Weird Al's always been a pretty easy-going guy. Coolio threatened to beat him up, and Weird Al just apologized. But when Weird Al produced a much-needed satire of "You're Beautiful" called "You're Pitiful," he blew his top. The problem is that the artist James Blunt approved the satire, but his record company didn't. Weird Al did something he's never done before - he fought back, putting the track on his website Weird Al.com as a free download instead. It's a shame he didn't get approval, because it's a really funny song. Then again, we get the song for free, so in a way I'm glad Weird Al got burned. NPR did a story on the whole issue.
Note: Looks like Weird Al got burned again, because he's no longer hosting the song on his website. Then again, six or seven other people are. You can't fight the Internet, losers!
Trivia: In the video for "White and Nerdy," Weird Al can be seen defacing the Wikipedia article on the controversy with the words "You Suck."
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Hmmm. I was wondering why that song was listed on the "You're Pitiful" album, but I thought it was a single. Too bad. It is a great song, but my favorite thing about it are the subtle parodies of the artists style.
The intro begins with "My life is brilliant", and then goes into a ten second parody of how the song seems to begin and then begin again a few seconds later. I also like how he changes the pitch of a line right in the middle ("You're hoooo-memade star trek uniform") similar to the artist.
It's a shame when the simple little jokes that he tries to do get blown out of proportion.
Thanks for the head-up about the wikipedia article. I wondered about that.
Al did a great job on the voice. It's amazing..it's Al's same voice, but somehow he manages to put in subtle changes that mimic the original singer so well. And the pitch is funny, like when he says "farty-PA-ants."
I never noticed that weird opening to the original song until Al made fun of it.
Post a Comment