I said NC mainly because of Weird Al and because I love a well-done parody, though I'm sure there are plenty of instances of CRAP.

Weird Al is never crap - one of the most entertaining live acts I've ever seen.

This is a tie-in with the “crap interactions with musicians” thread, but the first time I saw the Make-Up perform, having had zero context for how they sounded or looked other than they were ex-Nation of Ulysses (pre-internet, I know it’s hard to imagine), I was in hysterics and thought they were the funniest send-up of white-boy R&B minstrelsy I had ever seen. I said as much to Ian Svenonious after the show and was met with silence and a major stink-eye.

Parody bands, generally crap but a few waffles for Weird Al’s single-minded dedication to the form

This is as terrible as numetal, bro country and instagram rap pop -

Jimbo wrote: Tue Aug 16, 2022 12:51 pm Generally, crap, the joke wears thin pretty quickly.

But I will have words with anyone who speaks ill of Weird Al.

Well said

5:05 for the schtick.

zorg wrote: Tue Aug 16, 2022 12:31 pm I can't imagine spending any money or time on going to see someone do their best Allan Sherman.

On Alan Ross's ... my son the copy cat ..., a parody of Allan Sherman, I enjoyed the song "School Days":



Yeah, but even the novelty of that parody wears thin. Weird Al is pretty much the only person who can pull it off consistently, so Crap, I guess.

Weird Al is an interesting one because he's a genuine pop cultural phenomenon and celebrity in his own right. He does parody songs, but at this point the choice of parody is almost irrelevant because whatever he does it will be primarily identifiable as Weird Al. And whoever he's parodying today, he was probably famous as Weird Al before they were born.

I've always loved the way Ween skips along the razor's edge between parody and homage. No schtick, just a genuine love for the inspiration/source material.

Most full-time parody concepts go from fun to tedious in about 2-3 songs (Mac Sabbath)...


...kind of like listening to AC/DC!

What about ordinarily non-comedic artists parodying their own tracks??

Feels like that's an under-explored impulse. Lotta potential there.

first2letters wrote: Tue Aug 16, 2022 2:29 pm This is a tie-in with the “crap interactions with musicians” thread, but the first time I saw the Make-Up perform, having had zero context for how they sounded or looked other than they were ex-Nation of Ulysses (pre-internet, I know it’s hard to imagine), I was in hysterics and thought they were the funniest send-up of white-boy R&B minstrelsy I had ever seen. I said as much to Ian Svenonious after the show and was met with silence and a major stink-eye.

I just want to acknowledge this story as bring goddamn amazing. Just stellar. Salut!

I feel like Weird Al shouldn't even be lumped in with these other one-note joke acts. Weird Al is miles above fucking Okilly Dokilly.

Most of these acts right now seem geared toward getting clicks more than anything. The aforementioned Okilly Dokilly were blowing up music blogs before they even had anything recorded. I've sort of despised them ever since for that.

Laughed my ass off at a Metallagher show in the mid-2000s, though.