Nut Sack (Capitol Nashville, 2003)

Rodney Carrington is raucous, obscene and profane. He is unable to string two lines together without at least one scatological reference. He's also pretty damn funny. The format is the same as on earlier releases: double entendre album title, 20 or 25 minutes of stand-up followed by much music. The stand-up is all about men and women and their fruitless efforts to understand each other. Carrington tries to stretch his wings a little musically; "It's Too Late" and "The Night the Bar Closed Down" start off as standard C&W tunes (and Rodney actually could be a singer if he wanted to) before quickly veering into NC-17 territory.

But he hedges his bets by giving his audience what he knows they'll like - the same stuff they liked before. "Letter to My Penis" has already appeared on CD before (twice on one album!) but here it gets a new rat-pack-reminiscent arrangement, same old lyrics though. "Carlos, Man of Love" is a sequel to a track on "Morning Wood." "She'd be a Millionaire" is almost indistinguishable from the earlier "In Her Day."

You can't help laughing at this stuff, but you'd laugh a little harder if you just relistened to "Hangin' With Rodney" knowing you had an extra 20 bucks in your pocket. Carrington needs to realize he's got a large and faithful following, and they'll fly with him wherever he leads them, but they might get tired of being stuck in a holding pattern.