As America's preeminent inheritor of Lenny Bruce's singular comic legacy, George Carlin has long been the dangerous comic it's safe to love. But as America itself has co-opted the "free expression" Carlin holds so dear, he has become a foot soldier without a battlefield. Sadly, Carlin's new album You Are All Diseased--culled from his 1998 HBO special--finds him crossing the line into near-total social impotence. His take on such "cutting edge" topics as airport security, cigar smoking, and the Clinton-Lewinsky affair couldn't get a rise out of a factious prison inmate, and his failure to find subversion in subtlety is more obvious than ever. Carlin's riffs on religion and terrorism are sloppy, valuing hollow extremity over the cutting observation that characterized 1996's Back in Town album. There are a few classic lines here--"If white people are gonna burn down black churches, then black people oughta burn down the House of Blues"--but more often than not, this grumpy old man sounds like a certain Dana Carvey character of the same disposition. Where's the danger in that? --Matt Hanks
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