The Lonely Island Concerts Setlist

The Lonely Island is an American comedy troupe and comedy music band. They were formed in 2001 in Berkeley, California. The founding and only members ever to be part of the group are vocalists Andy Samberg (born in 1978 in Berkeley, California), Akiva Schaffer (1977, Berkeley, California), and Jorma Taccone (1977, Berkeley, California).

The three founders were high school classmates at Willard Junior High School in Berkeley. After they graduated, they attended college in different parts of the country - however, they all studied theater or film making. They kept in touch during their college years, and after getting their diplomas, they reunited in their hometown to try to make it in the entertainment industry together. They formed The Lonely Island troupe in pursuit of their dream - the name of the trio referred to their small rented apartment in a sea of traffic on a busy road.

Samberg and his crew registered a website where they would host comedic short films they made. At this point, their work wasn’t music-specific. However, the first ever video they produced was a comedy hip hop video titled “Ka-Blamo!” in September 2001.

In 2005, they produced a pilot for a sketch comedy show titled “Awesometown” for FOX, but FOX and a number of other channels passed on the project. However, it did lead to The Lonely Island getting a writing gig for the 2005 MTV Movie Awards. Jimmy Fallon hosted that show. Given he is an SNL alumn, after he was impressed with their work, he recommended them to Lorne Michaels at the long-running NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live. Consequently, the boys were hired: Samberg as a cast member, while Taccone and Schaffer as writers.

As the name suggests, SNL is broadcast live. However, The Lonely Island got their own little pre-recorded segment on the show called “Digital Shorts”. The third one they ever made was a comedy rap song titled “Lazy Sunday,” which ended up becoming widely popular on the internet. It was the first viral video on YouTube in December 2005, which helped the video sharing platform stand out among the then-even competition. Since the video wasn’t uploaded by NBC, however, it was taken down for copyright violation in February 2006, and wasn’t reuploaded until August 2013.

This prompted The Lonely Island to focus their best-produced work on funny music videos, which ultimately led to the release of their debut album “Incredibad” in February 2009. It ended up being a massive success for a comedy album, peaking at #13 on the famous Billboard 200 chart in the US. The band also started doing live The Lonely Island concert shows across the country.

Their next record, “Turtleneck & Chain” from May 2011, performed even better, reaching #3 on Billboard 200; while the latest new The Lonely Island album is from June 2013, titled “The Wack Album”. Samberg, Schaffer, and Taccone seem to have abandoned their comedy music project since (even though no official break-up has been announced) and got other kinds of careers in entertainment since - the most notable of which is Samberg’s, who starred in the FOX/NBC sitcom Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

The biggest hits in The Lonely Island tracklist are “Jizz In My Pants” (2008), “I’m on a Boat” featuring T-Pain (2009), “I Just Had Sex” featuring Akon (2011), and “Jack Sparrow” featuring Michael Bolton (also 2011). The line-up has remained intact from the beginning with Samberg, Schaffer, and Taccone, all vocalists.