BY MARK GUARINO | SUN-TIMES MUSIC WRITER
Master parodist Weird Al Yankovic returns with a video that playfully skewers one of the biggest hits of this year: Pharrell Williams’ “Happy.”
The retooled “Tacky” features Yankovic, known for premier parodies “Eat It” and “Smells Like Nirvana,” bouncing through the Palace Theatre in Los Angeles, dressed in garish neon clothes and singing lines like, “I get drunk at the bank and take off my shirt at least/I would live tweet a funeral, take selfies with the deceased.”
The video also features comedian-actors Aisha Tyler, Margaret Cho, Eric Stonestreet, Kristen Schaal and Jack Black, who reveals he has been practicing twerking these last few months.
Retooling “Happy” is now an Internet trend. A website, WeAreHappyFrom.com, features amateur videos of people from all over the world, from Portland to Istanbul, Jerusalem to Kenya, lip-synching the Williams song. “It’s still amazing to me how many people have created their own versions of Happy. Thank you.,” he posted via Twitter on July 1.
The Yankovic video premieres today on Nerdist.com; His 14th studio album, “Mandatory Fun” (RCA) is released Tuesday.
Check it out here:
The original Williams version:
