AOL music AOL music AOL music

Spinner

Weird Al Kicks Off Fun Fun Fun Fest With Career-Spanning Set, TV Show Montage

November 6th 2010 5:00PM


Bob King, Redferns / Getty Images

"He who's tired of Weird Al is tired of life," Homer Simpson once said while playing an erstwhile grunge-rock icon on 'The Simpsons.' And no one at Fun Fun Fun Fest in Austin, Texas this weekend showed any signs of being tired of life.

Friday, at the Live Music Capital of the World's Waterloo Park, an audience that was otherwise attending for the likes of Bad Religion, the Hold Steady, MGMT and the Gories treated parodist and cultural pundit Weird Al Yankovic like the childhood hero that he is. Singing along to 'Smells Like Nirvana' (even though it's actually a little disconcerting to see Weird Al dressed as Kurt Cobain), the crowd also applauded his 1989 film 'UHF' and begged him for 'Yoda,' which arrived as part of a fully costumed 'Star Wars' encore that included 'American Pie' pastiche 'The Saga Begins.'

Kicking off the set with his signature 'Polka Medley,' now augmented with parodies of tracks by Lady Gaga ('Polka Face') as well as Lady Antebellum, Justin Bieber, Katy Perry and a yodel-aided Ke$ha spoof, Yankovic put on an almost Springsteen-length show that clocked in at two hours and 15 minutes.


The performance featured the world's shortest drum solo (twice), but also more costume changes than Gaga and Liberace combined -- the song breaks padded out with videos both brilliant (the Funny or Die trailer for a Weird Al biopic), dated (fake interviews with Jessica Simpson and Keith Richards) and impressive
fshare tweet
Filed under: Concerts and ToursNewsExclusive
AOL music AOL music AOL music
AOL.com  |  Mail |  Search
*