Flight of the Conchords get laughs, smash things at Radio City Music Hall

Flight of the Conchords took the stage of New York City’s Radio City Music Hall last night dressed as robots, the better to perform “Too Many D—s on the Dance Floor.” Their costumes were unwieldy, and by the end of the electro jam, Bret McKenzie had managed to knock over and destroy a toy piano. Looking fairly embarassed, he and Jemaine Clement climbed out of their robot suits while a roadie brought out a replacement. “We spared no expense on tiny pianos,” Jemaine explained. The New Zealand comics spent the rest of the night cracking jokes about Bret’s mishap, intermittently tossing detached keys from the broken instrument into the crowd.

That’s what you’ll get if you see Flight of the Conchords on the U.S. tour they kicked off a couple weeks ago. Don’t expect any fancy set design or stagecraft after that opening number. Bret and Jemaine have become pay-cable stars who can easily sell out a venue like Radio City two nights in a row, but their live show still amounts to two hilariously awkward dudes doing their thing. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Also: Heckle at your own risk. When one particularly insistent audience member kept shouting for “Hip-Hopopotamus vs. The Rhymenoceros,” Jemaine compared her to “an angry muppet”; later, Bret sternly advised someone else that “This isn’t a time for you to have a conversation with us!”

Even when the Conchords were playfully insulting them, though, the Radio City crowd was loving it, cheering at the start of nearly every song in the season-two-heavy set. Bret and Jemaine finally yielded to the yelpers during the encore, busting out “Business Time” at their request. And for the final tune of the night, they got the entire auditorium singing along to “Sellotape.” My favorite song! Aww. So, were you at any of Flight of the Conchords’ recent shows? Let us know how you liked them in the comments below.

addCredit(“Chris Gordon/WireImage.com”)