Audio Remixer: Peter Abbott.

Editor: Peter Abbott.

Photographer: Vicki Hodgetts.

Comedian George Carlin's definitive monologue was delivered on 1972's Class Clown album in the form of "Seven Dirty Words You Can Never Say on Television." While the majority of routines on Class Clown dealt with Carlin's self examination surrounding his Irish Catholic upbringing, he saved his controversial tour de force as the album's grand finale. The record buying public embraced the album; however, the FCC and Supreme Court held the routine as the epitome of tastelessness, threatening to yank the license of any station that dare play it over public airwaves. George Carlin ran with the torch Lenny Bruce lit a decade earlier and much to Carlin's credit, he put the dirty word issue together in a more concise and universal manner; something that, at times, escaped hipster Bruce. Class Clown was reissued on CD by Atlantic in 2000. ~ Al Campbell

Following soon after the scene-setting FM & AM, 1972's CLASS CLOWN fully introduced George Carlin's brand-new standup persona. The comedic voice of the post-Woodstock generation, in much the same way that Lenny Bruce had spoken to and for the Beats, Carlin seemed to emerge fully formed with this album, as if his earlier transitional efforts and his previous life as a mainstream Vegas-style comic had never existed.

The difference this time out is that the material on CLASS CLOWN is far more personal and observational than anything he had previously attempted, not to mention much funnier. Although the epic, career-defining "Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television" is the album's most famous routine by far, "Class Clown," riffing on Carlin's life in Catholic school, is one of his most consistently hilarious segments. Carlin continues the theme later in the record, meandering through other religious topics in a tone more gently questioning than openly antagonistic. Besides being a huge seller and a popular discovery for generations of misfit teenagers to come, CLASS CLOWN is one of the finest standup comedy albums of all time.

Alternative Press (12/00, p.128) - Included in AP's "10 Essential Comedy Albums" - "...[He] sounds relaxed and smooth here...the fact remains - Carlin is funny because what he says is (mostly) true..."