What material exactly did Hicks write?

Hicks on the "clean side"? Weird.

"I can speak for every guy in this room here tonight. Guys, if you could blow yourselves, ladies, you'd be in this room alone right now. Watching an empty stage."

"Childbirth is no more a miracle then eating food and a turd coming out of your ass."

Yup, that's Bill! Clean wholesome fun! :D

Anyways: Bill Hick's work was STOLEN by Denis Leary, as anyone can see by actually watching both of their works and looking at the dates they were made. Denis Leary was a very mild-mannered sweatered stand-up going nowhere when he suddenly changed his act and made "No Cure For Cancer", which "borrowed" some of Hick's routines.

Some of the stolen stuff: "Shop around for cigarette types, low birth weight etc." and the freaking out and suddenly stopping and saying "I'm available for children's parties".

The difference between Bill Hicks and Denis Leary is that Bill was for real, while Denis was just trying to put on a *beep* it all" kind of act. Also Bill wasn't just about saying "aw, *beep* it!", he really believed in what he preached about raising people's awareness.

So why is Denis Leary a successful, popular comic? Because there's No Cure For Cancer!

I haven't seen this show, but this is in the memorable quotes section:

Denis Leary: Heavy Metal fans are buying Heavy Metal records, taking the records home, listening to the records and then blowing their heads off with shotguns? Where's the problem? That's an unemployment solution right there, folks! It's called natural selection.

On a Hicks show I downloaded (I can't remember which one, I downloaded a bunch), Hicks makes that EXACT joke, virtually word-for-word (except he says Judas Priest rather than Heavy Metal). I don't want to spark a flame war, I just want to know what the "Leary-never-ripped-him-off" side of the debate has to say in defence of that (I might not even been in the actual Leary show, I haven't seen it, just read the quotes).

EDIT: It's quoted slightly differently in another part of the memorable quotes section.

Denis Leary: Explain it to me. Heavy metal bands on trial because kids commit suicide, what is that about? Judas Priest on trial because my kid bought the records, and he listened to the lyrics, and he go into Satan... ALLALALALALALLALA! Well that's great. That sets a legal precedent. Does that mean I can sue Dan Fogelberg for making me into a pussy in the mid '70s, is that possible, HUH?

I'm pretty sure Hicks made that pussy remark too.

Boy are you PR for Leary or what? Talk about spin. Leary was doing bits about smoking "as early as the 1980s"? So that's spinspeak for 1989 then yeah? Curiously that's the same year Sane Man was made available for the first time, though Hicks had been touring with that material for sometime previously. In reality Leary's All Music Guide biography states that he only started writing No Cure for Cancer in 1990 after the birth of his child in the UK. That's a year after Sane Man was released and in a country where Leary would be very aware of a large underground following for Bill Hicks. Dangerous was released around the time Leary first started writing what eventually became NCFC. Clearly the Iraq war stuff would only have been added by both Leary and Hicks in 1991 at the earliest yet Hicks released Relentless in 1992 and it's those 3 albums which contain the majority of the material for NCFC. Of course watered down with the balls removed.

Tom_Myers, nothing personal against you but you need to get your dates and your facts straight. You were right though, Dennis Leary did not emerge until the early 1990s. 1993 in fact. His angry man act only surfaced in the 1990s. Hicks had been doing the Angry man act for the best part of a decade by then.

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I noticed a few bits very similar.

Complaining about John Lennon being shot and not other people was in Hicks' routine. Leary said it should have been Ono, Hicks said Manilo (although Hicks had some other complaints about Barry Manilo).

The Judas Priest fans killing themselves came up, both of them made a joke about how it was good although the execution was different.

Jim Fixx's sudden death came up in both. Both fallaciously used it as evidence that eating properly and getting exercise is a waste of time.

Both of them had some jokes about how great smoking is, although the jokes were different.

I think Hicks was kind of annoyed that Leary copied his "angry guy who is going to tell you some 'real' stuff" act too.

Personally I don't think it's that big a deal. Even Hicks stole extensively from Hicks. I've seen all his stand up specials and listened to almost all of the albums and there were plenty of bits that I've heard again and again. If Hicks hadn't died young he seems like the kind of guy who would have just faded away.