A brief history of Weird Al covering (not parodying) other artists

If you ask people what “Weird Al” Yankovic is most famous for, a lot of them will respond, erroneously, “cover versions.” The reality is, Weird Al mostly does parodies of famous songs, not covers. In fact, up until 2018’s Ridiculously Self-Indulgent, Ill-Advised Vanity Tour, Yankovic very rarely performed straight renditions of other people’s songs, unless we’re counting bits of film scores and/or Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565.” However, he has occasionally sprinkled a cover song or two into his setlists over the years, and chances are very high that on Saturday, for the final night of his Bigger & Weirder Tour at the Fiserv Forum, fans will hear exactly one cover of a beloved oldie. What song will it be? Let’s take a look at the history of Al’s cover choices and see if we can make a solid prediction.

Going back to the beginning of Al’s career, we find that as early as 1980 he was occasionally performing the novelty tune “Shaving Cream,” often attributed to young Yankovic’s idol Dr. Demento, who had re-popularized the song in the ‘70s through frequent airplay on his radio show. Demento even recorded a new version of the song for his first official compilation album in 1980, Dr. Demento’s Dementia Royale. The song originated in 1946, though, written by Benny Bell and sung by “Paul Wynn,” a pseudonym which may have referred to either Phil Winston or Bell himself (birth name: Benjamin Samberg). Back then, people didn’t have smart phones; they had to amuse themselves by dreaming up unremarkable new names and swapping them with each other.

This goofy relic from the ‘40s remains one of the more risqué songs Yankovic has ever performed, what with each verse featuring a “mind rhyme” of “shit.” (Al would use the same device in his own “It’s Still Billy Joel To Me,” an early parody he never recorded but kept playing live until at least ’84.) The only other cover from 1980 that we could uncover (we’re not counting his numerous polka medleys, of course) is arguably his greatest: a truly, um, imaginative take on Debbie Boone’s “You Light Up My Life,” evoking Boone’s secret new wave proclivities.

By the end of 1984, the covers had dried up entirely; it would be all parodies and Yankovic originals for a few years, although it’s worth pointing out that some dates on 1985’s The Stupid Tour featured a partial lounge-style take on The Who’s “My Generation” as an introduction to his own “One More Minute.” Clearly the best extant document of this comes to us from Al’s performance on…The Motown Revue Starring Smokey Robinson??

His only known performance of the song post-1985 was a brief duet with Victoria Jackson, live in 1990 from…The Joe Franklin Show, a radically different interpretation.

Other than these snippets, the internet will try to tell you Al performed Jethro Tull’s “Aqualung” at least twice in 1987 and again in 1992, but the internet is misleading; this was merely a five-second bit he dubbed his “Jethro Tull impersonation.” It seemed that only polka medleys would ever again feature Al singing other people’s words. Until October 1999, in a little town called…Albuquerque.

Only months before, he’d unveiled his song “Albuquerque” on the Running With Scissors album, and fans at the Kiva Auditorium were treated to an epic second encore featuring a partial rendition of “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,” plus The Surfaris’ “Wipe Out” and Burt Bacharach’s “(They Long To Be) Close To You.” And finally, the live debut of “Albuquerque,” a song he then wouldn’t play anywhere besides Albuquerque until 2007.

We could mention the summer of ‘04, when Al would occasionally, in an effort to “mix up the setlist,” take requests—from his bandmates. They’d then bust into 30 seconds of “Sweet Home Alabama” or “Whole Lotta Love” before Al would put a stop to it and launch into “One More Minute.” That summer also saw the Yankovic debut of Elvis Costello’s “Radio Radio.” Following technical difficulties putting a halt to “Trash Day,” the band busted into this cover; it would subsequently become their go-to whenever something went wrong with the increasing technological demands of the “Weird Al” stage show. (In June of 2016 they played it almost every night of the tour, but not at Summerfest! The servers must’ve been giving them hell that month.)

That would be the only possibility of a cover at Weird Al shows until, naturally, his next visit to Albuquerque (technically, Rio Rancho, New Mexico): “Smoke On The Water,” “Last Train To Clarksville” and “China Grove” are all Yankovic debuts in the encore, although we couldn’t find any audio or video evidence from these Albuquerque shows. This could all be a setlist.fm conspiracy.

We can confirm, however, that in 2017, at a Sweet Relief benefit in L.A. called “Strange ‘80s,” Al performed Devo’s “Girl U Want” and Tommy Tutone’s “867-5309/Jenny.” This event may have sparked something in him, because not only would he soon be collaborating with Weezer on a cover of Toto’s “Africa” (a live performance as well as the official video). The aforementioned Vanity Tour would launch the following year, featuring a different cover for the encore each night of the 77-date tour. Far from the oblivious self-serving endeavor it purported to be, the Vanity Tour was an explicit showcase of his band’s versatility (as well as longtime fans’ dream come true); completely different setlists each night, ranging all throughout the Yankovic catalog plus the unique cover. A few he’d done before, but most were a complete surprise to attendees—quite a feat in the internet age.

This radical reinvention of his approach went over well, but surely lots of fans did miss the elaborate spectacle of his usual costumes-and-videos routine. They’d have to wait a bit; first there was the Strings Attached orchestral tour in 2019 (no covers), followed by a pandemic, and then in 2022, The Unfortunate Return of the (…) Vanity Tour began. It was twice as many dates as the original Vanity Tour and a streamlined song repertoire; only half of the covers from 2018 made the cut, although six new ones were also added. Chief among these, duh: Paul Simon’s “You Can Call Me Al;” what took him so long?? This one even made the cut for his current Bigger & Weirder Tour; just last month, it surpassed “Radio Radio” to become the most-covered song of Al’s nearly-five-decade career. Only fitting, isn’t it?

That’s one of a possible six options you probably have to look forward to on Saturday, Milwaukee. But unless he ends up playing it the night before in Green Bay, our money is on “You Can Call Me Al” for the tour finale. Even Albuquerque didn’t get any special treatment this time around; they got George Harrison’s “What Is Life,” which is neck-and-neck with “Call Me Al” and a couple others for most plays on the current tour. Unfortunately, chances are slim that he’ll be doing a Chappell Roan song—but chances improve drastically next month in Kansas City! The annual Thundergong! benefit for the Steps of Faith Foundation is coming up on November 14, and at each of the past two Thundergongs Al has performed a different Roan cover with Will Forte. It’s a long shot, but just maybe, “Pink Pony Club?”

1980-84: Dr. Demento’s Shaving Cream, very occasionally

At least 3x in ’85: My Generation (Squeeze Box in ’18 & ’22)

8/20/87: Aqualung (again in October, then once each in ’92 and ’18!)

7/23/92: First Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565

7/14 & 7/21/04: Sweet Home Alabama first performed (New Hampshire, California); played infrequently since, often as an encore

– Free Bird played once in ’18

– Whole Lotta Love (???) x4 in ’04 (Rock And Roll in ’18)

10/8/99: Partial In-A-Gadda, Wipe Out, and Bacharach’s (They Long To Be) Close To You (also played once each in ’07 and ’18), plus debut of Albuquerque!

8/29/04: Radio Radio (Elvis Costello) – subsequently busted out 27 more times to date, often during tech issues

5/14/17: Girl U Want, 867-5309 (Girl + Uncontrollable Urge in ’18)

10/17/07: Smoke On The Water, Last Train To Clarksville (x5 more ’18-23), China Grove, Sweet Home Alabama (as Sweet Home Albuquerque—Rio Rancho, part of the Albuquerque metro area)

2018: 78 shows, 78 different covers

-Elton x3: Funeral/Love Lies Bleeding, Crocodile Rock, Saturday Night’s Alright

-Kinks x2: All Day And All Of The Night, You Really Got Me (She’s Got Everything x3 in ’22)

-Stones x2: Honky Tonk Women & It’s Only Rock And Roll (latter x5 in ’22-23)

-Ramones x2: I Wanna Be Sedated, Beat On The Brat (latter x4 in ’22-23)

-Petty x2: Breakdown, Refugee (latter x2 in ’22, once in ’19)

-Beatles x2: I Saw Her Standing, I’m Down (EGSTHEMAMM x2 in ’22)

2022-23: 46 covers across 158 shows (only 6 new: Call Me Al (x5; ultimately becomes Al’s most-covered tune, not counting film music and Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565), Nobody But Me, She’s Got Everything, Cleveland Rocks, American Woman (x3 each), EGSTHEMAMM (x2))

Nov ’24 & ’25 @ ‘Thundergong!’: A Chappell Roan cover each time w/Will Forte (HOT TO GO! & Pink Pony Club)

2025-26:

– I Am Woman (x10; 2025 only)

– China Grove (x12; previously played in ’18 and ’22, dropped after ’25)

– The Letter (x26)

– What Is Life (x26; first played in 2015 at ‘George Fest’ along with Handle With Care)

– You Can Call Me Al (x26)

– Happy Together (x25)

– Suffragette City (x13; new for ’26, reup from Vanity Tour)

– A Natural Woman (x12)

– Beer Barrel Polka (x2 to fill time during tech issues; 1st performed on Fallon in ’11)

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