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LA’s Goddamn Comedy Jam brings a benefit show to Vegas

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The Amazing Johnathan
Courtesy
Julie Seabaugh

LA’s Goddamn Comedy Jam straddles the intersection of stand-up and rock ’n’ roll. Comics all perform a set plus a song, backed by a live band. Creator and host Josh Adam Meyers (Netflix’s F Is for Family) will welcome the Amazing Johnathan, Steve Byrne, Pete Giovine and Joel Ozborn to the Jam January 16 at Backstage Bar & Billiards, with proceeds benefitting victims of the October 1 shooting. We spoke with Meyers.

On future Vegas possibilities: “The plan is to hopefully start doing a monthly in Las Vegas. When Steve [Byrne] started naming comedians like the Amazing Johnathan, I told him, ‘Please God, make this happen!’ He’s one of the first comedians I really knew by name when I was a kid. I remember him drinking the Windex. I don’t know what song he’s doing, but I’m insanely excited to have him. There will also be some cool special guests coming by as well.

On staying sober in Vegas: “The first time I went there, I cracked immediately. Like, I had ecstasy within a half-hour. The second time, I was so dialed into sobriety that it wasn’t even a question. I don’t think Vegas is a real trigger for me now. I look at people who are way too hammered and think, ‘That just doesn’t look like fun.’”

On his strip-club DJ past: “I know a lot of people who work at the Spearmint Rhino. I judge myself against them. I used to be a wedding and bar mitzvah DJ, so if I go to a wedding or bar mitzvah, I kind of study what they’re doing: ‘Ooh, you’re bringing the Electric Slide out that early?’ It’s the same thing as being a comic: ‘I wouldn’t have opened with that bit.’

I’m not competitive, but I do think I was the greatest strip-club DJ who ever lived. I was definitely the funniest.”

GODDAMN COMEDY JAM January 16, 8:30 p.m., $10. Backstage Bar & Billiards, 702-382-2227.

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