Mitch Hedberg

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New CD gives comedian Hedberg life after death
Sep 12, 2008
JEFF BAENEN, AP

Comedian Mitch Hedberg left behind a scanty treasure-trove of work before his death in 2005 of a drug overdose at age 37 - two CDs, 10 appearances on David Letterman, and bit parts in the movies and TV. Now, three years after his death, fans can get a taste of what Hedberg was planning for his third CD with the release of "Do You Believe in Gosh?" Recorded at a California comedy club just two months before his death, "Do You Believe in Gosh?" is intended as a tribute to the long-haired St. Paul native with the spaced-out stage persona.

Comedy Central Records, which releases between eight to 12 records a year, is making the Hedberg CD its big release of the year, with billboards, print ads and a series of Hedberg tributes at a half-dozen comedy clubs earlier this month. "This was not the record that he was going to record, but it's as close to it, I think, as we can get," said Jack Vaughn, vice president in charge of Comedy Central Records. "We just didn't want to do anything that would hurt his legacy or do anything that we don't think he would have been happy with."

Hedberg was working on new material that he recorded before an audience at the Ontario Improv in Ontario, Calif., in January 2005. Vaughn said Hedberg talked to him that March about recording a new CD the following October. But Hedberg never got a chance to record that album. The comic once dubbed "the next Seinfeld" by Time magazine died March 30, 2005, in a hotel room in New Jersey. His death was ruled an accident from "multiple drug toxicity," including cocaine and heroin.

Hedberg was "maybe 15, 20 minutes of material away" from recording his third CD, Vaughn said. "Do You Believe in Gosh?" runs about 40 minutes; old material was edited out from Hedberg's performance, and although the shows were being recorded only for archival purposes, the sound quality is "great," Vaughn said. "It's not B sides. This is a great stand-alone Mitch record," Vaughn said. Asked why it took three years from Hedberg's death for the record to come back, Vaughn said the label focused on "doing it right."

Vaughn says Hedberg, with his slacker image, hipster delivery and observational humor, "was one of the big voices of his generation of comedy" and has inspired a lot of imitators. "People really, really connected with his material and who he was as a person, so I think he's incredibly missed," Vaughn said. Dave Becky, Hedberg's manager for about a decade, says the new CD is "just Mitch being Mitch" in front of a crowd, telling jokes. "This album is very bittersweet, but I'm glad all the fans out there get one more thing they can get and hold on to," Becky said.

Hedberg, who was known for his one-liners, is in vintage off-the-wall form on "Do You Believe in Gosh?" (the title comes from a line in one of his notebooks):

-On his "door deal" at the comedy club: "I got a door deal here. I'm workin' for 50 percent of the door, and then tomorrow I'm workin' for 50 percent of the door, and then on Sunday, I'm gonna have ... a door."

-On his decision not to wear his signature tinted aviator glasses at the performance: "When you wear glasses and you talk to someone, you always think they're outside of a window. It's like, 'Hey, why don't you come inside.'"

-On wearing a vest. "I gotta vest: If I had my arms cut off, it would be a jacket."

Hedberg's widow, Lynn Shawcroft, 38, is a fellow comedian who appeared at his Los Angeles tribute. She says her husband, who suffered such stage fright early on that he would stare at the floor or close his eyes during performances, practiced a gentle form of comedy.

"It wasn't super-personal in the sense like, he didn't get up and talk about, 'This is what I feel about government and women and abortion,'" Shawcroft said. "He was all about stand-up," she adds. "Mitch definitely would have loved to get into some more acting. But the fact that he was very, very hard-core into stand-up, I think that influenced a lot of people, too, who started taking stand-up really, really seriously as its own thing."

Hedberg's mother, Mary, said she and her husband, Arne, still hear from fans or see mention of their son on the Internet every day nearly four years after his death. "People have not even come close to forgetting our son, and all you can do is hope and pray that his legacy lives forever," she said.

Hedberg's first two CDs have been popular - his second, "Mitch All Together," released in 2003 on Comedy Central Records, has sold about 400,000 copies, while his first, self-released CD from the late 1990s, "Strategic Grill Locations," reissued by Comedy Central Records in 2003, has sold more than 200,000 copies. But other than his appearances on CBS' "Late Show with David Letterman," there's very little of Hedberg on the screen. He made appearances on TV's "That '70s Show" and "Ed" and smoked fake pot with Peter Frampton in "Almost Famous" (2000).

Vaughn, of Comedy Central Records, believes all that would have changed if Hedberg had lived. "I think he would have been a superstar," Vaughn said.

Shawcroft says she hopes fans like the new CD, which she says is probably the last of original Hedberg material. "I just hope it makes people feel good. I hope people are happy to hear Mitch tell jokes again," she said.

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This is great to hear - I found his stuff by chance and felt like a gold miner striking it lucky when I did. I've got quite a few bootleg recordings of live gigs that he did, but they're all pretty poor quality.

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I've never seen an interview with Mitch Hedberg before, and this is a full length one too... nice

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The Mitch Hedberg website has been revamped with lots of clips and info

http://mitchhedberg.net/