This be an interesting question. I hadn't listened to him in a few years and didn't even know he still had a show, till a thumbnail of him doing a recent bit popper up in my youtube search results. I watched and was favorably impressed. In this clip he appeared to have recovered his sens of humor, was doing his thing very well, and wasn't yelling and screaming. So I watched a few more of those and got sucked in. Well, guess what. :-0
I won't launch into a full description of what I think of Hendrie here, as I have washed my hands of him and am moving on, but, alas, genuinely funny content is hard to come by. I've tried some supposedly funny podcasts, but they all sucked like a Hoover.
I always feel I have to defend Hendrie on here a bit because he is criminally under-appreciated, and even many of his fans turn on him in the end. OK, that's often his fault - and he does appear to be an odd and difficult man - but what he has managed to do in radio is something unique and puts into perspective the careers of shrewd mediocrities like Stern. I don't have to like him to listen to him. These days his show is mostly technically impressive and gets nowhere near the inspired stuff of his classic days, but the guy is getting on and radio eats up comedy material like nothing else. Where a comedian could tour an act for a year before turning it into a special, Hendrie burned up material day after day. No wonder he got a bit weird at times. Also, I don't think you can have the gifts that he possesses without it coming at a cost, and sometimes you listen and wonder where comedy genius ends and some sort of schizophrenia starts.
I still listen to the show, but not every day, and certainly he doesn't quite have the vocal command that he used to and favours certain voices over others. R.C Collins is nowhere near as high-pitched as he used to be, and he has recently re-introduced Lloyd again, who sounds nothing like the maniac of the glory days. I think he has always suffered a bit by being a highly intelligent man who didn't get a good education and ends up trying too hard to sound smart - a common problem for an auto-didact. He also pulls the emergency cord too often in his dealings with his fans when (for example) he could have handled the bootlegging problem with far more charm and tact.
I think the big frustration for him is that he has never really fitted in anywhere. He doesn't quite fit into radio, because he's too gifted and original, yet when you listen to him on stage he is not a natural stage performer and something gets lost. Likewise, his attempts to turn his stuff into a TV show don't work either. It's no wonder, then, that he has often come across as unreasonable and a bitter old dick, but it doesn't change the fact that he is one of the greatest comedy minds there has ever been.
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