This CD combines the 1960 EP Pieces of Eight and the 1961 LP One Over the Eight -- both taken from the revues of the same name, featuring the original cast -- into one disc. It's droll, arch British humor that makes much use of contrasting accents and class backgrounds. Kenneth Williams is involved in every sketch, but only does a few on his own; on most of the 16 pieces, he bounces off another member of the cast as a foil. It's perhaps not as notable for Williams' own talents (though his send-ups of British character types are accomplished) as the material, most of which was written by a young Peter Cook in the period just before he started his rise to fame as a comic performer in his own right. For the international audience, Monty Python's Flying Circus is the most familiar touchstone in measuring the influence of British comedy predating the late '60s, and you can hear some seeds of Monty Python here, especially in the banter between stuffed-shirt archetypes and loutish semi-loonies with funny voices. Most specifically, Buy British (from the Pieces of Eight EP), in which guests at a French restaurant are offered all manner of disgusting delicacies, sounds very much like a prototype for Monty Python's memorably gross sketch featuring the proprietor of a candy company offering such items as "crunchy frog." Hand Up Your Sticks, about a botched stickup, will also trigger memories of several Monty Python bits when criminals and policemen can't quite get their lines straight. There are other worthy routines here without such specific future reference points, though, like Interesting Facts and Not an Asp (both based around seedy bores who won't leave their upper-crust partners in conversation alone) and Evils of the Weed, a self-damning anti-smoking message by an incessantly coughing narrator. This compilation might be more understated than uproarious, but it has its place as an important source of modern British comedy. ~ Richie Unterberger, Rovi

1		Not an Asp
2		Buy British
3		If Only
4		The Last to Go
5		Hand Up Your Sticks
6		Sex / Send Me
7		Take Over Bid
8		Lost Art
9		Evils of the Weed
10		Night Life
11		Perfect Host
12		Interesting Facts
13		Critics' Choice
14		One Leg Too Few
15		Bird Watching