The thing re Weird Al that I think is worth recognizing is illustrated by the Spike Jones Jr quote “One of the things that people don’t realize about Dad’s kind of music is, when you replace a C-sharp with a gunshot, it has to be a C-sharp gunshot or it sounds awful.“ It’s like really good parody has to do it all backwards and in heels, and Weird Al gets in there and counts the syllables and pours over the phrasing and word choices so that it all sounds precisely like the original, and then re-records the song, acknowledging the tiniest details of the recording, and also makes it a highly detailed spoof of an adjacent and absurdly unrelated piece of popular culture. I think really good parody has a love for the source materiel that’s impossible to fake. It takes real musicianship (or craft) to do and it usually gets tossed aside as “novelty” recording.
You gotta be fuckin’ good if you want to fuck it up.
Al will also try to reuse the original music video sets if they’re available, and bring back the same background actors.
I assure you, in the music industry, Weird Al is highly respected. If he makes a parody of your song it’s acknowledged that it means you have ‘made it’ as an artist. Rappers have commented on how ‘scary good’ at rapping he is. His range is right up there with Danny Elfman in terms of how incredibly huge it is. Accordion players have commented that he’sinsane on the accordion, and does it while jumping around on stage, I may add. He learns from his mistakes and to top it all off he’s a really kind man (I’ve met him).
The thing re Weird Al that I think is worth recognizing is illustrated by the Spike Jones Jr quote “One of the things that people don’t realize about Dad’s kind of music is, when you replace a C-sharp with a gunshot, it has to be a C-sharp gunshot or it sounds awful.“ It’s like really good parody has to do it all backwards and in heels, and Weird Al gets in there and counts the syllables and pours over the phrasing and word choices so that it all sounds precisely like the original, and then re-records the song, acknowledging the tiniest details of the recording, and also makes it a highly detailed spoof of an adjacent and absurdly unrelated piece of popular culture. I think really good parody has a love for the source materiel that’s impossible to fake. It takes real musicianship (or craft) to do and it usually gets tossed aside as “novelty” recording.
You gotta be fuckin’ good if you want to fuck it up.
Al will also try to reuse the original music video sets if they’re available, and bring back the same background actors.
I assure you, in the music industry, Weird Al is highly respected. If he makes a parody of your song it’s acknowledged that it means you have ‘made it’ as an artist. Rappers have commented on how ‘scary good’ at rapping he is. His range is right up there with Danny Elfman in terms of how incredibly huge it is. Accordion players have commented that he’sinsane on the accordion, and does it while jumping around on stage, I may add. He learns from his mistakes and to top it all off he’s a really kind man (I’ve met him).
UHF (1989) Lag Time: 27 years Dir. Jay Levey Starring: ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic, Michael Richards, Kevin McCarthy
UHF. This is either Weird Al’s love letter to pop culture or a love letter to himself. Either way, there are few movies that take on the personality of its creator like this one. No matter what it does or doesn’t do as a film, let this be heard loud and clear: this is a movie that was made for the fun of it, and that much is evident from start to finish. Quotable, feel-good, indulgent, and fun to indulge in, UHF is in a class of its own. As parody incarnate, it naturally sets itself apart from other films in how it looks at them from the outside and weaves together a daydream narrative of overt recreationthat separates what Weird Al does from the crass referencestyle parody of the 21st Century “[BLANK] Movie.” It’s individuality makes it hard to critique. I could comment on how Weird Al is the epitome of amateur acting, caught somewhere in between really good high school drama star and bad mainstream secondary character actor, but this film doesn’t take itself seriously enough to deserve that criticism. I would comment on how the blatant Asian stereotyping for comedic effect does not hold up under modern social grace but this film doesn’t take itself seriously enough to warrant that sort of attention. I should comment on how this film irresponsibly evades writing in a hard lesson for the main character about the exploitation of the mentally handicapped for entertainment and profit, but I realized half way through the film that it was not going to take itself seriously enough to do that. This funny, over-the-top, under-budgeted film could be a production of UHF Channel 62 itself. In fact, there’s probably an alternate universe where this movie was produced as a film of films within a film withinthe film. But under no circumstance is there an alternate universe where this film takes itself seriously. Because Weird Al transcends dimensions, just as this film transcends conventions of cinematic criticism. Thisis UHF.
The thing re Weird Al that I think is worth recognizing is illustrated by the Spike Jones Jr quote “One of the things that people don’t realize about Dad’s kind of music is, when you replace a C-sharp with a gunshot, it has to be a C-sharp gunshot or it sounds awful.“ It’s like really good parody has to do it all backwards and in heels, and Weird Al gets in there and counts the syllables and pours over the phrasing and word choices so that it all sounds precisely like the original, and then re-records the song, acknowledging the tiniest details of the recording, and also makes it a highly detailed spoof of an adjacent and absurdly unrelated piece of popular culture. I think really good parody has a love for the source materiel that’s impossible to fake. It takes real musicianship (or craft) to do and it usually gets tossed aside as “novelty” recording.
You gotta be fuckin’ good if you want to fuck it up.
Al will also try to reuse the original music video sets if they’re available, and bring back the same background actors.
I assure you, in the music industry, Weird Al is highly respected. If he makes a parody of your song it’s acknowledged that it means you have ‘made it’ as an artist. Rappers have commented on how ‘scary good’ at rapping he is. His range is right up there with Danny Elfman in terms of how incredibly huge it is. Accordion players have commented that he’sinsane on the accordion, and does it while jumping around on stage, I may add. He learns from his mistakes and to top it all off he’s a really kind man (I’ve met him).
Buckle up, because the podcast gets “white and nerdy” when Weird Al Yankovic visits the studio. Everyone knows that the Almighty Weird One is a legendary songwriter and pop culture satirist, but did you know that he’s an animation geek who has done voices on The Simpsons, Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Adventure Time, Pig Goat Banana Cricket, Teen Titans Go!, Gravity Falls, Wallykazam!,andMilo Murphy’s Law? Weird Al talks with Hector about his craft, his upcoming projects, and getting the white-glove thumbs up from none other than Michael Jackson.
Keep up with our intrepid host Hector on his own TwitterandInstagrampages. And stay tuned to NickAnimation25 for next week’s episode featuring Avatar: the Last AirbenderandThe Legend of Korra composer Jeremy Zuckerman and co-creator/executive producer Bryan Konietzko!
