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Alfred Matthew Yankovic (born on October 23, 1959), better known as "Weird Al" Yankovic, is a Grammy Award-winning musician, satirist, parodist, accordionist, and television producer. He is known in particular for his humorous songs which make light of popular culture, parody specific songs by contemporary musical acts, or both. His works have earned him three gold and five platinum records in the U.S. His career longevity is notable among contemporary performers, and he had his first Billboard top ten album and single in 2006, nearly three decades into his career.

Biography

After hearing Dr.Demento's radio show (a comedy radio program featuring humorous music), Yankovic sent the Doctor a tape of a song entitled "Belvedere Cruisin'", a song about his family's current vehicle, in 1976. Another song included on the tape which never received airtime was entitled "Dr. D Superstar", a parody of "Jesus Christ Superstar". He was a senior at Lynwood High School at the time, but that tape was the start of his eventual career.

Three years later, Yankovic was an architecture student at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and a disc jockey at the university's radio station (KCPR). According to Yankovic he has been called "Weird Al" since High School and used the nickname on air. Since "My Sharona" by The Knack was on the charts and The Knack was scheduled to play at Cal Poly, Yankovic took his accordion into the restroom across the hall from the radio station (to take advantage of the echo chamber acoustics) and recorded a parody entitled "My Bologna", with a B-side called "School Cafeteria". The Knack met Yankovic after a show at his college, thought the song was funny, and arranged for it to be released on their label, Capitol Records, which gave Yankovic a six-month contract. Dr. Demento's listeners frequently put this track atop his "Funny Five" list.

In 1980, Yankovic was working in the mail room at Westwood One, Dr. Demento's radio network at the time, when he developed another parody called "Another One Rides the Bus", a parody of Queen's hit, "Another One Bites the Dust". While practicing the song outside the sound booth, he ran into Jon "Bermuda" Schwartz, who told him he was a drummer and agreed to bang on Yankovic's accordion case to keep a good steady beat to the song. They rehearsed the song just a few times before going live on The Doctor Demento Show. "Another One Rides the Bus" became so popular that it got Yankovic his first television appearance, The Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder. On the show, Yankovic played his accordion, and again, Schwartz banged on the accordion case in addition to providing comical sound effects. The rare 1981 Placebo EP release of this song has the track "Happy Birthday" as a B-side. "Happy Birthday" is a dark song about the world's problems and imminent destruction, with the sarcastic suggestion that denial is the natural solution. The Placebo EP recording of the song was remixed into stereo by Jon "Bermuda" Schwartz in 2005 for inclusion on a Hurricane Katrina charity compilation featuring various other comedy musicians.

1981 brought Yankovic on tour for the first time as part of Dr. Demento's act. His stage act caught the eye of manager Jay Levey, who loved it and became Yankovic's manager. Levey insisted that the act would sound better if he had a full band, so he held auditions. Steve Jay became Yankovic's bass player, and Jim West played guitar. With Schwartz on drums, the band was complete. Yankovic's first show with this band was not successful at all. Yankovic and his band were the opening act for Missing Persons. The unimpressed audience threw items at the group, and they were booed off the stage.

In 1985, Yankovic co-wrote and starred in a mockumentary of his own life entitled The Compleat Al that intertwined fact and fiction of his life up to that point. The movie was co-directed by Jay Levey, who would direct UHF (see below) four years later.

In 1991, Rubén Valtierra joined the band on keyboards, allowing Yankovic to concentrate more on singing during concerts. Rick Derringer produced all of Yankovic's albums until the 1992 release Off the Deep End. After Derringer's departure, Yankovic began to produce his own albums.

In January 1998, Yankovic had LASIK eye surgery and shaved off his mustache, radically changing his trademark look. Yankovic commented that "Millions of girls actually found me hot for the first time!" Although his "official" look does not feature facial hair, he is often seen with a goatee; most notably, on the album art for the 2006 release, Straight Outta Lynwood.

Yankovic is of no relation to the famous accordionist Frankie Yankovic, but Weird Al did play accordion and sing backing vocals for one of Frankie's final records. Frankie Yankovic also made a cameo appearance in a special by Weird Al for the 1986 Grammys. Weird Al jokes that his parents made him take up accordion because, "apparently, my parents felt the world needed two accordion-playing Yankovics." When the elder accordionist died in 1998, a woman Weird Al knew on the east coast called him and errantly told him, "I'm sorry your dad died," which gave him "a good jolt" at the time.

Yankovic married Suzanne Krajewski on February 10, 2001. Their daughter, Nina, was born February 11, 2003. They also have a pet poodle, Bela (pictured atop Yankovic's head on the cover of his album, Poodle Hat), and a pet cockatiel named Bo Veaner.

On April 9, 2004, Yankovic's parents, Nick, 86, and Mary, 81, were found dead in their Fallbrook, California home, apparently the victims of carbon monoxide poisoning from their fireplace that had been recently lit. The flue was closed, which trapped the carbon monoxide gas inside the house, suffocating them. An hour after his wife notified him of his parents' death, Yankovic went on with his concert in Mankato, Minnesota, saying that "since my music had helped many of my fans through tough times, maybe it would work for me as well" and that it would "at least ... give me a break from sobbing all the time."

It is often noted that Yankovic's career in novelty and comedy music has outlasted many of his "mainstream" parody targets, such as Toni Basil, MC Hammer, Men Without Hats and Crash Test Dummies. Furthermore, most novelty artists are often one hit wonders, but Yankovic's continued success (including a top 10 single and album in 2006) has enabled him to escape the "one hit wonder" stigma often associated with novelty music.

A biographical booklet was released with the 1994 box set compilation Permanent Record: Al In The Box.

                YOU SUCK

Misattribution and imitators

Because Yankovic is arguably the most successful parody artist, songs posted to file sharing networks are often misattributed to Yankovic due to their humorous subject matter. Much to the disdain of Yankovic (known for his clean lyrics), this includes songs that are racist, sexually explicit, or otherwise offensive. A young listener who had heard several of these offensive tracks by way of a file sharing service confronted Yankovic online, threatening a boycott due to his supposedly explicit lyrics. Quite a few of the songs, such as "I Wanna Be a Stormtrooper" by Anarchy Steering Committee, "Star Wars Cantina," "Star Wars Gangsta Rap," "Yoda Smokes Weed," "Chewbacca, What a Wookie", "The Devil Went Down to Jamaica" and several more, have a Star Wars motif. The large number of Star Wars related songs attributed to him is somewhat surprising, as to date Yankovic has only sung two Star Wars related songs: a parody of The Kinks hit "Lola", called "Yoda", and of Don McLean's "American Pie" about The Phantom Menace called "The Saga Begins". There are also others such as "Windows 95 Sucks", and "I Ran Over the Taco Bell Dog". In addition, some of these parodies are only a minute long.

Yankovic cites these misattributions as "his real beef with P2P sites":

If you do a search for my name on any one of those sites, I guarantee you that about half of the songs that come up will be songs I had absolutely nothing to do with. That particularly bothers me, because I really try to do quality work, and I also try to maintain a more-or-less family-friendly image – and some of these songs that are supposedly by me are just … well, vulgar and awful. I truly think my reputation has suffered in a lot of people's minds because of all those fake Weird Al songs floating around the Internet.

A list of songs not by Yankovic can be found at The Not Al List. Alternatively, a list of all commercially released songs recorded by Yankovic can be found on his website's Recording Dates Page.

Weird Al Star Fund

The Weird Al Star Fund is a campaign started by Yankovic's fans to get him a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Their mission is to "solicit, collect, and raise the necessary money, and to compile the information needed for the application to nominate 'Weird Al' Yankovic for a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame." Fans worldwide have sent donations to raise the $15,000 needed for a nomination. In addition to the preferred method of cash donations, many methods were used to raise money for the cause, such as a live benefit show held April 11 2006, and selling merchandise on the official website and eBay, including t-shirts, calendars, and cookbooks. On May 26 2006, the campaign hit the $15,000 target -- just 5 days before the May 31 2006 deadline to submit the necessary paperwork. However, Yankovic was not included on the list of inductees for 2007. His application will automatically be reconsidered in 2007 for the possibility of receiving his star in 2008.

Awards and album certification

• "Eat It" — Grammy Best Comedy Recording (1984)
• "Fat" — Grammy Best Concept Video (1988)
• Poodle Hat — Grammy for Best Comedy Album (2003)
• Six other Grammy nominations
• The "Eat It" single reached the #1 position on the Australian singles chart in 1984.

Source: Weirdal.com and RIAA

Discography

Since Yankovic secured a recording contract in 1982, he has released many albums and parodies. The following is a comprehensive list of his albums to date, with US release date, and highest Billboard Chart position:

Singles

See: List of singles by "Weird Al" Yankovic

Compilation albums (international)

Special projects

• Peter And The Wolf / Carnival of the Animals, Part II (With Wendy Carlos) - October 4, 1988
  • "This warped classical children's record featuring narration and poems written by 'Weird Al' Yankovic and music arranged, composed and performed by synthesizer artist Wendy Carlos". Yankovic's text modifies the original story considerably: "The Grandfather will be played by... Don Ameche! What? He couldn't make it?", while the music features various innovations by Wendy Carlos over the original by Sergei Prokofiev. Side two of the album is "Carnival of the Animals, Part II" which is in part a homage to The Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns, with Yankovic taking the role of Ogden Nash in writing humorous poems about various animals that were "forgotten" in the original Carnival. Parts of this recording are reminiscent of the signature style of Peter Schickele's public radio program Schickele Mix.
• Crispin Hellion Glover, The Big Problem ≠ The Solution. The Solution = Let It Be (1989)
  • Yankovic is listed as an accordionist in the album's extensive production credits.
• Babalu Music! - October 22, 1991
  • A collection of music from and related to the television sitcom I Love Lucy. Yankovic's contribution as producer seems not to extend past the title track.
• Frankie Yankovic, Songs of the Polka King, Vol. 1 - September 24, 1996
  • Accordion and backing vocals for "Who Stole the Kishka"
• Pokémon The Movie 2000 (soundtrack) - July 18, 2000
  • Includes Yankovic's "Polkamon"
• Ben Folds, Songs for Silverman - April 26, 2005
  • Yankovic performs background vocals for the song "Time".
• Sandra Boynton, Dog Train - 2005
  • Yankovic sings a duet with Kate Winslet on "I Need A Nap".

Compilation albums (imports, other)

• Eat It - May 1, 1984 (Japanese LP)
• The Official Music of "Weird Al" Yankovic - June 1984 (Japanese LP)
• The Best Of Yankovic - 1992 (Korean LP)
• The Saga Begins - January 25, 2000 (Japanese CD)

Videography

The following is a comprehensive list of his long form videos to date, with the United States release date.

• The Compleat Al - August 1985
• UHF - July 21 1989
• The "Weird Al" Yankovic Video Library - May 1992
• Alapalooza: The Videos - December 1993
• "Weird Al" Yankovic: The Ultimate Collection - 1993
• Bad Hair Day: The Videos - June 1996
• "Weird Al" Yankovic: The Videos - January 1998
• "Weird Al" Yankovic Live! - November 23 1999
• "Weird Al" Yankovic: The Ultimate Video Collection - November 3 2003
• The Weird Al Show - The Complete Series - August 15 2006

Cameos and special appearances

• Tapeheads - 1988
• The Naked Gun: From The Files Of Police Squad! - 1988
• The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear - 1991
• The Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult - 1994
• Spy Hard - 1996
• Safety Patrol - 1997
• Nothing Sacred - 1998
• Desperation Boulevard - 2002
• Haunted Lighthouse 4-D - 2003

UHF

In 1989, Yankovic starred in a full length feature film, co-written by himself and manager Jay Levey, and filmed in Tulsa, Oklahoma called UHF. A satire of the television and film industries, also starring Michael Richards, Fran Drescher and Victoria Jackson, it scored floundering studio Orion their highest test-scores since the movie RoboCop, however, it was unsuccessful in theaters (likely due to a release in the summer of 1989, going up against Ghostbusters II, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Batman, and more). It has since become a cult classic, with out-of-print copies of the VHS fetching up to $100 on eBay until the release of the DVD in 2002. Yankovic occasionally shows clips from the film at his concerts (to which MGM, the film's current owner, initially objected). To apparently make it more accessible, the Australian release of the film was titled The Vidiot From UHF, a title Yankovic openly loathes.

Directing career

"Weird Al" Yankovic has directed many of his own music videos; Yankovic has directed all of his music videos from 1994’s “Bedrock Anthem” to his latest, 2006’s “White and Nerdy”.

He also directed the end sequence of 1986’s “Christmas at Ground Zero” (an original piece juxtaposing Christmas with nuclear warfare) from his “Polka Party” LP.

Additionally, he has directed several videos for artists such as Hanson, The Black Crowes, Ben Folds, Jeff Foxworthy and The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. He has cameo appearances in his videos for Hanson and Ben Folds. Yankovic also directed the title sequence to Spy Hard, in which he sang the title song.

Notable television appearances

Yankovic had a TV series called The Weird Al Show, which aired from September 1997 to September 1998 on CBS. Though the show appeared to be geared at children, the humor was really more for his adult fans. The entire series was released on DVD by Shout! Factory on August 15, 2006.

Yankovic has hosted Al TV on MTV and Al Music on MuchMusic many times, generally coinciding with the release of each new album. For Poodle Hat, AL-TV appeared on VH1 for the first time. A recurring segment of AL-TV involves Yankovic manipulating interviews for comic effect. He inserts himself into a previously conducted interview with a musician, then manipulates his questions, resulting in bizarre and comic responses from the celebrity.

VH1 produced a Behind the Music episode on Yankovic, however, he was so clean-cut that the producers could not find any of the typical angst-laced problems that make many rock stars' stories compelling (as Yankovic noted in the episode), so they stretched many smaller disappointments and skirmishes during his career into major downfalls to fit the program's classic formula. His two commercial failures, his film UHF and his 1986 album Polka Party! were presented as having a larger impact on the direction of his career and Coolio's later disapproval of "Amish Paradise" was played up as a large feud. Much was also made over his apparent lack of a love life. Despite the dramatic angles given to these events, the special was accurate in discussing Yankovic's life and career and received heavy playtime well after its initial airing.

Yankovic was also featured in a 2003 episode of The Simpsons, singing "Homer & Marge" (a parody of John Mellencamp's "Jack & Diane") with his band. The episode, "Three Gays of the Condo", in which Marge hires "Weird Al" to sing the aforementioned song to Homer in an attempt to reconcile their marriage, later won an Emmy for "Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming Less Than One Hour)".

Yankovic appeared in Adult Swim's Robot Chicken episode "The Munnery" two days before his album Straight Outta Lynwood was released, where the music video for his song "Weasel Stomping Day" (made in stop motion by the Robot Chicken crew) debuted. Along with the "Weasel Stomping Day" short, Yankovic also appeared in another short during the episode.

An exhaustive list of television shows on which Yankovic has appeared is available on his official website.

Trivia

• Yankovic's signature food is a Twinkie-wiener sandwich which consists of an overturned Twinkie split open as a bun, hot dog, and Easy Cheese. He has stated that he has switched to using tofu hot dogs since becoming a vegetarian, but still enjoys them as his favorite snack. The twinkie-wiener sandwich can be seen in UHF.
• As a recurring joke, Yankovic often includes the number 27 somewhere in his work.
• Yankovic says that his favorite car is the Nash Metropolitan, and he tends to feature a brown and white Metropolitan in his films and music videos.

See also

• List of singles by "Weird Al" Yankovic
• List of songs by "Weird Al" Yankovic

Other well known artists who have parodied popular music:

Billy Connolly

Homer & Jethro

Stan Freberg

Maclean and Maclean

Cledus T. Judd

Frank Zappa

Notes and references

1. ""Weird Al" Yankovic: Rare Items: UNLABELED TAPE". Retrieved 2006-08-24.
2. "Laughter is a Powerful Weapon Volume 2: Funny Musicians for a Serious Cause". Retrieved 2006-08-24.
3. ""Ask Al" Q&As for December, 1998". Retrieved 2006-10-23.
4. "A Message From Al". Retrieved 2006-08-24.
5. "Weird Al's shtick still draws a crowd". Retrieved 2006-10-16.
6. "Revenge of the "Nerdy" for spoof artist Yankovic". Retrieved 2006-10-22.
7. "Permanent Record: Al In The Box". Retrieved 2006-08-24.
8. ""Ask Al" Q&As for October 2, 2005". Retrieved 2006-08-24.
9. "The Not Al Page: The most popular songs he didn't even write (or perform)!". Retrieved 2006-08-24.
10. ""Don't not download this song"". Retrieved 2006-09-23.
11. Gina Serpe. "Damon, Diddy, Ponch Got Star Power". E! Online News. Retrieved 2006-08-24.
12. "The Official "Weird Al" Yankovic Web Site". Retrieved 2006-08-24.

External links

• Official site
• Video and free download of Don't Download This Song
• Template:MySpace-music
• "Weird Al" Yankovic at IMDb
• "Weird Al" Yankovic discography at MusicBrainz
• Weird Al Wiki, a fan-created MediaWiki-powered wiki knowledge base dedicated to everything Weird Al
• Weird Al White Nerdy video clips
• I Must Take Issue With The Misplaced Pages Entry For 'Weird Al' Yankovic The Onion's biting commentary on this article (10 Nov. 2004)
• The Not Al Page attempts to list tracks which are often wrongly attributed to Yankovic and discover their true origins.
• Al-oholics Anonymous The largest fan-based site for Yankovic, including photos, sounds, and video clips.
• Yankovic! The first parody web page devoted to the parody king. Also home to Yank Blog
• Weird Al Star Fund Help get "Weird Al" Yankovic his star on Hollywood's Walk Of Fame
• Make the Rock Hall "Weird" The grassroots campaign for Yankovic to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

• "Weird Al" Yankovic
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• American singer-songwriters
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• Parody musicians
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• Grammy Award winners
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• Robot Chicken voice actors
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