Monday, April 06, 2009

Lonely Island: Like A Bawse


"Cry deeply...(like a bawss!)"

Got this from Whores Never Learn, here's the new lonely Island single, faturing Seth Rogen no less. Saw Pineapple Express at the weekend, was ok. Not laugh-aloud-aplenty but one or two guffaws to be had...


He's my chat with them that I did for RWD recently. I didn't include the fairly amusing convo about parmesan omelets, couldn't seem to work it in somehow...

THREE THE HARD WAY…

With over 40m hits on YouTube, The Lonely Island are the undoubted Kings of Comedy right now. Hattie Collins talks to the trio about Justin Timberlake and jizzing in their pants…

“I would say luck,” decides Andy Samberg, before Akiva Schaffer cuts in. “And Justin Timberlake. People do seem to enjoy willy’s and Justin Timberlake,” he muses.

Akiva, Andy and Jorma Taccone, AKA the Lonely Island are three of the biggest stars in the US right now. Combining music with comedy and sketches, the trio have had over 50million hits on YouTube, with their singles Dick In A Box Ft. Justin Timberlake, the banned-in-the-UK and the new T-Pain featuring single I’m On A Boat.“Just for the record we make a lot of other songs that aren’t about willy’s at all,” pipes up Jorma, before admitting that 90-95% of the other songs on their debut album, are about pants.

The childhood geeks (their words) grew up near each other in Berkeley, C.A, bonding over their love of Monty Python, Airplane and Steve Martin. After years of knockbacks, the trio eventually landed a gig on major US TV show, Saturday Night Live. A weekly comedy sketch show that has not only launched the career of comedians like Steve Martin, the power of S.N.L has even credited for helping Obama become President Elect in ’08 after the brilliant Tina Fey spoofs of Sarah Palin.

SNL were so impressed with their self-written comedy skits like White Power, which sees the trio addicted to tooth whitener, and their idea of doing Dick In A Box with Justin Timberlake at the MTV Awards that they were bought onboard full-time. Their own part in the show is a segment called ‘Digital Shorts’, which sees the guys write and perform sketches including Lettuce and Staring Contest. They also got Natalie Portman to namecheck N.W.A on Natalie Raps and recorded the now infamous Jizz…. “We’re fans of hip hop,” insists Akiva when we wonder if they’re simply taking the mick out of spitters. “We’ve found that hip hop works well for two reasons. The main one being that we’re huge fans of it, and the second one being that none of us play any instruments and none of us can sing.”

Compared to cult New Zealanders Flight Of The Conchords with the sensibility of film-maker Judd Apatow (Superbad), these hipster Comedy Kings have recorded a whole album of celebrity-stuffed tracks that deal with jizz. “We bonded over or love of ‘90s R&B”, they say of working with Trousersnake. while, with T-Pain, “We just asked him,” says Andy of persuading Teddy P to get onboard, “He’s a pretty hilarious dude and I think there are many misconceptions about T-Pain because people like to right him off due to autotune and his look, but I think he’s insanely talented and definitely very funny.” What was he like on the day? “He was wearing an Aqua Teen Under Force shirt, he’s kind of a little comedy nerd maybe,” reveals Akiva. “But just so we don’t not ruin his reputation, he did bring a Lamborghini and a drop top, no joke. Don’t think he’s fucking around or anything. I don’t know how he was even going to drive both cars, but he had two!”

The rest of the album, that has DJ Nu-Mark and Sly & Robbie on production, features big names like Julian Casablancas from The Strokes, their Bay Area neighbour, E40, and Maroon 5’s Adam Levine. “Wayne Rooney turned us down he said no,” laughs Jorma when we wonder who they guys didn’t manage to get. “‘Who else? Oasis, Coldplay, Tony Blair was unavailable, Nick Frost, the guys from Brass Eyes, Mighty Boosh… “

They’ve obviously come a log way since sharing a small apartment in LA (which they named the Lonely Island, hence their name now), trying to get a network to see the funny side of their humour. Andy, the trio’s lead actor has already been in the much funny film , and can soon be seen in Land Of The Lost with Will Ferrell. Akiva, who directed Hot Rod, also makes videos for groups like We Are Scientists and he and Jorma are also full-time writers for S.N.L.. Life must be pretty good right now, right? “Everything just feels different, but the same cos were still doing stuff together,” Akiva decides. “We try not to get too swept away by everything. The main thing we do is concentrate on making each other laugh. That’s top of our To-Do right now.”

Incredibad is out now.
Lonely Island YouTube

No comments: