Flight Of The Conchords

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• Genre: Comedy Rock
• Hometown: Wellington

About

With the silliness of elementary school kids, the dry wit of scholarly jokesters and the tuneful talent of parody whizzes like Tenacious D, Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement make up one of the funniest duos to ever come out of the Southern Hemisphere. The Kiwis label themselves as a two-man, digi-folk band, but have musical capacities beyond acoustic guitars and synthesizers. Flight of the Conchords do smooth soul like Marvin Gaye, funkadelic shrills a la Prince, dancehall in the vein of Shaggy, Bowie-esque new wave, freestylin' hip-hop -- pretty much any genre that may strike their fancy. If you weren't playing close attention to lyrics like, "You're so beautiful/ like a tree/ Or a high-class prostitute," you may confuse them for a talented yet confused act trying to find their niche. They were introduced to an American audience in 2007 with their eponymous HBO series, which revolves around the lives and loves of the two trying to make it big in New York City. Sub Pop released the EP, The Distant Future, which subsequently won a Grammy for Best Comedy Album. Their first full-length debuted in April 2008, featuring studio versions of songs performed on their TV show; this was followed by a second disc, I Told You I Was Freaky, featuring tracks from their second season on HBO.

- Stephanie Benson