I've learned how to use my spam filter pretty effectively.
Al Yankovic
My hobbies just sort of gradually became my vocation.
I think that nerds, if you want to call them that, have only gotten more hip and assimilated into the culture.
As my father used to tell me, the only true sign of success in life is being able to do for a living that which makes you happy.
One of my pet peeves is that sometimes the talents of my band get overlooked because, and it was the same problem that Frank Zappa had, with a lot of groups that use humor, people don't realize there's a lot of craft behind the comedy.
Some people want to advertise their weirdness, and spread it out, that's not me.
As a kid, I certainly never thought I would get to spend my life doing something fun.
How can you get bored if the audience is cheering and laughing at something you're doing?
There are probably a few library fines I haven't paid yet, but I'm a pretty clean-cut guy overall.
Probably 90 percent of my albums have polka medleys.
People never ask people doing serious music, 'Do you ever think about doing funny music?'
You don't need to be defined by your job.
I'm very analytical, I'm very precise.
At this point I've got a bit of a track record. So people realize that when 'Weird Al' wants to go parody, it's not meant to make them look bad... it's meant to be a tribute.
If I could find the right kind of property, get tied in with the right movie, I'd love to be involved, but I just find it hard to be motivated to do another screenplay right now.
Pop culture's gotten much more disposable.
The irony is of course that my career has lasted a whole lot longer than some of the people I've parodied over the years.
Like, I have had moments, which I think most people have, where you'll be watching TV, and it'll be interrupted by some tragic event, and you'll actually find yourself thinking, 'I don't want to hear about this train being derailed! What happened to 'The Flintstones?'
I don't think there are any new media I'd like to cover.
In the '80s, I was putting out an album virtually every year, I think mostly based on fear - that if I didn't, people would soon forget about me.
I make charts of songs that are good candidates, good targets, so to speak. Then I try to come up with ideas for parodies. And 99% of those ideas are horrible.
If something is good enough, it can be out there and people will see it.
I write and write and write, and then I edit it down to the parts that I think are amusing, or that help the storyline, or I'll write a notebook full of ideas of anecdotes or story points, and then I'll try and arrange them in a way that they would tell a semi-cohesive story.
There are a lot of songs that would ostensibly be a good candidate for parody, yet I can't think of a clever enough idea.
I don't really look at myself as the kind of person who craves attention, but I've never been to therapy so there's probably a lot of stuff about myself that I don't know.
You fake something until you're good at it.
People that were a little nerdy in high school would look up to me and know it gets better.
What kind of morons do you have working at newspapers in Austin that would base an entire review of an artist's performance on whether or not they had a good seat?
As much as people are griping about the Internet taking sales away from artists, it's been a huge promotional tool for me.
I mean, I hate to gloat, but I'm extremely satisfied with my position in life and the way things have worked out for me.
It's hard to really articulate what the parameters are that make one song parody-able and another song not, but if I can come up with a good enough idea for it, I go for it, and if not, then I have to move on.
As it turns out, there is a thing called the Internet, and stuff does go out there whether the suits like it or not.
I'm still a geek on the inside, that's the important thing.
I mean, I don't write for kids.
Whenever I do a parody it's not meant to make you hate anybody's music really.
I know now that everything I write, I'm going to put out, and I'll have to live with it for the rest of my life.
I can't get too offended when somebody parodies me.
One of the hardest things I've had to deal with in my career is keeping my material topical even though I only release albums every three or four years.
You still have Top 40 radio now, but it's 40 different stations. There aren't many hits that everybody knows, and there aren't many real superstars.
I have a long-standing history of respecting artists' wishes.
There aren't that many superstars around anymore.
A lot of rap songs don't usually have a lot of melody per se.
I like the guitar-driven music of Nirvana at its peak. At that point, I thought there was a lot of really exciting music coming out.
When I go to my live shows it's often a multigenerational audience, a family bonding experience.
I suppose I had my rock star fantasies while I was singing into my hairbrush in the bathroom mirror, but I never really consciously said, 'OK, this is what I'm going to do for a living and I'm going to be Weird Al.'
So I'm one of the few celebrities that got to do a repeat performance on 'The Simpsons,' which I'm very flattered by.
When I was a kid, I thought I was going to be an architect, because when I was 12 years old I had a guidance counselor that convinced me that that was the best career choice for me.
I've done a movie and a TV series, and someday I'd like to do a successful movie and a successful TV series. That would be nice.
I'm obviously not a rapper, and I don't have any claims to be one, really.
I'm watching the charts every week and hoping something will pop into my head.
