World of Weird Al Yankovic

Journal[/i]"]Weird Al Yankovic and his parodies of rock just don't roll
01:00 AM EDT on Saturday, August 30, 2003

BY RICK MASSIMO
Journal Staff Writer


WOODSTOCK, Conn. -- Legend has it that President Dwight D. Eisenhower once read halfway through a parody of one of his speeches before he realized that it wasn't the real thing. Whether that's true or not, that's what parody is all about.

Weird Al Yankovic doesn't get that. Hasn't for decades. That's why his records, and most of his first show last night at the Woodstock Fair, have never provoked more than some amusement, even among those who call themselves his biggest fans.

Weird Al has made a career out of making fun of hit songs, with authorized parodies such as "Eat It" (tweaking Michael Jackson's "Beat It") and combining the Dire Straits song "Money for Nothing" with the lyrics of The Beverly Hillbillies theme. He did both of them last night. Clever, sure, and in the case of "Eat It," amusingly theatrical, as he wore an exaggerated fat suit. But to what end? He's gleefully pulling the nose of the excesses of rock and pop music, but what is he suggesting we replace them with? Mere amusement? Doesn't seem like a fair trade.

Sure, he's clever, and sure, everybody loves a clown, as Gary Lewis and the Playboys sang, but Spinal Tap showed us that if one wants to parody rock, one must rock. On record, Weird Al doesn't rock. His voice doesn't rock. His band doesn't rock (they may know the chords to the songs they're spoofing, but everything ends up sounding the same -- the overcaffeinated, early-'80s non-grooving similar to the "New Wave" stuff they used to play on Square Pegs.

I was hoping that maybe, in a more live setting, banging away in front of a raucous audience, Al and pals would show the kind of chops that would at least fool ol' Ike. Once in a while, they did, particularly on the original "I Want 2 B Ur Lover," an original parodying no particular song but the quiet storm soul style ("Baby, your eyes are bluer than the water in my toilet") and "Spider-Man" (a parody of Billy Joel's "Piano Man"), where Yankovic turned his trademark whine into, respectively, a decent falsetto and a frayed-at-the-edges shout. Made me wonder what it would sound like to hear Weird Al tear into some tune after a four-day bender. Interesting thought, which sustained me through one of the seemingly hundreds of interminable costume changes, covered with intermittently amusing video interludes.

Unfortunately, there were only a couple such moments. The order of the day, clearly, was to keep the band's sound reined in and Al's voice in the forefront, the better to amuse everyone with a hyperclear, easily grasped enunciation of the lyrics.

The crowd overflowed the small outdoor stage, and clearly enjoyed the show, as more than a few fans knew enough words to sing along, but with merely smirking -- there's that word again -- amusement. Better to take rock, rap and pop as they are, with their silly excesses and their transcendent moments, than smart-aleck imitations. The late critic Lester Bangs once lamented about music that takes emotion out of the room rather than putting it in. He was talking about cooler-than-thou New Wave, but if he had ever heard Weird Al Yankovic, he'd put him in the same tank.

The fair continues today, with entertainment tonight by the Marvellettes, the Platters, the Coasters and the Drifters, tomorrow with the Fifth Dimension and Monday with Lee Greenwood.

The order of the day, clearly, was to keep the band's sound reined in and Al's voice in the forefront, the better to amuse everyone with a hyperclear, easily grasped enunciation of the lyrics.