Gregg Turkington: Cutting-edge comedy

Gregg Turkington is a Swiss army knife of comedy. Neil Hamburger is the blade.

Your humble scribe is not the equal of those who routinely pen lacerating smartassery in acid quips about the fulsome awfulness of Hamburger’s comedy.

We also resist the pity that would normally accompany our beholding such epic sloth and awkwardness. We long to offer a lozenge for that phlegm-filled throat, a tissue for those clogged sinuses, Milk of Magnesia for what appear to be painful stomach ulcers, and a comb, or maybe hedge clippers, for those forsaken locks.

We brace ourselves, firmly, for his onslaught of terrible puns, groan-inspiring one-liners, misanthropic bon mots, and, heaven help us, “knock-knock” jokes, even while hammering our big, imaginary gong because, of course, we wouldn’t miss it.

A Hamburger show is as transfixing as a train wreck. It’s an outsized, multi-faceted pile of contorted genius. His jokes have pilloried easy targets like Ted Nugent, the Beach Boys’ Mike Love, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Aerosmith and Iron Maiden. “What’s the only thing worse than police brutality? The Police discography.”

Yet they frequently hold barbed social commentary or a cause for self-reflection. Prepare to keep the mental lights on while groaning.

Hamburger is a contrivance of Turkington. The Hamburger character first emerged on a self-produced 1992 recording, “Great Phone Calls,” featuring a dozen tracks of crank phone calls of his own creation. As we would say in the podcast age, “It blew up.”

Two compilations of country “hits” became his best-known Hamburger recordings. His 2008 release, “Neil Hamburger Sings Country Winners” includes original compositions along with covers of popular genre-spanners like “Midnight Cowboy,” “Crazy on You,” “Standing on the Corner” and “Homeward Bound.” The recording is still available on cassette as well as LP and download.

Turkington’s label at the time, and for a few releases since, was Drag City, an edgy, Chicago outfit best known for its post-punk and indie music stable including Stereolab, Bonnie Prince Billy, Pavement and the Silver Jews.

But the label also waxed Fred Armisen and Andy Kaufman, so they had an ear for smart, quirky comedy, and Turkington/Hamburger’s country-seasoned tracks fit neatly into then-trendy “Alt.Country” ears.

Drag City’s connections in the industry resulted in a far better, tighter backing band than we might expect for Hamburger’s funny business, but the contrast between the inspired musicianship and the offbeat singing made “Neil Hamburger Sings Country Winners” an underground-insider hit.

In all, Turkington/Hamburger features on 46 recordings, including some with several bands he belonged to. His agile wit has sustained a sizeable audience for his social satire. While Drag City has continued to move his product, more recently he’s recorded with Third Man label, headed by Jack White of the White Stripes. Third Man is also home to Dave Chappelle, Rory Scovel, Stephen Colbert and Conan O’Brien.

Turkington was born to American parents in Australia and grew up in Arizona and San Francisco. The Arizona experience surfaced in his first claim to notoriety, a ‘zine called “Breakfast Without Meat.” The Meat Puppets’ Derrick Bostrom was a frequent contributor.

By 2006 he was a popular guest on underground internet talk shows, including Tom Green’s House Tonight, and he started his own talk show, “Poolside Chats,” on Tomgreen.com. Among guests were Buzz Osborne of the Melvins and Kyle Gass of Tenacious D.

The following year he toured with Tenacious D, and, while that led to a performance at Madison Square Garden, he left the tour when audiences in the UK began booing and heckling him. They have since embraced his peculiarity.

Turkington found his largest, most devoted audience in the 13- season run of “On Cinema at the Cinema,” a satiric web series with Tim Heidecker. The show was among the first picked up by Adult Swim, where it found a much broader audience for its passive- snark send-up of know-it-all movie critics. Imagine an edgier, more culturally relevant “Between Two Ferns.” Turkington, as a character named “Gregg Turkington,” undermined every expectation of a movie critic, while exaggerating all of the affectations.

The most recent exciting development in Turkington’s acting career was a movie role as Hamburger in the film, “Fremont,” which debuted this year at the Sundance Film Festival. A dramatic tale about an Afghan refugee finding her way in America as a fortune cookie fortune writer, the story is rich with unique characters. So far, it’s earned a 95% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Neil Hamburger, 8 p.m. Friday, May 19, 191 Toole, 191 E. Toole Avenue, 191toole.com, $25

MORE COMEDY THIS WEEK

Coyote Trail Stage, 8000 N. Silverbell Road, maranalaughs.com/shop, 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 12, tickets start at $10, Marana Laughs Clean Comedy, Brian Kohatsu, family-friendly with a playful knowledge of pop culture.

Laff’s Comedy Caffe, 2900 E. Broadway Boulevard, laffstucson.com, $15, $20 preferred seating, 8 p.m. and 10:30 p.m. Friday, May 12, and 7 and 9:30 p.m. Saturday, May 13, Justin Berkman, a smart comic with original ideas and a busy passport

The Screening Room, 127 E. Congress Street, screeningroomdowntown.com, 7 p.m. Tuesday, May 9, $10; Daniel Eachus, a finalist in Comedy Central’s “Up Next” with a Dry Bar special, “A Mild and Skinny Guy”

The Screening Room, 127 E. Congress Street, screeningroomdowntown.com, 10 p.m. Friday, May 12, tickets start at $25 advance; as seen on Comedy Central, Graham Elwood talks politics; Shishonia Livingston opens.

Spark Project Collective Event Center, 4433 E. Broadway Boulevard, 6:30 signup, 7 p.m. start, free, Ernie Celaya hosts. This will be the last monthly mic at Spark.

Surly Wench Pub, 424 N. Fourth Avenue, surlywenchpub.com, 6 p.m. Sunday, May 14, $8 advance, $10 door, Wench Comedy’s seventh anniversary showcase for Mother’s Day: Phoenix comic Leslie Barton headlines, Steven Black guests, Maggie O’ Shea, Cindell Hanson, Amber Frame and Nicolette DiMaggio round out the bill, Roxy Merrari hosts.

Tucson Improv Movement/TIM Comedy Theatre, 414 E. Ninth Street, tucsonimprov.com, $7 each show, $10 for both shows, same night, free jam and open mic.7:30 p.m. Thursday, May 11, “Cage Match;” 8:30 p.m. Open Mic.; 6:30 p.m. Friday, May 12, Improv Jam; 7:30 p.m. “The Soapbox;” 9 p.m. “Improv v. Standup;” 7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 13, “Your Favorite Movie Improvised” and “The Meeting;” 9 p.m. “Fourth Avenue Confessions”

Unscrewed Theater, 4500 E. Speedway Boulevard, unscrewedtheatre.org, $8, live or remote, $5 kids. 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 12, Family-Friendly Improv; 9 p.m. Unscrewed Fridays After Dark (pay what you will); 7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 13, Family Friendly Improv; 9 p.m. Uncensored Improv Comedy with house teams Not Burnt Out Just Unscrewed and The Big Daddies

Vail Theatre of the Arts, 10701 E. Mary Ann Cleveland Way, vaillaughs.com, 7 p.m. Saturday, May 13, Vail Laughs Clean Comedy, Brian Kohatsu, tickets start at $10, Brian Kohatsu

This article appears in May 11-17, 2023.