A First Time For Everything

From today's AP article on Chris Rock and the Oscars:

How will Rock know if he's killing the Kodak Theatre audience on Oscar night?

''I'll probably pay more attention to the musicians in the pit than the stars because they're the closest you're going to get to normal people in the audience,'' he said.

''If I can get them laughing, I know I got the whole world laughing.''

On the one hand, hey, musicians are almost like normal people! That may be the nicest thing anyone's ever said about us! On the other, that's only in relation to Hollywood actors, so this may be the very definition of damning with faint praise.

A word of caution to Mr. Rock, though. These are the guys who came up with all those damn drummer jokes.