20 Year Itch

Steven Wright returns with a new comedy album after a long time off the record.

After a long absence, influential stand-up comedian Steven Wright has returned in recent years with more prominent live appearances, and now a new CD, “I Still Have A Pony,” in stores September 25.

The title is a reference to his 1980s album, “I Have A Pony.” The sequel, 20 years in coming, is actually very similar in material to the DVD that Wright released earlier this year, “When The Leaves Blow Away.” When similar material is released in different formats, it does deserve a warning to fans, but Wright’s work is so unique in its elliptical path to punch lines that the CD is still worth getting -- if you don’t already have the DVD.

Everything Wright does seems like one-liners, but it’s deceptive, because they all come with his brand of twisted logic. To quote anything on the album would spoil the surprise too much. So much of his material also wouldn’t be the same if it wasn’t coming with his deadpan delivery. But take this one little bit:

“I was at my uncle’s funeral and I was looking at the coffin and thinking about my flashlight and the batteries in my flashlight and I told my aunt, ‘Maybe he’s not dead, he’s just in the wrong way.’”

Wright’s genius is spinning the little pieces of life on their head, and this latest album is even more skewed than he’s been before on record and on video or TV specials. Age has taken him to an even more remote plane, and we’re just trying to catch up.