Marc Maron's WTF podcast is one of the essentials out there to listen to, and at first the reason is because of the guests of a wide variety (not just comedians, in the years since it's been on he's also had serious actors like Bryan Cranston and music people like Iggy Pop) - and over time, Maron himself can grow on the open listener. He talks about himself and things going on in his life in the opening segments of the podcast, and sometimes you'll want to skip over these parts because of the neurotic takes on life and the past and family and relationships... other times, it can be very funny and incisive and, for me, Maron has become like one of those radio personalities you can't turn off. You want to hear what he says next, as neurotic it can get it's always interesting.Maron's stand-up is like that as well, though there is a focus to it if you can pay attention. He appears to just be 'winging-it' in a way, like he just came off the street and is rolling off things in his head. They might be funny, or they might not be so much. But he's really a pro, he's been at it since the 80s, and his humor really does work: he talks about buying obscure records, about the awkward-times on a morning radio show; about the time he spends with his girlfriend and the frustration that comes (from himself, as he coins a phrase "dude brood"); and trying to just live life without worry. Which is hard.Probably the funniest is how he is so self-reflective and can find the hardcore pain in the comedy of his situations... or, no, the other way around, maybe, you get the idea. When he tells the story, which he's said many times on his podcast, about failing to catch the baseball, he knows how stupid it was, or that it was just very real. But there's humor there, there's a humorous side. Or he sees the side of the pain and terrors that are/were maybe, not really, as severe as they might have seen at the time. He also has a good intimate way of showing this to the audience, which is a small comedy club sized one, not a stadium or big arena like a lot of stand-up comedy concert movies. By the end they, as us, will know Maron a little better, and Maron may know himself a little better too.Or not. All the same, Maron's observations, scathing wit and power to poke and prod himself and find the absurdity in it makes Thinky Pain a worthwhile watch. I certainly want to see more stand-up from him now that I've got this taste... though on the other hand, you may wonder if there is much more than this. He lays so much here that it's crazy - or even funnier - to think there's more neuroses to un-Earth.

I just finished watching this on Netflix. A few months ago a roommate added HBO GO to the "options" in the living room, and after catching up with the last few years of surprisingly good HBO programming (Boardwalk Empire, Trailer Park Boys, and True Detective).And then one day I saw a comedy series menu thumbnail with the name MARON in it. It was his HBO series that details a fictionalized version of his real life late-stage comedy success as a pod-cast recorder in his garage, bumbling through this all-too-relatable existential single male Gen-x crisis (even at age 27, I somehow relate to most of it), played out as though direction for the show came directly from his stream of consciousness.I returned to Netflix after a few weeks of not watching much/any TV, I saw this new stand-up special and, never having seen anything else he's done (still haven't gotten around to his pod-cast for some reason), pressed play. Ninety-some minutes later I feel like I'm an idiot for not following this guy for years. His deprecating everyman persona that he's seems to have just decided "fuck it, i'm just going to make fun of myself by talking about myself as if i were alone and in the giggly stage before teenagers fall asleep." Couple that with the guilt of relating to his descriptions of the baggage of his broken-yet-average upbringing, and you would be hard-pressed to find a modern philosopher that can paraphrase so many abstract bits of your own life in the natural and endearing way that Marc Maron serves it up.If you loved Calvin and Hobbes as a kid, never became a team captain, tried a drug more than once, and more importantly over-analyzed a chapter in your past, than you will most likely feel the same way as I now do about him. To summarize: I thought This live show was straight up hilarious, and multiple levels more complex and resolved than most other working comedians today. I think he does an as good, if not better job at relating to his audience than Louis C.K.

Maron has been a frequent guest on the Late Show with David Letterman and made more than 40 appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, more than any other standup performer. Despite this, his name is not one I was familiar with. The face I know, but not the name -- how did I overlook him? Others have compared him to Woody Allen, and some of his "culturally Jewish" humor does have that Allen quality. Is he neurotic? Probably (but what comedian do you know is completely sane?).If nothing else, I learned that prostate cancer hurts the butt cheeks. Now I will not have to go to a local doctor's house and have him put his finger somewhere uncomfortable.

I originally discovered Maron through the WTF podcast - he was interviewing someone I really liked and I found myself listening to it on my iPod much more than once, which I do sometimes when I especially enjoy an interview. Took me a few months to realize I was re-listening to it because I liked Maron.Started downloading other episodes of WTF, a lot of them, and when his TV show came on, I watched that as well. Also watched some of his you tube clips but I didn't think they were that funny. In this Netflix outing, however, the perfectly-titled Thinky Pain, he's straight out hilarious.Everything about this show works. Maron's demeanor, his spot-on observations, his priceless personal stories and the way he tells them, his superb timing, his palpable and oddly endearing angst, and most of all, his willingness to lay it all out there and share himself fearlessly, to just trust that he will be able to hold the audience's attention in an organic way, which he does effortlessly here. Cannot recommend highly enough. Boomer Lives!