Postcards from the Funny Farm

Tenacious D are going to be on Saturday Night Live (it’s a rerun) in a few minutes so I thought I’d write a “real time” review. Jack Black has become one of my most honored heroes in movies and as a public personality. He does what he wants! My admiration for him came about largely as a result of his work with “Shallow Hal” and more recently and powerfully, “Nacho Libre.” For those of you who don’t recognize Tenacious D, it’s Jack’s spoof band. Or are they a spoof?

(waiting for the show)

Show Begins! I can’t believe he memorized all those words. The other guitarist looks like a bald, overweight cop off the beat (pun intended) eatin’ a donut. I LOVE IT. It’s odd though. The song is like Bohemian Rhapsody without a good tune. Dramatic Jack is jamming on and on with a cacophony of words spliced together in what is probably a pattern. There is almost a medieval quality to it, like death metal only more acoustic . . . if that even makes sense.

I think the key to the thing being powerful, and it does pack a punch of wonder and curiosity in me, the viewer, is that they are BOTH totally dialed into the vision of what they are doing. If an act has that, then I say it has almost everything to grab an audience. They just finished playing.

My conclusion? Jack Black rocks. I wouldn’t buy a Ten D CD, but I may rent the DVD. Yes, if you hadn’t heard, they have a new movie: “Tenacious D, the Pick of Destiny.” I won’t recommend Ten D to you as a musical investment, but I will recommend the idea of doing what you want, whatever people think! You gotta take the good with the bad. If Jack wasn’t so successful, we never would have been graced with Nacho Libre: probably the funniest movie I have ever seen.

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