Writer-actor John Lehr has been a semi-recognizable face for more than a decade, first with bit parts in Noah Baumbach's early films, later with sitcom stints. The improv vet has recently grabbed some basic-cable limelight by starring in 10 Items Or Less, a funny TBS sitcom which wraps up its first season on December 25.
Lenny Bruce, "All Broadway Musicals Sound The Same"
John Lehr: Boy, that makes me look like a pretentious guy, that I've got Lenny Bruce on my MP3 player, but I do. I got turned onto him in college, and then I went out and bought this CD. It's just terrible. It's a terrible CD. I think he was trying to make some money, so he put out an album of stuff that they thought the mainstream would like. It's just not funny at all. But my favorite album of his is Live At The Curran Theater. I guess that's when things were going really bad for him—this is the story I heard—and his manager got this theater and nobody showed up. They ended up inviting a bunch of homeless people in. [Laughs.] I don't consider myself anywhere near Lenny Bruce, but as a fellow performer, I can sure relate to that. I've been in some spots where you just want to kill yourself. I did a gig at Schuba's in Chicago when the Blackhawks were in the Stanley Cup, and we were doing improv on the stage. We didn't realize it, but surrounding the proscenium of the stage were a bunch of television monitors playing the game. [Laughs.] People were just screaming when goals were made. It had nothing to do with us, and I remember one guy pointing at me, and it was like straight out of Spinal Tap, he just pointed at me and said, "You suck." I thought he was pointing at all of us. And he saw that I thought he was pointing at all of us, and he said, "No you, you suck." [Laughs.]
The Velvet Underground, "Ocean"
JL: I was on a TV show called Jesse. A horrible, horrible show. It got great ratings because it was sandwiched between Friends and Frasier. And I used to joke with people that if there were 30 minutes of black screen sandwiched between Friends and Frasier, it would get better ratings than Jesse. But at Warner Brothers, they have a store where you can go buy stuff. I was so thrilled to be a Warner Brothers employee, to go in and buy cheap Warner Brothers stuff. There was nothing in there. Stuffed animals. Like stuff you would buy in the Warner Brothers equivalent of Six Flags. Just all big stuffed animals and Warner Brothers characters and T-shirts. But they had some CDs, and this was one of them.
The A.V. Club: Have you been listening to The Velvet Underground for a long time?
JL: Yeah, I have. I was a pretty big pothead in college. I still like it. I play it a lot. It's good for parties. The Velvet Underground's good for parties because it's nice cocktail music —it's a hit with the kids. It holds up.
Beck, "Readymade"
JL: My wife's album. I knew nothing about Beck. She was the one who turned me onto him. I think I have three or four albums. I really like him. I saw The White Stripes perform—I live in Los Feliz, which is basically underneath the "D" of the Hollywood sign. So I'm right by the Greek Theatre. I went to see The White Stripes, and Beck jumped up onstage. It was really great. I guess people bum out that he's a Scientologist. I don't know what difference that makes. I've never seen him run around. But he's kind of the L.A. darling.
Tipsy, "Suez Motel"
JL: A friend of mine got me a subscription to the CMJ new-music magazine, and you get a disc with it every month. This is one of the discs that I just downloaded into it. I don't know. I downloaded those discs because I had them and I knew they were like hip, contemporary music. It might be good to have it on my MP3 player. I never listen to any of them.
AVC: So it's a very effective promotional tool, then.
JL: [Laughs.] It is. I feel this obsessive-compulsive thing that if I get a CD, I should put it in my MP3 player, but I stopped doing that. Now I'm only putting stuff in that I actually will listen to. I think we get spoiled with having so much storage space. It's ridiculous. [Laughs.] I end up having stuff that all I do is watch it come up on my screen and hit "skip." [Laughs.] I just hit "skip" over and over and over until Led Zeppelin comes on. I should just go straight to the four albums I'm interested in hearing. I'd like to think of myself as the type of guy that's open to new music, but I'm really not. I like what's comfortable. I want to know what I'm getting.
The Sex Pistols, "Seventeen"
JL: Nice. Great album. I still like music that's really, really loud. At 41, I guess this was a few years ago, but I was very proud to come home and tell my wife that I'd blown out my woofers on the speakers of my Toyota Corolla. I was playing some Metallica, but sometimes I get in a mood where I will play the hardest songs I have. "Whiskey In The Jar." There's a few that I'll just bounce around. Nirvana. Nirvana basically saved my life in the early '90s, when music was, I think, at its worst. I remember hearing "Smells Like Teen Spirit." I was just like, "Oh, thank God!" Right before it, I guess, was Guns N' Roses, too. It kinda paved the way. Those two albums were just like, "Oh, the rock is back. Thank God!" There was just that long period of independent college radio that I just didn't relate to. But I come from Kansas. I come from, like, Molly Hatchet. [Laughs.] I grew up listening to stuff like that.
Alanis Morissette, "Wake Up"
JL: It's my wife's. I'm not just saying that to get out of it. It really is. But I'll listen to it. What TV show was she on?
AVC: You Can't Do That On Television.
JL: Right. Whenever I hear her music, I always think of her on the set of some Nickelodeon show as a child actor. I can't help but factor that into hearing her sing. I've heard her on Howard Stern a few times. She seems really cool. She talks about therapy a lot, which is good.
Queen, "The Invisible Man" JL: [Laughs.] I really am trying to not participate in the "Hey, give me all your songs on a hard drive for free," but this is the exception to that. My brother-in-law has every song ever recorded in the history of time on 10 teradrives. I asked him for some Queen, so he gave me every single Queen song, which I'm sorry I said, in retrospect. I just want a couple of Queen songs.
AVC: So this one isn't close to your heart?
JL: "The Invisible Man" is not something I'm very interested in. But Freddie. Amazing. What a voice. That guy was a fucking rock-god star. [Laughs.] Actually, whenever I hear a Queen song, I only think of my friend's sister. The first Queen fan I'd ever met. Just hot. Hot young high-school girl. We were both junior-high guys. She ended up dating George Brett, who was the third baseman for the Kansas City Royals. Maybe twice her age. I remember her parents just signing off on it. "Oh, it's George Brett? That's fine." Anybody else, "No." "My daughter's in high school, but George Brett, that's totally cool."
Dwight Yoakam, "You're The One"
JL: Another best-of, which I salute. I'm a huge fan of Dwight Yoakam. I've become more of a fan in later years. There's a bar called El Sid near us that has been like putting a lot of music on Monday nights. There's kind of like the mini movement in LA of a kind of punk-country sound, similar to Dwight Yoakam's, but a little rawer. Basically, a hipper, younger version. An homage to Dwight. I'm into it. My dad played country all growing up. Never got into it. Then somebody bought me… It was Noah Baumbach who turned me onto George Jones. That brought me back into country. I love Dwight. I listen to a lot of country now. It brings me back to my roots, too. It's interesting when you're growing up and you find similarities with your father, and understanding the music he liked is part of it. He was a big Johnny Cash fan, and I am too.