George Carlin Essentials

No other comedian has dissected the absurdities of American culture and disrupted the Establishment like George Carlin. The NY-born comedian rose up from the ashes of the Beat era, influenced by the provocative rants of Lenny Bruce. His sharp, poetic observations were so radical and subversive that he prompted action from the U.S. Supreme Court with his early-'70s routine "Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television". The bit was a potent defence of free speech, a topic Carlin thrived on into his final years, when he beautifully, breathlessly summed up post-millennial malaise in "A Modern Man".