Love All the People (New Edition)

by Bill Hicks

  I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you a story now. This is, I’m kinda . . . hanging here by nothing. I’m kinda tired. I flew in ah, yesterday. Four-hour flight, now . . . dig this. They don’t allow smoking on airplanes, right? But . . . they allow children, OK? Now . . . a little fairness is all I’m asking for. Some woman on the plane: ‘Well, smoking bothers me.’ Well, guess what? Ha ha ha! Come here and let’s chat about Junior for a little while. I think I could fill your fucking ear with some irritants, baby. Anyway, I luck out on this flight, right? Every seat next to me is empty. Cool, I’m going to sleep. No shame, every armrest goes up, pillows, blankets on the head, fuck it: I’m outa here, man. Which I love doin’ cos it really bugs the business guys sittin’ around. I actually had a guy say to me: ‘Hey is that allowed?’ ‘No, I bought every seat. Shut up. I love taking 6,000-dollar naps, you idiot. Go back to your Macintosh, monkey boy. Just cos you’re in the sky don’t mean you can’t work for the man. Hey, I think I hear your jacket wrinkling in the overhead compartment.’ So I’m asleep on this flight, blessedly, finally asleep, right? And I feel this tapping on my head, this non-stop, relentless . . . tapping on my head. And I look out of my little . . . cave of pillows, and there’s this little kid . . . loose. Someone set it loose. And out of all the things on an airplane that might attract the attention of a little toddler, the top of my head beat out all the fucking competition. Fuck Barney the dinosaur! Put the top of my head on TV and your little spawn’ll sit saucer-eyed for hours, tapping the fuckin’ screen. I don’t know what it is about the top of my fuckin’ head, little kids go fuckin’ nuts over it. And I look across the aisle at the mom. She’s course grinning like an idiot, you know. Guy next to the mom: ‘They’re so cute when they’re that small. Ha ha ha ha.’ Isn’t that amazing, though? Letting your kid run loose like that on an airplane? And then . . . the kid ran over to the emergency exit and started flippin’ the handle to the door. And the guy next to the mom started to get up, and I went: ‘Wait a minute. We’re about to learn an important lesson. (crash, sound of explosive decompression) Boy, you’re right: the smaller he gets, the cuter he is. Ah, God. Stewardess, since we got a breeze in here, can we smoke now?’ True story. Semi-true story, ah . . . altered times for formal use, poetic licence, in order to ah avoid day work. (laughs)

  How long you been smoking, sir? Fifty years? Did you start when you were one? Did you have like a cigarette mobile over your crib? (makes noise of baby laughing, then crying) ‘Time to go change the baby’s ashtray.’ You look great. You feel OK?

  50-year smoker: Die tomorrow.

  Bill: Die tomorrow? Well, you got about thirty minutes. Thanks for spending it with me. You ever try an’ quit? Right, see, that’s every, I love that. Every smoker: ‘You ever try an’ quit?’ ‘Mm-hmm. I’m trying right now, believe it or not. You may find it hard this hard to believe, but.’ Have you tried cold turkey? That’s the hardest. Yeah. You gotta quit gradually. That’s what I’m gonna do. Quit gradually. What I’m gonna do is I’m gonna lose one lung . . . little while later I’m gonna lose the other one. And that’s it. I got a plan. Dude, can I bum a cigarette from you, man? I’m trying to quit buying. Thank you, sir! Fifty years of smoking – you’re giving me fuckin’ hope! I was gonna quit till I saw you. Fuck it.

  But I have this hope. This hope . . . it’s a hope, really. It’s a theory, it’s a dream, it’s a wish, it’s a prayer, it’s a hope. That if that scenario is at all true when you die and you go to heaven – if St Peter is actually at the gate and he meets you – I hope and believe the first thing he’s gonna ask is:

  ‘Got a light?’

  ‘You mean y’all smoke here?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s why it’s heaven . . . These aren’t clouds, this is cigarette smoke, buddy. Hell is non-smoking. You wanna look down at them for a minute?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘I can’t believe what they do to their bodies. It smells like an ashtray. I don’t wanna smell their secondary smoke while I’m trying to eat. Why would anyone do that to their bodies?’

  ‘God, how hellish.’

  ‘No shit. Light up. Come on in . . . Hendrix is on harp tonight.’

  ‘My man, Jimi! . . .’

  (imitates Jimi Hendrix playing American national anthem)

  ‘Yeah!’

  Man, he’s a fucking alien, no doubt about it, man. UFO dropped him off, said, ‘Jimi, show us how it’s done. We’ll pick you up in twenty-eight years, all right?’ He went, ‘All right.’ Fuck, that guy played his cock. They strung his cock with . . . guitar strings and that’s what he played. Played it with his teeth. Does that make him gay? You know . . . ‘Hey heeyyy all righ’.’ Hendrix language. I don’t even . . . encompasses everything. ‘Heeyeaahh.’ Tripping his FUCKING ASS off. Playing the guitar like no one has ever played it since. Fuck Eddie Van Halen, fuck Steve Vai, fuck these phoney soulless piece of shits. Jimi Hendrix played his cock. ‘All right, baby. Yeah. Playin’ my cock.’ . . . I don’t think that makes him gay. Let’s do some comedy. I always like to add some comedy to my show. Those who’ve seen me before might know that. There’s another guy I love: Keith, man. Keith went over the edge years ago. You know, I thought, ‘Ah, he’s fucked, man.’ Keith went over the edge, and then everyone looked down over the edge, and there’s a fucking ledge and he’d landed on it! ‘Ay it’s a ledge beyond the edge. What a lucky fucking guy I am. Throw down me guitar, got a riff.’ Da dow da da da. There’s a ledge beyond the edge. Who knew? Keith found it. What an explorer. What a fuckin’ bold man. ‘I’m over the fucking edge. Good night everybody.’ Ew! Thonk. Goddamn it, there’s a ledge over there. That lucky son of a bitch. ‘All right. Yeaah. All right, baby.’ What fucking language was Hendrix speaking anyway? Just the all-encompassing positive: ‘Yeaah.’ ‘Bill, you’re talking about musicians who died over twenty years ago. You ever thought about updating your fucking show?’ Beethoven was wacky. Now I . . .

  Now that I’ve been travelling a lot, and where have I been? Interesting places. Ah, I was in Australia. That was interesting. Anyone here ever been to Australia? (audience member whistles) One . . . one squeaking human over here. Some marsupial of some kind. (makes mewing noise) Australia’s really interesting, ah . . . I didn’t know anything about it, but dig this: first of all, it’s as big as the United States is geographically. Seriously. As big as the US: picture that. With as few people living there . . . as are in this room right now. Lotta leg room down under. Apartments: dollar a month. Two-thousand-acre den: picture that. Would hate to vacuum, but fuck, think of the parties. But anyway, the Australians, I found out – this is interesting – were the ah criminal, criminal class of Great Britain, and the Brits, in order to punish them, sent them to Australia. Their own prehistoric, Edenlike island continent . . . bummer! Well, you don’t want to get on the wrong side of the Brits – they’ll fuck you good, Jack. How do you wanna bet the crime rate really soared in Great Britain when people figured out where they were going to be sent to, you know?

  ‘Let me get this straight. You keep the shitty weather and the shitty food, and we get the Great Barrier Reef and lobsters the size of canoes . . . I’m Jack the Ripper.’

  ‘No, I’m Jack the Ripper.’

  ‘I’m Jack the Ripper.’

  ‘I’m Jack the Ripper.’

  ‘We’re all Jack the fuckin’ Ripper.’

  ‘Where’s the boat?’

  (makes noise of boat horn)

  That’s me going over the horizon. (boat horn) It is down under, but ah . . . you just see two Australians surfing the Great Barrier Reef:

  ‘What were you, mate?’

  ‘I was a murderer.’

  ‘I was a thief.’

  ‘All right. Hope we’re not parolled.’

  There are dick jokes on the way, ladies and gentlemen. Please relax. Feeling a little tension in the room here. ‘He hasn’t told any dick jokes. Doesn’t he know he’s in America? Doesn’t he know about our puritanical self-hatred of our own body and its desires, the
only way we can find relief is through the medium of penis material?’ Yeah, I’m totally aware of where I am, don’t worry. The dick jokes are on their way. Here’s the deal, ladies and gentlemen: I editorialize for forty minutes. The last ten minutes we pull our ’chutes and float down to dick-joke island together. K? And we will rest our weary heads against the big, thick-vein trunks of dick jokes, while we sit in our big, cushiony, beanbag scrotum chairs and giggle away the dawn like any good, American comedy-club audience.

  I went to a dance club the other night, very much against my will. I wasn’t driving – there you are, stuck an’ ah . . . I go to dance clubs, you know, about once a year, just to justify the other 364 days of the year I spend in my apartment going, ‘God, what idiots!’ And ah, takes about one day. I have to fill my hump – I’m like a camel. I go to the dance club, fill my hump with hate. I can go about a year then the hump starts to go down, I go back to the dance club (makes sucking noise) fill my hump of hate, and I’m off again. I’m the hate camel, don’t you see how that . . . An’ what am I doing here, you know? Anyway this girl asked me to dance, which really cracked me up. ‘Would you like to dance?’ And I was like, ‘Ah, you read my fuckin’ mind, you know. That’s why I’m leaning in the darkest corner closest to the exit, you know, I ah . . . I’m about to boogie. I’m about to cut a rug.’ But it’s so weird, women have this weird myth you can tell the way a guy is in bed by how he is on a dance floor. I think that’s ludicrous, man. And what does it matter, anyway? You know what I mean? If a guy’s on a dance floor, really getting into it and enjoying himself and expressing himself, what does it matter how he is in bed? He’s gay! Real men don’t dance. They sit, sweat and curse.

  Speaking of homosexuality . . . something has come to my attention . . . that has shocked even me. Now, I consider myself a very open-minded person, I’ll be honest with ya. I think I’m very open-minded. Being a fella such as I am, who over the course of his lifetime several times has taken his body weight in psilocybin magic mushrooms, I’ve had my mind fairly opened, OK? UFOs? Seen ’em! (laughs) OK. Been on a couple. (laughs) Good gas mileage. OK. I’m out on a fucking limb with Shirley MacLaine at this point, all right? She’s clinging to the trunk, I’m hanging by a twig. ‘Come on, Shirley. Take another cap! Come on, the UFOs are honking. We gotta go!’ I’m pretty open-minded – mother goddess, earth goddess, I’m there, I’m with you, believe me, in all ways. Now! And yet . . . something has come to my attention that absolutely shocked me. Have you heard about these – and I know you have – these grade-school books they’re trying to put into the curriculum for children to help them understand the gay lifestyle? You know what I’m talkin’ about? One of ’em is called Heather’s Two Mommies. The other one – ready? – Daddy’s New Room-Mate. Folks, I’m gonna have to draw the line here, and say that this is absolutely disgusting. I think it is grotesque, and I think it is evil. I’m talking of course about Daddy’s New Room-Mate. Heather’s Two Mommies, on the other hand . . . quite a fetching read. I ah . . . ooh, they’re hugging on page seven. Go Mommy, go. That is such a lucky girl. Ooh, they kiss in Chapter five, oooh. I wish I were Heather. Me and my nephew wrestle over that book every night.

  ‘Uncle Bill, I gotta do my homework.’

  ‘Shut up! Do math. I’m proofreading again. Ooh, they’re hugging. Oooh, what’s six plus nine?’ (laughs)

  I just don’t fit in with anywhere, man. I’m watching TV, you know. I’m down in Florida, man, and I was down there a couple of years ago when Bob Martinez was Governor of Florida, you know? And I’m watching him. They say, ‘Here’s Bob Martinez, Governor of Florida.’ Yeah, I agree. ‘Here’s Bob Martinez, Governor of Florida.’ He comes on. He goes, ‘It’s obscene. It’s pornographic. It’s filthy.’ And I’m thinking, ‘Cool, what is it?’ Anyway, he’s talking about thong bathing suits. Do you know what these are? Thong bathing suits? Well, I didn’t know what they were, and I’m watching the fucking TV, and . . . here’s some women on the beach of Florida in thong bathing suits, and over this Bob Martinez’s voice: ‘It’s obscene. It’s pornographic. It’s filthy.’ Let me tell you something real quick: any man that doesn’t want women wearing thong bathing suits is a fuckin’ freak. D’you hear that clearly? Good. Even the Pope was going, ‘What are you, nuts? You can see their asses, Bob. Bob, I’m the Pope and I’m looking at her ass. Shut the fuck up! Do you want me to take this tall hat off, start banging you with it, you fucker? God created that ass, Bob. Worship. BOW to that ass, Bob.’ ‘Poe-naw-graphic.’ That’s what Jesse Helms calls it: ‘Poe-naw-grah-fee. Poe-naw-grah-fee.’ I don’t think you should be against something . . . till you can pronounce it. Is that harsh of me? I think that’s a good rule of thumb.

  Let me ask y’all a question real quick. It’s crude, I warn you up front, but there is a reason I’m asking. It’s not done gratuitously, all right? I’ll do that stuff in a minute. Are there actually women in the world who do not like to give blowjobs? That’s the nicest way I can say that. Did you hear the question? See a lot of guys on dates got their fingers crossed here tonight. ‘Well, it better not be true.’ Reason I ask, I’ll do this one more time. She goes down there for like three seconds and starts coming back up. And I’m going, ‘Uh-uh . . . Uh-uh . . . Unless you’re getting up to put ice in your mouth.’ Anyway, without getting graphic . . . she actually said to me, ‘I think you’ve had enough.’ Really? Well, I think you’re gonna know when I’ve had enough. Yeah, pretty definite ending to this. Fairly cut and dry. Anyway, it blew my mind and it’s all it blew, so I been inquiring from audiences why you ladies don’t like to do that to your guys. I cannot conceive of one reason why you don’t make that your avocation while here on this planet. Why don’t you wanna do that all the time to your guy? I don’t understand. I actually had a woman last show go, ‘Yeah, you ever try it?’ I said, ‘Yeah. Almost broke my back.’ It’s that one vertebrae, I swear to God, it’s that close. I think that vertebrae is gonna be the thing to go in our next evolutionary step. Just a theory of mine . . . and a fervent prayer. It’s great, all the guys are going, ‘Honey I have no idea what he’s talking about right now. I think he’s a devil child.’ Yeah, that may be true but guys . . . you know what the fuck I’m talking about. Guys, if you could blow yourselves, ladies you’d be in this room alone right now . . . watching an empty stage. I hope I don’t seem shallow.

  But anyway, I asked the woman who said that, ‘You ever try it?’ I said, ‘Well, let me ask you something. Why don’t you like doing that to your guy?’ She goes, ‘Because it’s disgusting.’ Well, that’s a tad harsh. And also, I might add, a double standard. Cos you know what? I have never heard you ladies say it’s disgusting . . . when we’re down between your legs, gnawing away. ‘Oh, this is so gross. I’m gonna throw up. Oh, don’t put your finger in my a– oh, that’s ruude.’ I’ve never heard that before. Guys, you ever heard that? Ever? Yeah, weird. Me neither, huh. Then again, maybe I can’t hear it cos your thighs are clamped . . . Boy, my folks are proud of me.

  ‘Bill honey, you still doing that pussy-eating sketch in your act?’

  ‘You betcha, momma.’

  ‘I wish your grandmother was still alive to see you do that pussy-eating skit, honey. That is so funny. Your glasses going whicha way. Your grandma and grandpa woulda loved that piece. That comedy ah’ journey under the moniker “cunnilingus skit”.’

  ‘Thanks, mom.’

  ‘No biggy honey.’

  Someone actually asked me once: ‘Who’s your favourite New Kid?’ The first one that dies! That’s the poster that’s going up in Willie’s room. And I hope it’s Donnie, that scruffy little rebel. Hope Donnie gets that one chin-hair he’s been working on for three fuckin’ years caught in the front wheel of his scooter, and it pulls his head off like a champagne cork comin’ out. Pop! Pop! Pop! He’s in the middle of the freeway like a plasma sprinkler. (makes squirting noises) That would crack me up for days. And his parents are there, and they see it too. Oh yeah, yeah. There’s mom, his
mom watches the whole fuckin’ thing with her eyes open like Malcolm in Clockwork Orange. ‘I can’t fucking blink. I’m watching my son torn asunder.’ Yeah, who’s that in the corner of your eye? It’s Bill, laughing his fucking head off. Shooting blood thirty feet into the sky like a fucking geyser. That, my friends, would tell me God is loving.

  My old girl? Thanks for bringing her up, dude. My girlfriend left me, man. It’s hard to believe. You know what’s weird? She said she loved me, but when she left she took the TV, the bed and the VCR. Guess when ah . . . we were at home and she was saying, ‘I love you, I love you, I love you’, I was standing in front of either the TV, the bed or the VCR, and like an idiot, I thought . . . ‘I love you, you big nineteen-incher.’ Thanks, honey. (laughs) So she can’t add. I’d come home, the Toshiba’s gone.

  S’OK that she left, dude. I don’t care. What am I gonna do, get bitter? You know what? You can’t get bitter, man. Just because someone tells you they love you, then they leave. You gotta, you gotta think that it’s a reason that it happened, and you gotta look on the bright side, and you gotta move on, right? Right?

  Audience member: ‘Wrong.’

  Audience member: ‘Yep . . . sure.’

  Bill: Yeah, sure. Yeah, right. Yeah, Bill, whatever, get to the fuckin’ point. No. I’m not gonna get to the point. I’m gonna sit here and ramble into this fuckin’ wall. On the bright side I’m glad she left, cos you know what? It helped my career. Cos I’m driven now. I’m driven by a fantasy that one day this girl who I loved more than anything in the world, and she said she loved me then left, one day she’s gonna be living some day in a trailer park somewhere in Alabama . . . living with this ex-welder, 600 pounds, fur all over his back, drinks warm beer, farts, belches, beats the kids, watches The Dukes of Hazard every fucking night, and has to have it explained to him. She’s gonna have nine, naked little kids with rickets that bring home dead animals from the side of the road for them to eat at night, burrs in their hair, mud on their face, rats laying babies in their ears at night. One night that welder’s gonna be making love to her, and he’s gonna be on top and suddenly his heart’s gonna explode, and she’s gonna be trapped under 600 pounds of flaccid, fish-belly cellulite, shifting like the tides of the ocean as blood, phlegm and bile pours out of his mouth and nose . . . into her face, and just before she drowns in that tepid puddle of afterbirth . . . she’s gonna turn to The Tonight Show and I’m gonna be on it. So you see, I’m not bitter.