Saturday Night Live

Loved Tribe Called Quest. I actually expected them to do something even more confrontational, because what do they care? One of their founding members is dead, and they're old enough that they're not getting back on live TV any time soon. Even so, the right act for the right week.

I mean how much more confrontational did you want them to be than to open with the song from the new albumthat's their take on "In the Flesh"? Should they have burned down the studio and murdered people?

x-post: I'm answering strongo. What are you doing?

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that cold open was snl's equivalent of pitchfork's two "sorry :(" pugs, only with much graver stakes

Xpost The song was a great choice.

as a non-American, it astonishes me that this show is still a going concern

― Number None, Sunday, November 13, 2016

In answer:

SNL is like the Tonight Show, or Today - it's a franchise in a non-prime time slot. Whether it is funny or not is beside the point to the network execs who keep it on the schedule. It will probably survive another 25 years because it is super cheap to produce - and what else are they going to put on at that time slot that could draw more viewers?

― Aimless, Monday, October 20, 2008

Only 17 years to go before my prediction is confirmed.

Thought McKinnon's opening, Chappelle's monologue, and the election-night sketch (agree there was some awkward line deliveries) were all great. Didn't watch the rest.

This is kinda rich coming from a show that had Trump on as a host not so long ago. Fuck SNL tbh

SNL is also a network show that is extremely well suited to YouTube

p sure Trump being on SNL had zero effect on the election results tbh.

also at this point I am incapable of having an emotional response to anyone other than Leonard Cohen singing "Hallelujah"

the Hallelujah ouroboros of people covering Jeff Buckley covering John Cale covering Leonard Cohen

@Morbius - obviously it's trivial in the grand scheme of things, but HRC was McKinnon's signature character, and there was even a big feature in Rolling Stone a couple months ago about her take on the character and her future with it. She plays a variation on the same character in a lot of stuff - the leering, creepy sorta thing - but the characters are never as distinguished or dignified as HRC. she's screwed unless she gets some good movies soon

xps DJP - how is it their take on "In the Flesh"?

McKinnon's screwed? She's clearly the most used and talented member of the cast. They're gonna bring her in for impressions every week on weekend update. They routinely build sketches around her characters, I don't see that changing now that Hillary lost.

She might leave, but only if she feels she's outgrown the show, not because the show has no use for her.

HRC will probably be a more interesting character to bring back during the coming nightmare than she would be as president

I still can't stop thinking about McKinnon and Vaughn Meader. this was the role of her lifetime. @iatee, you're probably right, i hadn't thought about that

xps DJP - how is it their take on "In the Flesh"?

"In the Flesh" is a fascist anthem about rounding up undesirables and removing them. "We the People" is about being an undesirable and challenging the fascists targeting you. Both use the same conceit of making a litany of listing undesirables that are being rounded up and pushed out; ITF does it as averse, WTP uses it as a chorus. It's the same issues being approached from opposite contexts.

McKinnon won an Emmy for best supporting actress last year, she'll be fine

impressions are the lowest form of the kind of comedy that gets laughs

not sure that's what she was doing tho, as it would require her to at least vaguely suggest a 69-year-old

IMO all of the SNL women since… Molly Shannon? have been incredible

Baldwin is most definitely doing an impression, one i find utterly pointless give the grandiose scale of the original

"In the Flesh" is a fascist anthem about rounding up undesirables and removing them.

I had to google this because I was like, "The Blondie song?!"

lol okay I know The Wall has fallen deeply out of fashion but come on

ha, i had no idea what song you were talking about either. i don't think i've ever listened to that whole album. i saw the movie when i was a kid though and that scene is certainly memorable. i did buy the disco hit on 45 when it came out.

I had to google this because I was like, "The Blondie song?!"

― Whiney G. Weingarten

same thoght

ah, i was thinking of the opening track of The Wall, the one with the question mark

I at least understand THAT confusion point

Wait, what the fuck song are you even talking about then?

oic

as a non-American, it astonishes me that this show is still a going concern
― Number None, Sunday, November 13, 2016

well, how else is anyone in America going to enjoy a free live show from the comfort of their own home?

SNL persists because it is LIVE. it is written and produced and rehearsed and performed straight out of thin air by real people that have made this their life's work, and they do it all in the space of DAYS. unbelievable! there is a book called "Live From New York" that is a mostly oral history of the show, told by many of the actual people involved, and it is a great book for many reasons (funny too of course) but it illustrates very well the amount of talent, and forethought, but mostly plain old grueling thankless hard work that goes into making the thing happen every week.

it's a live show! how many people reading this message board have performed a live show for ten people, thirty people, nevermind millions of people, a show that didn't even exist days before the performance? a show that will be recorded for hundreds of millions of other people to view and scrutinize well after the fact and forevermore, and you're all like "well so and so flubbed a line" are you kidding me? I can't believe this. I can't believe that one of the top threads on ILM is all about the new A Tribe Called Quest record, and yet their appearance on this show at this time playing the songs that they played is just an unfortunate anomaly or something, as if they are just on another "promo tour for the new record", as if Dave Chappell came out of hiding just to help Q-Tip sell some records! In 2016!

does no one want to talk about the monologue? the monologue where Chappell says certain unsayable things and addresses so many different stripes of people in a way that only a brilliant comedian can in this world? does no one want to talk about the first sketch, where Chappell and Chris Rock lampoon what has been the top thread on ILE for a year or more? does no one want to talk about the sketch about children (shades of wonder showzen here, that's encouraging) where they end with a stark black screen and bold white text: "Our children are watching."?

or the sketch where Chappell resurrects characters from the Chappell show to try and send a positive, constructive message to all of the hundreds of millions of Chappell show fans he can reach, no matter which side of this stupid imaginary aisle they sit on?

does no one want to remark on how the stars of the show were a homosexual woman and many POC (by the way, as a "Person of Color" myself how did this ancient slur become the preferred nomenclature what the hell is happening in this world)

does no one on this or the damn Tribe thread want to talk about what Q-Tip had to say live on-air to the entire nation, the entire world? one day ago?

does no one else think it was admirable for a collection of tremendously talented people to come together and show up for work and try to provide some measure of damage control for this country? and everyone else?

and to try and be entertaining! and funny! not a one of you has made me laugh or smile in the past week. that isn't your job, so I won't hold it against you.

but for some people it is their job, and they did a hell of a lot more work than I did on saturday night.

watching tribe perform "space program" is the best i've felt since the election results came in.

also ali shaheed muhammad has aged really well.

(Ha ha, I first thought of the Blondie song, too!)

i'm just going to presume that nobody read my wall o' text because I'm not a member of the 77 club so who cares, I am a little disappointed that I didn't even earn a dressing down from dr. morbz but oh well.

I forgot to mention in my talking points that no one wants to talk about that Dave Chappell is a black man AND a Muslim.

anyways dope discussion everyone, here's to 4 to 8 more years of the best echo chamber on the world wide web

sheesh

i mean sure comedy is hard and i guess snl's version of it... proves that? too many skits go on too long or rely on cheap pops or, worse, both

also not to be a dick but it's "chappelle"

thank you maura, thought to double check the spelling of dave's name but probably should have gone with the triple.

fwiw i am not here in this thread to defend SNL the television show, i cannot remember the last full episode of SNL i watched and maybe it is consistently terrible but i do understand the appeal of a live show, and i think this last live show that all of these people put on, on the day that they did, is the most anyone in America has done in the past week to try and fix this madness

Can someone explain what the cold open "Hallelujah" was about? I mean, what, rhetorically, was the point of it?

And when I say snl sux, that is in full view of the fact that it's live with a very limited time to prepare.

Mourning.

sheesh i am not going to argue lengthily bcz unlike an SNL sketch, life doesn't go on forever

this was def a sub-par ep overall

thanks doc, your own story of the member of this community presently dying of cancer and so beloved that he has his own birthday thread, banned for being offensive or whatever and summarily un-banned days later for being right(?), as if nothing much has happened, whatever, who knows what is happening in this world, probably deserves to be commented on in your fucking birthday thread(!), but thank you for chiming in and if i may be sympathetic i most certainly am.

still can't believe all of the love ATCQ is receiving on ILM and yet no one on that thread has anything to say about this show beyond a perfunctory youtube embed, how can you reconcile this music that you love so much and the actions that the people that gave it to you have made? where is the support? do y'all honestly think that ATCQ cares about selling records? today?

i don't really know what you want us to say? i thought they were phenomenal. in a week with a lot to process (which, not to assign motivations to my fellow posters, might be part of the reason you're not getting the response you demand) it was a balm, an opportunity for catharsis about what was lost not only in the past week but in the past year.

sheesh 4 mod

i'm not dying right now, exactly, but thx for yr very badly formed concern

"and to try and be entertaining! and funny! not a one of you has made me laugh or smile in the past week. that isn't your job, so I won't hold it against you."

lol, sorry. you're doing it for all of us!

i mean this right here is comedy gold:

"does no one else think it was admirable for a collection of tremendously talented people to come together and show up for work and try to provide some measure of damage control for this country? and everyone else?"

Tribe performance was great - also the last time I will watch this show. Fuck Lorne Michaels forever.

is the average collection of SNL skits really that much better than what any semi-professional improv group would have come up with given the opportunity