“Weird Al” Yankovic is providing his own version of summer re-runs, taking his “Mandatory World Tour” back out for the second straight year.
“If people saw it last year, they shouldn’t come expecting anything dramatically different because it will not be,” Yankovic said. “I think there are enough people that didn’t see it last summer that are going to get another chance to see it this time around,” he added. “And it just felt like because it is the same tour that it didn’t necessitate changing around the set list too much. We still want to be promoting the material from ‘Mandatory Fun’ (his 2014 album), and also there are all the greatest hits that people are expecting to hear.”
Thirty-five years into his career, Yankovic has never been more popular, as reflected in the current live show, which figures to be plenty entertaining even for fans seeing it a second time.
“We try to outdo ourselves every time we come on the road, and I do feel the ‘Mandatory World Tour’ is the biggest and best we’ve done yet,” he said. “There are more costumes and a bigger LED screen and there’s more production value and theatrics in this show. The crowds keep getting bigger and the energy keeps building and, you know, it doesn’t ever seem to be dissipating. We’re giving it everything we’ve got every single night.”
Yankovic still sounds amazed at what he has achieved with “Mandatory Fun.” When it was released in July 2014, it became the first comedy album ever to debut at No. 1 on the “Billboard” magazine album chart. It was a special moment for an artist who has now won four Grammys (including the 2015 Best Comedy Album award for “Mandatory Fun”).
“It was pretty mind blowing,” Yankovic said of the chart-topping debut. “I never in my wildest dreams expected my album to debut at number one, just because that had never happened before. I always thought there was a bit of a glass ceiling for comedy albums. So there were a couple of times on live TV during that week where it was hard for me to even hold it together because it was a very emotional time.”
What might be even more impressive is that Yankovic has sold more albums than any comedian – more than George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Bill Cosby, Robin Williams or even Bob Hope.
“I have no real reason or explanation for that,” Yankovic said. “I mean, there was a certain period of time, in the ‘80s and ‘90s particularly, where the record industry was doing extremely well, so I wound up selling a lot of records during that period. Certainly MTV was a big help during those same years to get my material out there and also sell albums. But yeah, it’s inconceivable to me that I’ve sold more albums than my heroes.”
Yankovic, who got his big break in 1980 after his parodies of the Knack hit, “My Sharona” – retitled “My Bologna” – and “Another One Rides The Bus” — the Queen hit “Another One Bites The Dust” – aired on the “Dr. Demento” radio program, is up to his usual tricks. He turns Pharrell’s mega-hit “Happy” into “Tacky,” which offers an encyclopedic run-through of all sorts of less-than-cool behaviors. Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” becomes “Word Crimes,” an examination of grammatical missteps, both funny and a bit educational. And Lorde’s “Royals” is re -imagined as “Foil,” which somehow evolves from a lesson on expert handling of leftovers into a tale of conspiracy theories.
Yankovic said he has never tired of doing song parodies (as well as the original songs and the polka medleys that usually also populate his albums).
“I’m not surprised I still have a passion for it,” he said. “I’m more surprised that people still allow me to do it. I just never dreamed that at this point in my life and my career that there would still be so much interest and excitement about me going out on the road and performing. I just thought that it would start trailing off. And I’m sure it will at some point. But the fact that I’m still here 35 years after I started and people still care about what I do, I mean, that’s the amazing thing to me. I’m not amazed at all that my passion is still there because that’s something I’ve always had.”
7:30pm Friday, July 1. $37.50, $49.50, $65. Toledo Zoo Amphitheatre, 2 Hippo Way. 419-385-4040. toledozoo.org
