audience came to feel like the knew him, even celebrities. So when celebrities enter his studio they are more willing to engage on that level; Its only fair because Stern himself has been doing it for years.

You know a celebrity is uptight when they decline to be on with Stern, not because he's going to ask them when they lost their virginity, but because he might ask them about something that really matters. Someone like Tom Cruise for example could never go on because there's no telling Stern ahead of time not to discuss Scientology. Its what people are wondering about Tom Cruise, therefore its what Stern will ask about, period.

Basebf555 fucked around with this message at 17:45 on May 5, 2014

skipdogg
Nov 29, 2004
Resident SRT-4 Expert

Agreed with the previous 2 posters. I was never much of a Stern fan until I started having a long commute. I listen to him for the interviews. I don't really care for the Wack Pack, what Ronnie is doing this week, Eric the Actor or any of the other stupid poo poo they talk about most of the time, but some of his interviews are just loving amazing.

Today Louis CK was on this morning and he's telling Stern how when he was 12 or something he was experimenting sexually and trying to gently caress different melons and fruits, and once even a couple of chicken cutlets he warmed up in the microwave. You won't get that kind of interview anywhere else. Louis CK talking about loving chicken cutlets because he thought they might feel like a vagina. Holy poo poo.

AGT is starting up again soon, and I really don't care for him bitching about how AGT is such a drag on his life when he's getting paid 15 million dollars for less than 30 days of work. He's usually in touch with his audience, but Howard bitching about having to drive to Jersey for AGT, when he's making 15 Million to do it seems to me might be a big turnoff for his average blue collar listener who busts his rear end for a middle class lifestyle.

Anyway, with Stern it's all about the interviews. Some memorable one's I've listened to lately that were just so interesting

John Goodman, Kathy Griffin, Pitbull, Queen Latifa, Steve Carell, Tracy Morgan, Anderson Cooper (this one was really good). He just has a gift of getting folks to talk about things they normally wouldn't talk about.

xutech
Mar 4, 2011

EIIST

I watched him with Jerry Seinfeld on an episode of Comedians in cars getting coffee and he seemed like a neurotic wreck.

invisiblelantern
Jan 15, 2007
Growing up listen to Stern in the 90s, he represented something...different than what was on the other radio stations, at least here in CT. Like that kind of counterculture element still in the public eye that comes around every so often. There was no morning zoo hijinks, no boring chatter about blase topics, no goofy "yuk yuk" kind of humor. In my mind, he was cutting edge -- the humor was sharp and witty, the writing team was spot on and his self debasement definitely influenced my own sense of humor to some degree. He was frank, forthright about his neuroses and funny -- and as the above poster said, a great interviewer to boot. He also made due with what he was given -- he could makes topics and "memes" I guess out of the regular show crew -- Bababooey, Scott the Engineer's awful smoking habit, Jackie the scummy comedian, etc.

That he would regularly harangue celebrities was amusing, but that he would too regularly send out a stuttering interviewer to ask offensive questions to select celebrities was absolutely hilarious to me. It was bizarre, but funny, and only added to the "anti-establishment" appeal that he projected, at least during that time. Thinking back, asking Billy Crystal if "there would be a Mr. Saturday Night 2" was really biting, and his constant OJ Simpson calls are still pretty amusing to listen to.

Basically, he was in the right place and provided the right kind of entertainment for the time period, but after personnel changes, he kind of lost his touch. I haven't listened to a full show in years, nor am I likely to. The humor from his own life situations is gone, and he's decidedly out of touch and dull.

Applebees Appetizer
Jan 23, 2006

Best interviewer of all time. He should have replaced Larry King instead of that idiot Pierce Morgan.

EugeneJ
Feb 5, 2012

by FactsAreUseless
YouTube is a treasure trove of old Stern interviews. Getting Daryl Hall to open up about fearing deer after he got Lyme disease was amazing and hilarious.

If you want to see a celebrity reduced to a human, watch Howard interview them.

signalnoise
Mar 7, 2008

i was told my old av was distracting
Agreeing that Howard Stern's real talent is getting honesty out of people. As far as non-interview humor, these days it's mostly poo poo that requires you having some sense of who is staff are and what they do etc.. There's a continuity between shows that really does pay off. Dumb as it sounds one of the more recent big stories was Shitgate, which was basically, Howard Stern is kind of a germophobe and someone went into the employee bathroom and took a massive spraying poo poo that got all over everything and they just apparently moved on and thought nothing of it. After some discussion and inquisition Howard said he was going to order a DNA test and got a hair sample from everyone for comparison, and whoever did it was fired unless they came forward. Turns out it was the VP or something and he's been branded ever since. It took multiple episodes for this to all come to closure. Everyone gets branded somehow and made fun of, whether it's for making GBS threads all over a bathroom or being a mushmouthed idiot or saying "bababooey" once in your career.

That continuity is responsible for a lot of the present-day value of the show, outside the interviews which are seriously awesome. Even people who you really don't care about much generally have some really great stories that Howard can get out of them, and he lets them tell the stories.

ZombieLenin
Sep 6, 2009

"Democracy for the insignificant minority, democracy for the rich--that is the democracy of capitalist society." VI Lenin


[/quote]
I think what everyone else has said here is true. He made a name for himself, and his importance to media is derived from, his willingness to push the envelope of what was acceptable in the 1980s and 1990s. He is the most fined person in the history of the American FCC.

These days, he's not that funny. He never really has been that funny to be honest. Howard Stern was at his funniest, in my opinion, when Artie Lange was his foil. Which incidentally was well after he stopped pushing the envelope on the radio (with some exceptions).

I still listen to his show everyday for a myriad of reasons. First, if I'm listening to the radio, I like hearing people talk. If I want to listen to music, given the fact this is 2014, I just listen to my own music in the car. And Howard Stern's radio channels on Sirius always provide people talking, no matter what part of the day it is.

Content wise though, Howard Stern has evolved into a great loving interviewer over the years. I love his interviews. He's willing to ask questions, and get answers, that nobody else is--and not just about sex. I've also grown up listening to the show, so all of the in-office shenanigans/ball busting/ragging is a lot like reality television. The people who work on the Stern show have all become characters whose inane bullshit stories I like to follow.

ZombieLenin fucked around with this message at 21:01 on Jun 11, 2014

Tuxedo Gin
May 21, 2003

Classy.

I remember he used to play a lot of Johnny Rebel, so in the age of the SJW he could still shock the poo poo out of people and offend them, but that demographic doesn't really listen to the radio anymore so he'd never get heard.

Viper_3000
Apr 26, 2005

I could give a shit about all that.
Echoing what everyone else has said about him being probably the greatest interviewer alive. If you've ever listened to Marc Maron's WTF podcast, it's similar to that in that both Marc and Howard can get people to talk about things and tell stories that they would never, ever mention to anyone else in the media. Marc however, has a tendency to turn the interviews back on himself a lot, where as Howard mainly focuses on the guest.

He's also one of the only people (if not THE only person) to get big name a-list stars to do these sort of lengthy, meaningful interviews. If you can tell me where I can hear someone interview Jerry Seinfeld for an hour and a half and get real, meaningful stuff out of him, I'd listen to them in a heartbeat, but the reality is that Howard (and to some extent Maron) is the only one doing this kind of thing anymore.

Applebees Appetizer
Jan 23, 2006

EugeneJ posted:

YouTube is a treasure trove of old Stern interviews. Getting Daryl Hall to open up about fearing deer after he got Lyme disease was amazing and hilarious.

I remember that one. By the end of the interview Daryl was saying gently caress DEER KILL THEM ALL THEY'RE WORSE THAN RATS.

Good poo poo.

Lagrange
Apr 27, 2002

Howard Stern is very much an acquired taste.

I never listened to him before I moved to the East coast and bought a car with satellite radio. I tuned in once for fun and thought it was probably the stupidest show I had ever heard. Not funny, unnecessarily offensive, painfully awkward phony phone calls, idiotic callers, etc. Then I switched to a job with a long commute, and because I tend to prefer talk/news shows over music when I drive I was mostly listening to NPR. For reasons I now don't recall, I tuned into Stern at some point and he had a great interview with someone I also don't recall, but it was a very big name in either politics or entertainment, and I was blown away by the fact that he/she would go on a so-called "shock radio" show with a "repulsive" guy. It was enough to have me tune in the next day, which was good, and then again, and after about a week I started to "get" the show.

The thing is, you need to approach it with no expectations whatsoever because the way the show is typically portrayed by third parties isn't the way it really is, and isn't what makes it compelling anyway. It's not really "shock radio," but instead a group of people who have been together forever, know each other very well, and are 100% honest, about absolutely everything, including very personal stuff, every day, all the time. The honesty really sucks you in, and all of a sudden the people on the show, the "wack pack," and all the stupidity gel into a very entertaining package. It's like listening to a big dysfunctional family air their grievances, mock each other, and generally do and say whatever they want, often with a lot of amusement, both intentional and not.

Stern is also easily the best interviewer I've ever heard. Nothing is out of bounds and he gets people, BIG people, to reveal stuff they'd never discuss anywhere else. He should lose the "how much money do you make" questions, because they're awkward and irrelevant, and the phony phone calls are still painful, but the payoff is worth it.

Tl;dr version: Listen every day for a week. By then you'll know if you love it or hate it.

Earwicker
Jan 6, 2003

Count Freebasie posted:

Thirding this. The man got Quentin Tarantino to recount a story that he and Brad Pitt smoked a chuck of hash out of a Diet Coke can together in France, which Angelina and Brad probably didn't want broadcast.

I really don't think anyone at all was remotely surprised to find out that Brad Pitt and Quentin Tarantino once smoked some hash together in France. That's not really the kind of "shock jock" material he first became known for and these days that sounds like a headline TMZ would reject for being too boring.

I used to find Howard Stern decently funny back when I listened to him regularly in the 90's but also I was a high school kid at the time.

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe

Earwicker posted:

I really don't think anyone at all was remotely surprised to find out that Brad Pitt and Quentin Tarantino once smoked some hash together in France. That's not really the kind of "shock jock" material he first became known for and these days that sounds like a headline TMZ would reject for being too boring.

I used to find Howard Stern decently funny back when I listened to him regularly in the 90's but also I was a high school kid at the time.

Forget about that one specific example, I agree with you on that. The point is he gets big name, sometimes legit A-list celebrities to sit down and do extensive, personal interviews the likes of which you literally don't see anywhere else in media.

Most of these big stars are used to going on a radio show or Good Morning America for 8 minutes and talking about the movie they're promoting, but when they agree to do Stern they know its a totally different kind of interview. That's what makes him unique.

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Time Trial
Aug 5, 2004

A saucerful of cyanide
Howard Stern is a judge on prime time NBC reality competition show America's Got Talent.

Edit: he also basically said we should kill all brown people on 9/11

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