He stayed

Chad Daniels lives in Minnesota, which is also where he grew up. He has been asked about that enough times to have an answer ready: Coming off the road and going to an apartment in L.A. or New York seems very sad to me.

He started in 1998 at an open mic at ACME Comedy Company in Minneapolis. Within the year he had the house emcee job at the Westward Ho in Grand Forks, North Dakota, hosting six shows a week.

Since then, eight albums, three of them Billboard comedy top ten — Footprints on the Moon at No. 2 in 2017, Dad Chaniels at No. 6 in 2019, Natural Selection at No. 7 in 2014. Combined, his albums have over one billion streams. Empty Nester premiered on Netflix in 2024. For Reels, the newest hour, came in 2025.

His television debut was with Craig Kilborn in 2004, followed by Live at Gotham in 2006 and a Comedy Central Presents half hour in 2008. He did The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, Conan in 2012, 2014 and 2018, @midnight with Chris Hardwick in 2015, and its successor After Midnight in 2024. In 2009 he did The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien, one of thirteen comics to appear during that run.

Along the way: a Laugh Riots finalist in 2003, Just for Laughs in Montreal in 2004 and again in 2012, City Pages Artist of the Year in 2009, the grand prize at Gilda's LaughFest in 2012, and named Comics' Comic at Aspen. In 2020 Vulture called him one of the great unsung American comedians.

The material turned when he started talking about being a father. He clears it with his kids before it goes on stage.

He co-hosts two weekly podcasts: Pretend Problems with Kelsey Cook, and Middle of Somewhere with Cy Amundson.