Will Jordan: Ill Will

Here’s an excuse for me to plug Gerald Nachman’s essential history of pioneering stand-up comedians of the 1950s and 1960s, Seriously Funny – it contains a concise career overview of Will Jordan, one of the “sick” school of stand-ups and an inspired and technically brilliant mimic, who had his own special corner of purgatory carved out for him when other comics lined up to steal his best bits:

https://books.google.com/books?id=B_Yzl5uXacwC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=will%20jordan&f=false

Jordan didn’t just invent the Ed Sullivan phrase “really big shew”, he invented “Ed Sullivan”, the caricature, more famous today – and more bizarrely endearing – than the real man. This is his stand-up LP on the Jubilee label from 1961, presented by Hugh Hefner. Jordan appeared on other LPs in the 1960s, including Tapped Wires with Rhoda Brown in 1963, but this was his only solo album. It’s surreal and really enjoyable – but I bought it, and you’re going to listen to it, because of THAT COVER, which is a gift that keeps on giving. In your waking hours. In your sleeping hours. For the rest of your life.

When I First Started in Show Business

Somewhere in South America

Ike on Television

All Rabbis Have Perfect Diction

Sammy Calls His Best Girl

Those British War Movies

The Pres. (of the Actor’s Union) Speaks

The Japanese Prison Camp

The German Teacher

Frankenstein

How Sir Ralph’s Picture Got in Lindy’s Window

LP audio & artwork

DISCLAIMER: To the best of my knowledge, this work is out of print and not available for purchase in any format. If you are the artist and are planning a reissue, please let me know and I’ll remove it from the blog. Also please get in touch if you’ve lost your art &/or sound masters and would like to talk with me about my restoration work.