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| Birth Name(s) : Weird Al Yankovic |
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Full Weird Al Yankovic Biography
Alfred Matthew "Weird Al" Yankovic (IPA pronunciation: ; born October 23, 1959) is an American singer, musician, satirist, parodist, songwriter, accordionist, and television producer. Yankovic is known in particular for his humorous songs that make light of popular culture and that often parody specific songs by contemporary musical acts. Since receiving his first accordion lesson a day before his seventh birthday, he has sold more than 12 million albums (more than any comedy act in history), recorded more than 150 parody and original songs, and has performed more than 1,000 live shows. His works have earned him three Grammy Awards among nine nominations, four gold records, and six platinum records in the United States. Yankovic's first top ten Billboard album and single were both released in 2006, nearly three decades into his career.
Yankovic began kindergarten a year earlier than most children, and he skipped the second grade. "My classmates seemed to think I was some kind of rocket scientist so I was labeled a nerd early on," he recalls. As his unusual schooling left him two years younger than most of his classmates, Yankovic was not interested in sports or social events at school. He claims to have been a "straight A" student throughout high school, which earned him the honor of becoming valedictorian of his senior class. Yankovic was fairly active in his school's extracurricular programs, including the National Forensic League (in which he "usually brought home some kind of trophy"), a play based upon Rebel Without a Cause, the yearbook program (for which he wrote most of the captions), and the Volcano Worshipper's Club, "which did absolutely nothing. We started the club just to get an extra picture of ourselves in the yearbook."
A factual biographical booklet of Yankovic's life, written by Dr. Demento, was released with the 1994 box set compilation Permanent Record: Al In The Box. The Dr. Demento Society, which issues yearly Christmas re-releases of material from Dr. Demento's Basement Tapes, often includes unreleased tracks from Yankovic's vaults, such as "Pacman", "It's Still Billy Joel To Me" or the live version of "School Cafeteria".
Yankovic is the sole writer for all his songs, and for "legal and personal reasons" does not accept parody submissions or ideas from fans. There exists, however, one exception to this rule in the case of "Like a Surgeon." Madonna was reportedly talking with a friend and happened to wonder aloud when Yankovic was going to turn her "Like a Virgin" into "Like a Surgeon." Madonna's friend was a mutual friend of Yankovic's manager, Jay Levey, and eventually Yankovic himself heard the story from Levey.
Under the "fair use" provision of U.S. copyright law, affirmed by the United States Supreme Court, one does not need permission to record a parody. However, as a personal rule, and as a means of maintaining good relationships within the music community, Yankovic has always requested permission from the original artist before recording his parodies. Most artists have had positive reactions to Yankovic's parodies. Several have considered it to be something of a badge of honor to have Yankovic ask permission to parody their song or style, since they felt that Yankovic would not choose to do so unless they were a success or had made an impact on the music scene at the time. There are, however, a few notable exceptions, where people have not allowed parodies or otherwise withdrawn permission.
In 2003, Yankovic was denied permission to make a video for "Couch Potato", his parody of Eminem's "Lose Yourself":“Last year, Eminem forced me to halt production on the video for my 'Lose Yourself' parody because he somehow thought that it would be harmful to his image or career.”
Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page is a self-proclaimed Yankovic fan, but when Yankovic wished to create a polka medley of Led Zeppelin songs, Page refused. Yankovic was, however, allowed the very rare opportunity to re-record a sample of "Black Dog" for a segment of "Trapped in the Drive Thru".
"Weird Al" Yankovic has directed many of his own music videos; he has directed all of his music videos from 1993’s "Bedrock Anthem" to his latest, 2006’s "White & 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! album and the title sequence to Spy Hard, for which he sang the title song.
Yankovic cites these misattributions as "his real beef with Peer-to-peer file sharing 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."”
Canadian gold records
- "Weird Al" Yankovic in 3-D
- Even Worse
- "Weird Al" Yankovic's Greatest Hits
- Greatest Hits Volume II
- Running With Scissors
United States gold records
- "Weird Al" Yankovic
- The Food Album
- Alapalooza
- Straight Outta Lynwood |
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