Eric Dively 
“Weird Al” Yankovic’s, Mandatory Fun hits #1 on the Billboard 200. This is the first comedy album to go #1 in 50 years. The release date was July 15 and it sold over 100,000 units in the first week. This is Yankovic’s first #1 in his career. In a music industry where sales have plummeted 15% this year alone, Mandatory Fun has done very well.
The new album contains parodies of Pharrell’s “Happy”(“Tacky”), Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines”(“Word Crimes”), Imagine Dragons’ “Radioactive”(“Inactive”), Lorde’s “Royals”(“Foil”), Iggy Azalea’s “Fancy”(“Handy”) and more. Eight videos were shot and can be found online. One was released each day, starting the day before the album came out. Most of them have gone viral.
Brian Warwick, one of Weird Al’s audio engineers, discusses the Mandatory Fun project. He explains some of his career, the history of comedy albums and more about Al.
Mandatory Fun has claimed widespread approval from all age ranges. Even the youth, some of which had never heard of “Weird Al” Yankovic before, show interest and find him hilarious. Many didn’t even know that parodies existed before YouTube. Over 45,000 of his fans have petitioned the National Football League to get him to play Super Bowl XLIX’s halftime show.
Weird Al’s website is the best place to go for someone to who hasn’t heard the new songs or seen his videos. There’s news about him, touring information, a photo gallery, archives of previous work, merchandise, links and much more. Fans can find singles of his songs on Amazon and the videos are located on iTunes. Make sure to check them out. Just don’t laugh too hard.
