Oakville comic busy with ‘I’m the Greatest’ album, ‘Survivor’ podcast and stand-up

From co-hosting a Survivor podcast to penning songs about former Prime Minister Jean Chretien and of Sheldon from Big Bang Theory to being a proud member of the ‘Hooded Order,’ comedian Joel Edmiston leaves no comedy nugget unmined in his search for laughs.

The Oakville comic has also just released an album titled ‘I’m the Greatest,’ which may be a stretch but the funnyman is certainly in the running for that honour, at least west of the Humber River, with one-liners, short stories and bawdy songs peppering his stand-up routine.

As co-host of Merge Boot, a Survivor recap podcast that was nominated Monday for a Canadian Podcast Award for best TV/Film show, Edmiston also gets to indulge his passion for the long-running television reality competition show.

“I’ve always loved the Survivor series,” Edmiston said, adding that the viewership spiked during the pandemic when people returned to the once hugely popular show and began binge watching it.

“I had a friend who had the equipment for a podcast so we thought we’d do it.”

The podcast, co-hosted by his pal Cody Crane, has a “rising listener list” and just got picked up by the Sonar Podcast Network, an award-winning collection of podcasts that has won 34 podcasting awards and been featured on the Comedy Network and a variety of local and national media.

As to his self-produced debut album, Edmiston thought it was time after a decade performing comedy in clubs around Toronto and the GTA.

“That’s sort of the trajectory for Canadian comedians right now,” he said. “There’s not a lot of people out there doing it for you, so you really have to do it yourself.”

“I wanted to get myself out there.”

‘I’m the Greatest,’ available on Bandcamp, Spotify, Apple Music and most other of your favourite streaming services, was recorded live in April at two shows at the Comedy Barn at Bloor and Ossington in Toronto, just down the street from Winona, a club at Bloor and Dufferin where he co-hosted Long Weekend Comedy, a weekly comedy show now in hiatus.

That strip of Bloor, Edmiston noted, has become a bit of a “hub” for local comics.

Edmiston’s material is more one-liner than observational, though he mixes it up as well, and is often accompanied by a guitar as he cracks funny about Chretien and other historical figures he knows little about “because I failed Canadian history” and ‘Old’ Sheldon Cooper, with that bit ending with the Big Bang and Young Sheldon’s character’s last breath.

He also makes a few obligatory penis jokes and boasts of being circumcised and a member of the ‘Hooded Order.’ “I’ve got a lot of foreskin,” he deadpans. “it’s actually a 24-skin.”

Edmiston also riffs on his part-time job as a delivery driver and living in his delivery van. “Talk about working from home,” he said, adding that his customers have learned “not to talk to me.”

Another bit is called Visiting a Bird, where he drops in on a friend who owned a Parrot. “Hi, I’m Polly,” the bird said. “Hi, I’m monogamous,” Edmiston replied.

Other routines on the album include Drinking, A Friend’s Sister, more Foreskin Comedy, Dracula, Lost Cat, Friday the 13th (and Friday the 13th Part 5), Kids Today, Fleshlight and a bonus track called The Leafs Win Game 3 at the Bar During the Second Show, along with a couple of dozen other bits.

“I try to be unique and do things that make me laugh,” he said, adding that the goal is to “get bigger” and start doing material that is “more unique, at least to me.”

He described the album, which was released October 27, as “fairly normal, down the middle comedy,” and added he also wants to branch out into other entertainment avenues such as sit-com writing or film work.

“But I never want to stop doing stand-up comedy.”