He has performance dates this coming February and March, so I assume. Unless he’s doing zombie schtick now.
And he IS pretty old now. The most recent picture I can find on Google Images is here.
Didn’t **The Simpsons ** totally skewer Mark Russell in the episode where Lisa won the trip to DC? I believe Bart was begging him to stop.
Here is the summary from www.snpp.com:
Much more potent and clever than either Russell or Capitol Steps were the Foremen when Roy Zimmerman was writing their songs. Even their topical stuff – “Firin’ the Surgeon General” (a take on the Jocelyn Elders masturbation flap), “Ollie Ollie Off Scot-Free,” “Russian Limbaugh” (an ode to Vladimir Zhironovsky) – is so tight and clever you can still appreciate it, and I don’t think any political satire captures the early-90s rise of conservatism as well as “Ain’t No Liberal No More.”
My fiance got me into the Capitol Steps, and I am a fan. I’ve seen them perform live twice, once in Dayton where the line “Sam him to Dayton” from a “Lirty Dies” sketch brought the house down. My fiance tapes the Capitol Steps when they’re on NPR and I gave him some CDs a couple of years ago.
I used to like Mark Russell when I was a teenager; I haven’t seen his show in years, though, so I don’t know if he’s any good these days.
As for Tom Lehrer, I keep hearing people rave about him, but I haven’t had that much opportunity to listen to him. I saw Mark Russell on PBS, and heard the Capitol Steps on NPR; where do I find Tom Lehrer’s stuff, short of buying a CD? I know he was active in the 1970s, like Mark Russell. Is he still performing and writing new stuff? If you want me to hear the good stuff, I’ve got to know where to find it.
According to Wiki he hasn’t toured or played live since the late 1960 or early 1970s. There was one exception in 1998, but he is not currently touring.
Most of his best known work is from the 1950s. some of it is quaint when listened to with modern ears (during one song intro he says "I don’t want you to think I have to do this. I could be making oh say $3000 dollars a year teaching mathematics.)
In the 1980s some of his songs were adapted into a revival called Tom Foolery. That sound track is available on iTunes.
Your best bet to get into him on the cheap is find someone that has his recording and ask them nicely to play them for you.
When you stop laughing, and regain your breath, you can buy your own copy of them from Amazon.
Getting the CDs is your best bet. If you want individual songs and a quick fix, go to YouTube. There are a zillion versions of his song “The Elements” alone. Just Search on “Tom Lehrer”.
There has been a show based on his tunes, Tomfoolery, which might come around. Or you might buy the album. But if you;re buying the album, why not just get Lehrer’s stuff in the first place?
I’m not particularly a fan of either Capitol Steps or Russell, but they’re both occasionally funny, just not all the time.
Posted too soon. I meant to add, “sort of like the folks on Whose Line is it Anyway?” The bits are funny but all the songs have the same basic beat so they’re too predictable.
They still refer to him because he was brilliant, and the Capital Steps are just talentless hacks. It’s interesting to see how unfunny they are just five years later.
Your quote above makes that clear. I was born more than ten years after “That was the year that Was;” I was just a kid, but my father had Tom Lehrer LPs (and a working turntable to play them on), and I learned about the past by listening to them. When a documentary about Werner von Braun came up on cable TV a while ago, I understood the whole thing better because of that song.
Likewise, I learned a lot about past popular music genres by listening to Lehrer’s “Clementine:” Glibert and Sullivan, etc.
Can’t stand either of them. The comedy is painfully obvious and entirely safe. It’s the same sort of jokes made a billion times before by every other political commentator. Listening to it actually makes me angry.
Ah, yes. When I went to see the Cole Porter musical “Anything Goes” when it was revived at Lincoln Center, my first thought was "I heard that in “Clementine”.
Anna Russell, who was studiously non-topical, did a pretty good full length Gilbert and Sullivan parody also.
“entirely safe” I think is the phrase that nails it here. I just get the sense that Mark Russell and the Capitol Steps would NEVER come up with anything that might be biting enough to endanger their comfy gigs as the official Establishment lapdog satirists. That is why they are not funny. To be really funny in the area of satire, you have to really push the envelope of what’s acceptable and what isn’t. These people are not ever going to do that. That’s also why NPR loves them.
Larry Craig has a big wide stance
Doo dah, doo dah
Guy in the next stall, his name’s Lance
Oh the doo dah day
First time I laughed all day
thanks!
And that’s why Tom Lehrer stands out. He was singing about the Old Dope Peddler spreading joy in the 50’s. It’s rather surprising he didn’t get imprisoned, given the times.
Or, in “Be Prepared”
*
Don’t solicit for your sister, it’s not nice
Unless you get a good percentage of her price
*
Why the NY Times critic noted that Mr. Lehrer’s muse is unfettered by such considerations as taste.
I could see the people the Capitol Steps etc. satirize enjoying it. I don’t think Werner von Braun enjoyed Lehrer. Kind of like the difference between Stephen Colbert and Rich Little.
Buncha wusses. Try sitting through Air Farce without a straightjacket and clips holding your eyes open.
Bill Strauss, one of the founders of the Capitol Steps, passed away December 18.
He will be missed.
Oh, God, yes! How those hacks have managed to become a cultural icon in this strange country always amazes me.
Stephen Colbert, at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner a couple years back, gave a good demonstration of how to push the envelope a bit.
He won’t get invited back, but it was great stuff. 
Parody songs, of any stripe, are just untouchably nerdy. Worse than getting married in Star Trek costumes or something. And I say this as a computer programmer, video game geek, and anime fan. 