Laughing in hell

In his 13 years as a stand-up comedian, Tim McIntire has played every kind of gig imaginable. There have been good ones, with crowds like the one that packed the Comedy Studio the last Friday in March for the release of McIntire's new CD, ''Scatterbrain." Then there are the kind of nightmare-inducing, confidence-shaking ''hell gigs" that no comedian can escape, the shows where the laughs are few and far between, if they even come at all.

On ''Scatterbrain," McIntire addresses the ups and downs of a working comic's life. The bulk of the album is all laughs -- solid material on everything from having kids to the war on terror, killer stuff from one of Boston's most reliable comedy veterans -- but it's the bonus track, the one labeled ''Nagasaki," that's getting the most attention. The nearly half-hour track is nothing short of a complete hell gig. Recorded at a country club function hall in Tyngsborough in 2003, the sounds that dominate the room are table talk and forks hitting plates -- and very little laughter.

''This is not like having a quiet set at the Comedy Studio," McIntire says of the track. ''This is bombing."

So why would anyone commit this to tape, much less release it to the general public? ''You get that little voice in your head that goes, 'if nothing else, at least you're going to have a story,' " says McIntire, of Medford. ''This is so surreal that it's funny. There are many nights where it's just a very beige-colored failure. The crowd doesn't particularly like you, and there's nothing particularly remarkable about the situation -- you just sort of die slowly. At least [the Tyngsborough performance] had the details to make it interesting."

Those details include the rush of food arriving to tables just as McIntire started his set, and a woman in a tank top, short skirt, and high heels walking around the room displaying a shotgun, one of the items being auctioned off to the gathering of big-game hunters. ''My favorite part of the whole thing is when you hear the guy call the toast on the glass in the back of the room [in the middle of my act]," he says. ''That was just sublime. That's when I knew they really didn't care that I was up there."

To some extent, these kinds of gigs are a necessary evil. Comedians need to get paid to survive, and club work isn't always available. McIntire, who cut his teeth in comedy in Colorado before moving to Boston in 1996, says he walked off a stage or two as a young comic. As a 36-year-old father of two, though, that option is less appealing. ''You're there to do it for money and you're like, 'You know what? I could really use four hundred dollars right now,' " he says.

There is at least one positive aspect to logging a few hell gigs. The more experience comics have working hostile crowds, the better they'll be able to keep an unruly crowd from becoming uncontrollable. And if there's one skill working comics need, it's the ability to think on their feet. ''When you get on Conan O'Brien and your first joke doesn't go the way you want it to, theoretically you've now got the tool to figure out what to do," says McIntire.

McIntire admits that it was the ''beige-colored failure" gigs that made him contemplate retirement a year ago. Instead, he decided to cut many of the potential duds from his schedule. ''I was just like, 'Why am I doing this?' " he says. ''If all you're doing is working gun shows or private retirement parties, then it's just a second job. You're sort of acknowledging you're not going to be on TV."

Now that he can boast a new CD, a redesigned website (www.reverendtim.com), and even a new stage name -- he has officially dropped the ''Reverend" part of his moniker -- McIntire is feeling better about his career. There might still be hell gigs lurking, but at least there will be fewer of them. ''I don't know if I'm doing anything that's more likely to get me noticed," he says. ''But at least when I'm driving home, I feel accountable to myself and I feel like I'm doing OK."