In just the past year, Kyle Kinane released two soulful, uninhibited and often hilarious stand-up specials.
Yet, for the 47-year-old comic, he sees his exceptional output as just part of the job.
“I have an hour that I present, and when I think it’s at its best, I record it and put it out,” Kinane told the New York Post in an exclusive interview.
“It’s similar to the UK model where you’re like, ‘alright, here’s this year’s offering,’ but while that’s being perfected, the new stuff is in the oven.”
And, true to form, the hardworking Chicago native and current Portland resident is already back on the road after dropping the excellent, expertly constructed special “DirtNap” on Monday, March 4.
As of now, Kinane has dates booked from March all the way up until November on his nationwide ‘It’s Not A Tour, It’s The Job Tour.’
That includes three shows at Albany’s Funny Bone on May 17-18.
“On this run, I’m exploring the idea of fight or flight as a human response to threats,” Kinane explained. “I don’t have that. I always wind up sticking around and not fighting, just being near things that would put me in peril.”
Exploring new concepts is nothing out of the ordinary for Kinane, who sees ample stage time in front of paying audiences as a gift, rather than a burden.
“Every weekend I’m at a club, that’s four or five hours onstage,” he noted. “That’s a lot of time to take an idea and run with it.”
As a result, the bellowing comic — whose gruff voice you may recognize from 2010s-era Comedy Central ads — has seen his act evolve over the years.
“I’m trying to move away from party stories,” he chuckled. “I’m a middle-aged man and those aren’t glamorous.”
While partying may no longer appeal to Kinane, there really is no better party in comedy than catching his laugh out loud act live.
And if you want to see the “Fast and the Furious”-loving comic flesh out his new hour live, it isn’t too late to grab tickets for all 61 (!) of his upcoming shows.
Below, we’ve got everything you need to know and more about Kyle Kinane’s 2024 ‘It’s Not A Tour, It’s The Job Tour’ below.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Kyle Kinane 2024 tour schedule
There will be plenty of chances to catch Kinane live this year.
“I’m not taking a break from something else to do standup,” Kinane said, explaining his humorous, meta tour name. “I’m not a TV show person. This is what I do all the time. It’s not going to stop.”
A complete calendar including all tour dates, venues and links to buy tickets to catch the stand-up lifer live can be found here:
How to watch Kyle Kinane comedy specials
Want to catch up with Kinane’s comedy before seeing him live this year?
Here’s how you can find all seven of his specials.
“Death of the Party” (2010) is streaming on YouTube
“Whiskey Icarus” (2012) is streaming on YouTube
“I Liked His Old Stuff Better” (2015) is streaming on YouTube
“Loose in Chicago” (2016) is streaming on YouTube
“Trampoline in a Ditch” (2020) is streaming on YouTube
“Shocks and Struts” (2023) is streaming on YouTube
“DirtNap” (2024) is streaming on 800 Pound Gorilla
Behind the scenes of “Dirtnap”
“Dirtnap,” Kinane’s seventh special, is an impressive feat in that the self-described storyteller crams so many hard punchlines into his 72-minute set that you often forget you’re not just having a conversation with the funnyman about moving to the suburbs, riffing on “The Fast and The Furious” franchise and goofing on his kind, Midwestern parents.
Still, per usual, the comic stays humble about his excellent output.
“I can’t write a lot of jokes, but I can beat the s— out of one joke for about 15 minutes,” he shared. “I can take one premise and not leave any meat on the bone. I’m punch line flush, but premise negative.”
As he did with his last album “Shocks and Struts,” Kinane enlisted a fellow comic to direct the special. Last time around, it was Jonah. This year, Bobcat Goldthwait was behind the camera.
“It’s nice to have someone who knows the technical aspect of directing and is a standup up who can say ‘what if you said this part in this section of the show?’ because it would call back to this,” Kinane said.
He and Goldthwait were also grateful that Minneapolis’ Acme Comedy Company were so gracious.
“Recording a special where I get to do a Thursday night, two shows on a Friday and record on Saturday, makes everyone more comfortable being in there,” Kinane pointed out. “Then, Bobcat can be in there, I can see how this is going to look on camera as opposed to ‘Here’s a new venue you’ve never played and there’s your one or two shots to get this right.'”
Typically, when all is said and done, there’s quite a bit of mixing and matching from different sets. However, Kinane ended up mostly using just one of his hours for the final product.
“We recorded the two Saturday shows and I think the tape is just the late show Saturday that went so well. I was like ‘Just use that whole one.’ There are very, very few edits in it.”
And while Kinane lovingly rags on his parents over the hour — even though they get their comeuppance — he was quick to gush about how wonderful they really are.
“They’re great,” he smiled. “They come to every show I do in Chicago and they go see my friends who are performing. They’re in their 70s and they’ll be like, ‘I saw Shane Torres is at Zanies. Would he care if we got tickets?'”
Finally, for those wondering, yes, Kinane truly does love “The Fast and The Furious” films.
“I see them in theaters,” the now-mustachioed comic deadpanned. “I love it. People can have their ‘Star Wars’ movies. I can have this.”
Kyle Kinane beard
Over the past decade, Kinane has become well-known for his iconic beard.
These days though, he’s rocking the ‘stache.
“I was so busy with moving, working, the holidays and the beard got real out of control,” he told us. “I usually keep it in check. And I didn’t for a long time then I was like, ‘we just gotta harvest this whole thing down and start fresh.’ This is my whittlings right now.”
“The beard will be back,” Kinane added. “Look at this face. There’s nothing to be proud of here.”
Up and coming comedians
Although he’s ascended to headliner level status, Kinane is always quick to pay it forward to those on their way up.
Over the course of our interview, he name checked Sam Tallent, Simon Gibson, Deb DiGiovanni, Shain Brenden, Sean Jordan, Kate Murphy, Adam Pasi, Geoff Asmus and Noah Watson as comics to keep an eye on.
And if they come to your town, Kinane recommends catching them at your local club.
“You really gotta see them live you got to be in the room with them,” he suggested. “There’s an energy that’s hard to capture watching through a screen.”
2000s Chicago comedy scene
Comedy has evolved quite a bit since Kinane’s early days in Chicago.
“The concept of a standup comedian has changed because now you also have to be a social media personality,” Kinane said. “That means smiling and being in the photos but fans like their favorite comics for being curmudgeons on stage, but then they’re mad if they were rude to them afterwards.
It’s like, ‘no, that’s the person.’ They’re being honest.”
Back when he began, it was all just about making people laugh.
“It was a heavily inebriated scene,” Kinane said. “It was people that just wanted to be really good at comedy. You weren’t going to be famous. And comedy was kind of a dead zone at the turn of the century.”
“You had a lot of people that dropped out of Second City because they saw the kind of pyramid scheme that that was,” he continued.
“You also had this really strong poetry and spoken-word scene, but there’s people that were too silly for that. So then they kind of filtered into standup.”
“Also, mentally ill people, outside are artists types.”
While it sounds like this might not have fostered successful comics, many huge names came out of this scene.
Along with Kinane, Hannibal Buress, T.J. Miller, Cameron Esposito, Pete Holmes, Beth Stelling, Matt Braunger and Kumail Nanjiani regularly performed for free in the Windy City way back when.
“It was Monday night at The Lion’s Den,” Kinane recalled. “That was the spot. There were 40 people on the list for the open mic.You’d get booked here and there but mostly you’re excited about that one. And people were excited about new jokes from each other and would help each other.
I might be looking at it with rose colored glasses, but I thought it was a really nurturing scene. A lot of people were legit lunatics also. That made it fun too.”
If you want to learn more about this freewheeling era of Chicago comedy, check out Mike Bridenstine’s recently released book The Right Amount of Wrong: The Rise of Alt Comedy on Chicago’s North Side.
Comedians on tour in 2024
Quite a few huge comics will be on the road this year to sling punchlines at clubs, theaters and arenas all over the U.S.
Here are just five of our favorites you won’t want to miss live.
• Marc Maron
• Nate Bargatze
• Anthony Jeselnik
• Mike Birbiglia
• Maria Bamford
Plus, since you’re still here, we recommend checking out the jaw-dropping lineup the 2024 Netflix is a Joke Festival has assembled.
Who else is on the road? Check out our list of the 107 biggest comedians on tour in 2024 here to find out.