A decade in the past, “Weird Al” Yankovic launched his twelfth live performance tour, which coated 200 reveals over two years. Someplace alongside the road, the pop world’s foremost parodist was backstage placing on a fats swimsuit “for literally the 1,000th time” when he was immediately struck by the need to “go out on stage and do a show like a regular musician.”
Quickly after, he launched his “Ridiculously Self-Indulgent, Ill-Advised Vanity Tour,” enjoying small venues with no video screens, no costume modifications, no props or choreography, and not one of the track parodies that made him well-known. The songs have been nonetheless comedic — “Everything I write winds up a little warped,” he says — however have been unique tunes that have been pastiches of, say, Frank Zappa or They Would possibly Be Giants’ model. He loved it a lot he revived the idea a few years in the past.
Yankovic, 65, has additionally not launched a parody track for greater than a decade, partially, he says, as a result of there’s not a “monoculture where it’s more obvious what the hits are,” but in addition as a result of he enjoys the challenges of these unique pastiches, a few of which take months for him to develop.
“I wanted to prove that I’m more than just the parody guy,” says Yankovic, who additionally co-wrote the 2022 TV movie “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.” The crazy biopic satire starred Daniel Radcliffe and earned Yankovic an Emmy nomination for his writing. (Just lately, he additionally had self-parodying cameo in “Naked Gun.”)
“The smaller tours cleansed the palate for me and were fun for my band and the hardcore fans,” he says. “But now we’re back playing the big tent. We’ve ramping up the silliness.”
(Wesley Lapointe / Los Angeles Occasions)
Now, having proved he was greater than the parody man, Yankovic has re-embraced the entire full-throated “Weird Al” parody factor — his “Bigger & Weirder” tour, which involves the Kia Discussion board in Inglewood on Saturday, options loads of video screens, numerous costume modifications and props, and twice as many band members.
And, after all, it options parodies protecting a long time of pop music: The Knack (“My Bologna”), Michael Jackson (“Eat It”), Madonna (“Like a Surgeon”), Coolio (“Amish Paradise”), Nirvana (“Smells Like Nirvana”) and Robin Thicke (“Word Crimes”).
“The smaller tours cleansed the palate for me and were fun for my band and the hardcore fans,” he says. “But now we’re back playing the big tent. We’ve ramping up the silliness.”
That features reviving not simply outdated songs but in addition outdated bits. “Some fans feel comfort in repetition, which is OK,” he says. Whereas he’ll change up particular person jokes, “we’re trying not to change too much what people came to see — if we don’t fulfill their expectations, they’re liable to walk away disappointed.”
(His followers are dedicated sufficient that some even parody his songs with their very own rewrites. Yankovic is especially impressed by Steve Goodie, who parodied his “Hardware Store” with “Dumbledore” and even has a one-man present known as “AL! The Weird Tribute (and How Daniel Radcliffe Got Mixed Up in This Nonsense).” “It’s fun and gratifying and a little ‘Inception’-like,” Yankovic says, though he has but to parody Goodie’s parody.)
And so band newcomer Probyn Gregory, a musician who labored with Brian Wilson, Paul McCartney, Billy Joel and Eric Clapton, spends “Smells Like Nirvana” dressed like a janitor and mopping the stage as a part of the efficiency. “He’s an amazing artist, but you can’t have a sense of shame and be part of this entourage,” Yankovic says.
For probably the most half, after all, Yankovic is placing Gregory and the opposite multi-instrumentalists he employed to extra sensible makes use of — three of them are ladies as a result of he wished three-part feminine harmonies, however between them in addition they can add percussion, guitar, saxophones and extra. “I needed somebody that could play the trumpet and then someone to play clarinet for the polkas,” he says. “In the arenas, I hear our sound and think, ‘Wow, this is much, much bigger than it’s ever been.’”
It’s additionally extra layered, with all these devices enabling him to “stretch and do songs that were out of our reach as a five-piece.”
To point out off his band, Yankovic drops the humorous stuff at one level in every present, protecting a traditional track and enjoying it straight. In current weeks, the group has performed Paul Simon’s “You Can Call Me Al,” George Harrison’s “What Is Life,” the Field High’s “The Letter,” the Doobie Brothers’ “China Grove,” and even Helen Reddy’s “I Am Woman.”
“It’s a rotating slot and almost every night is something different,” he says. The followers get into it, he says, though when he talks to them about it, he typically finds their reactions “baffling.”
“People sometimes say, ‘Oh, you guys can really play. You can really do real music,’” he says. “What do you think we’ve been doing? Just because the words are funny, it’s not real music?”
Yankovic is a “pop culture sponge” and has all the time listened to varied music genres, first for pleasure after which for work. “I just like to soak it in and regurgitate it in my own demented way,” he says. However he was additionally raised on Dr. Demento, and was closely influenced by Spike Jones, Tom Lehrer, Allan Sherman, and Monty Python. These comedians taught him that craftsmanship issues even, or particularly, while you’re playing around.
“I think that the craftsmanship is one of the reasons that the humor works so well and I think the best parody is material that emulates the original source as closely as possible,” he says. “It helps the joke if you’re sucked into thinking you’re listening to a particular pop song and then think, ‘Wait a minute, these aren’t the lyrics I’m used to.’”
For that to work, the craftsmanship in his writing and arranging should be matched by the musicianship in his band; he hopes his viewers appreciates each side of that coin.
He provides that he thinks he personally has improved over time. “I think I’m a better singer now than I was in the ’80s and I’m a better musician and a better arranger,” he says.
Even with the 4 newcomers, Yankovic depends closely on his unique band. “I’ve got one of the best bands in the world and they do every genre flawlessly, and that’s what helps make the whole act work,” he says. “The core band has been together for over 40 years and we’re kind of telepathic in the way we communicate now, so we’re a lot better than we were back in the day.”
