I've been to dozens of shows at the Upright Citizens Brigade (UCB) Theater, and this was the first one that I genuinely despised. There were times when two sketch shows would be grouped together and one of them was just average, but they were never painful. This show was, most definitely, painful.

The premise is simple; actors improvise a live radio program for the audience. Imagine talk radio but the hosts are actual comedians and not two dudes with smooth tenor speaking voices. Unfortunately, these three comedians were not funny this particular night. The jokes, when they told jokes, were stale or drawn out. Without the funny, this left you with a few radio show hosts who were neither entertaining nor easy on the ears.

The oddest part of the performance was when they brought out their guest, Scot Armstrong, who was a co-writer of Old School and Road Trip. He is a regular performer at UCB and is hilarious. Unfortunately, the hosts asked him serious questions, which were followed by serious answers. His commentary would have been great, if I wanted to know about the trials and tribulations of a screenwriter. Instead I came for the funny, as advertised, and I received none of it.

All of this being said, the two male hosts, who were the central performers, were definitely very funny people. It seemed that the structure was to blame as an AM radio with only one station isn't easy to bear for seventy-five minutes. Instead I'll go back and see Asssscat 3000 or Feature Feature to really get a taste of the talent on that stage.

Last night my lady was so kind as to treat me to an evening at the theater. She was able to get first row rush tickets too! As she pointed out, the gods were with us last night. The show we saw was Avenue Q and it was awesome.

Avenue Q is a puppet musical, that is definitely for adults. Puppets are good for kids, but songs like "The Internet is for Porn," and "I Wish I Could Go Back to College" are not. This unusual combination of puppetry and issues that I am facing right now made the play especially poignant (definitely much more the college thing and not so much the porn thing). It is a lot easier to hear difficult things when they're sung by puppets.

The staging and puppetry was great and singing was very good (not excellent, but it didn't have to be), but the play was just fun. It's tough to be there and not have a smile on your face. Definitely recommended for the twenty- and thirty-somethings of the world.

The Hanging Man, put on by Improbable Theatre, was an interesting take on our obsession with death. The story is based on the suicide of Edward Braff, an architect who crumbles under the pressures of building a cathedral. Unfortunately for him, Death refuses to allow him into the afterlife. This leads to a play focused on a man hanging from a noose (almost) the entire time.

Instead of taking a serious, brooding look at death, the company uses humor to defuse the intense topic. At times it made things more uncomfortable, but to a positive effect. Each of the actors were equally capable and made the performance wholly enjoyable. Since no actor was tied down to a specific character, the different perspectives on death and the responses to Edward Braff's opinions were much more diverse and interesting.

The most impressive aspect of the play was the set design. The set consisted of the interior of a half-finished church, but it made us of pulleys, trap doors and rising platforms to really extend the space. I thought it was fantastic.

It should be clear by now that I was very impressed by this play. It also made me realize for the hundredth time that I much prefer British theater and comedy. If you happen to read this in the next two days and live in New York City then I highly recommend you make your way to BAM and check this out.

This show started out ridiculously strong. Maybe too strong. Manitoba came out and wowed everyone with their music and time-synced videos. They were all wearing identical animal masks (Manitoba's lone gunman brought two compatriats to accompany him) and providing a lot energy. The setup consisted of two drumsets and an everyman, who played guitar or keyboards or whatever was needed. The set was fun and the music was amazing. Easily one of the better shows I've seen.

Four Tet, whose album I absolutely adore, was a little disappointing. It's tough to have a good laptop-rock show. The music was interesting and he put together some nice mixes of songs, especially "As Serious As Your Life," from Rounds. Unfortunately, the crowd was not into it and he could have been a lot more audience friendly.

Prefuse 73 brought us home and they put on a good live show. The set got me jonesin' for a copy of the album, which I still haven't had a chance to pick up. Sometime soon hopefully. Their set might have gotten a higher grade if I hadn't left a little early. Everyone was digging the show, but it felt awkward when they'd have a really catchy break, which would cause everyone to wave their arms in the air, and then it'd all go back down. Maybe that's the nature of these things but it made you wish for the amazing breaks during the still very good set around them.

Joe used to be in the band Joe, Marc's Brother, now he is tenatively the fourth member of Guster, but he continues to pursue his solo carrer. I saw Joe play last weekend at Pete's Candy Store in Brooklyn, which has an amazing concert space. It is totally intimate (holds about 30-40 people) and has great architecture. It definitely bumped up the score.

Joe himself was just amazing. His lyrics are completely human and his demeanor is very welcoming. Seeing him onstage made me very happy. This performance ranks up there as one of my favorite of all time. I won't forget it.

Minus the Bear: Very impressive. I really like their new album a lot and the live show lived up to it. I want to hear older stuff now.

No Knife: Overall, boring. They had a couple exceptional songs, but the rest was very eh.

Cursive: If you've never seen them, you have to see them the next possible time. I liked the show a lot, but it was the worst show of theirs I've seen. Of course, I've only been to two of their shows, but the first one was better.

This may have been one of the last D-Plan shows of all time. They were fine. I really went to see Enon.

Enon's most recent record, High Society, had been in my "record player" for a very long time and I was dying to see them live. They didn't disappoint. There stage presence is good and the songs their energy in a live setting. The only disappointment was that they couldn't replicate the production of the record on stage. Often the mix was not nearly as good as the record, which is most likely the in-house sound guy's fault, but it was noticeable, especially on songs that relied heavily on synth beats. This was only a minor distraction though as the show was a good time.

Too bad about D-Plan as their last record is easily my favorite.