Splitsider

Come one, come all, to the tour of the glamorous accomodations at Esther's Follies comedy show at SXSW. A vegetarian option will be provided. John Hodgman is your tour guide, and there may be run-ins with Kyle Kinane, Kumail Nanjiani, Todd Barry, Gabe Liedman and a male bartender named Dana. You'll feel like you're right there in Austin, even though you are at home staring at an electronic screen and tricking your mind into simulated experiences. Admission is free!

"Finally, Mustard."

It seems weird to have a password to get into a comedy show, but that’s what you had to say to get into RBar in Los Angeles’s Koreatown on Tuesday night. There was no cover, cheap beer, and a lineup of a dozen comedians trying out new bits and sharpening their jokes. One of them was the man I’d come to see, who I will be spending the next two weeks on the road with for his Great Mistakes Tour: Kyle Kinane.

For those who don’t know Kyle, he’s a 34-year-old LA-based comic who’s been doing stand up for over a decade and has had a [...]

“Give me a second with those beers, guys, I’ve gotta go get ice on this buffalo.”

Kyle and I are in Interior, South Dakota, just outside Badlands National Park. The town has 94 residents (according to the 2010 U.S. Census) and two bars (according to our own). We’re in the second drinking establishment of the evening, The Horseshoe, having found bar #1, The Wagon Wheel, to be the blandest bar in the United States, manned solely by its owner, who was drinking coffee and watching Armageddon. Here at The Horseshoe, though, we're surrounded by pool-playing cattlemen, a drunk with a brass-knuckle knife sticking out of his jeans, a woman [...]

Kyle Kinane was on Conan last night, and he relayed a story of getting drunk at home and then calling a cab to bring him to Wendy's. It's both sad and very relatable at the same time, which is the sign of a good story, I think.

“I’ve never been to Sturgis, I just thought I’d showed up at the ugliest gay pride parade I’ve ever seen. Really, that much leather and tassels and you’re going to tell me you’re all straight?”

We’re at The Knuckle Saloon in Sturgis, South Dakota, at the tail end of the 71st Annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. The Saloon is packed; there’s a handful of wary locals but many of the people in the crowd are bikers rounding out a weeklong bender. Kyle Kinane's on the stage, and as his opening lines swing out over the bar to mixed reactions I grip my pack tighter. In the bag, [...]