Newhart's material consists of him talking to an imaginary 'other person', either on the 'phone or in a variety of situations. Amongst the best are the policeman using the new guidelines to perusade a would-be suicide not to do it, and the policeman trying to defuse a bomb he's found. My favourite is the phone call between Sir Walter Raleigh and his agent in London, about the boatload of tobacco leaves he's shipped over.
The sound quality's not brilliant, and if it were music would be cause for compliant, but in reality it makes little difference as you're only listening to someone talking.
The trouble is, of course, that you can only listen to this a couple of times before it looses its edge, but it's still definately worth getting.
I vaguely remembered, when I was younger, hearing an amusing sketch about a driving instructor and his hilariously incompetent trainee. I tried to find this sketch and did so by buying this compilation from Amazon. And after listening to the wealth of Newhart's classics this is certainly not a decision I regret!
The "Something Like This" album contains two discs full of Newhart's material. Not all of it is likely to be brilliant for the modern non-American listening to it today. And yet so much of it is. The Driving Instructor, Bus Driver School and Ledge Psychology are just some of the real highlights in the anthology.
This Newhart compilation is almost entirely about one man talking to an imaginary audience - be it a bunch of passengers on a plane, sociopathic bus-drivers or the discontented crew of the U S S Codfish.
There are no special effects on these CDs. No on-stage colleagues. These sketches merely contain one man talking to other people who aren't actually present. And yet it works so well. As Bill Inglot says in the accompanying booklet to this CD package: "Bob Newhart had better conversations with himself than most people have with other people"
As I said, not all of the sketches work perfectly - but there are plenty that do and when they work they can send you into tears and outright laughter.
Just try putting this into your personal CD player. You may get some funny looks from your colleagues or bus passengers when they witness your smirking and giggling. But secretly they'd love to borrow one of your earphones and share a chance to listen to a truly brilliant entertainer.
For the price, the quality and the quantity - this is an excellent investment.
