Back on the road!

Yes, I'm blogging from the back of a tour bus this very minute. The last leg of the "Straight Outta Lynwood" Tour has officially kicked off. We did our first show in over 8 months last night in Henderson, Nevada, and I didn't pass out from exhaustion on stage… so I'm going to call it a rousing success!

We'll be playing around North America non-stop for the next 9 weeks or so, and then we're really truly DONE with this tour… so if you want to catch the show, this is your last chance! (I should probably also point out again that this is pretty much the exact same show we did in 2007, so if you're coming again this year, don't expect anything different!)

Anyway, I'm very much looking forward to seeing everybody out on the road, and rocking the proverbial hizzouse in a town near you. Check the tour dates on this page and see if I'm coming anywhere near your neck of the woods!

Your pal,
Al

8:04 PM - 321 Comments - 470 Kudos - Add Comment

The Simpsons

You've probably already seen my subtle announcement on this page, but yes, I'm going to be on The Simpsons this Sunday night (Jan. 27)!  This is an extra-special honor for me, because it puts me in a small, elite group of celebrities who have made return appearances on the show – I'm in the same exclusive club as Stephen Hawking and Thomas Pynchon!

The episode is called "That 90's Show."  It was written by Matt Selman and SPOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT! … flashes back to the early 90's, which (apparently through a revisionist timeline) is when Homer was dating Marge.  After Marge dumps him, Homer is so depressed and angst-filled that he and his rock band inadvertently invent the whole grunge movement.  I will appear briefly on a TV monitor, performing a bad parody of Homer's big hit song. /SPOILERS

It's been a while since I've written here.  As promised, since I got off the road in October, I've been mostly taking it easy – enjoying my family, doing some work around the house, celebrating the holidays… stuff like that.  I haven't started working on the next album yet (don't worry, I will!) but I've been keeping busy with some other projects.  In fact, right now I'm in the middle of directing a music video for my pals The Presidents Of The United States Of America – it's for a song on their great new album, which is coming out in March.

The only other thing I can talk about right now is that we are planning to be back out on the road in July and August this year, finishing up the Straight Outta Lynwood Tour.  So if you missed it last time around, now's your chance to see it!  And if you saw it last time, but for some reason you want to subject yourself to the exact same show again, be my guest! Dates will be announced as soon as they're confirmed.

Mahalo,
Al

1:54 PM - 559 Comments - 855 Kudos - Add Comment

End Of The Tour

Yes, the 2007 Straight Outta Lynwood Tour has finally come to a close. We traveled over 80,000 miles and performed 119 shows in the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. I've seen a million faces, and I've rocked… well, a reasonable percentage of them.

I want to thank everybody who came out to a show this year, whether you were a crazy tour-chaser, a newbie or a confused Kenny G fan. You guys made it all worthwhile. And I especially want to extend a huge thank you to all the fine members of the 501st Legion who joined me on a number of tour dates dressed in their finest Star Wars regalia. The funny thing is, every single one of those stormtroopers acted like I was doing them the biggest favor in the world by letting them perform on stage with me, when in fact the exact opposite was true.

I'm happy to say that I have absolutely no plans at the moment, other than spending some time with my family. I may or may not tour next year – I haven't really decided yet. And I'm sure I'll start working on the next album at some point, but right now I just want to slip into a coma for a few weeks.

I'm glad that everybody enjoyed the Biography special – big thanks to Seth Green, Drew Carey, Judy Tenuta, Ben Folds and all my other friends who were a part of it. If you missed the show because you don't get the Biography Channel, don't worry – A&E is supposed to air it on November 11 (early Sunday morning – set your DVR!)

And I know that my old music videos are all over the Internet anyway, but since I'm always striving to be redundant, I uploaded a bunch of them to my YouTube page for your perusal and amusement.

My one year anniversary on MySpace has come and gone… over 600,000 close, personal friends in the first 12 months – not bad! Thanks, everybody, for keeping in touch. See you at the next picnic!

Al

4:01 PM - 356 Comments - 604 Kudos - Add Comment

Ask Al

Meg of Skokie, IL asks: Al, how appropriate or inappropriate is the tour material in terms of a 10-yr-old? It's now made the top of the birthday list, and as a parent, while I'd love to see the tour, I need to know about kids...? Thank you very much!

I see every demographic in the audience at my live shows, from toddlers to geriatrics. And we do put on a "family-friendly" show… although that doesn't mean it's a squeaky-clean G-rated kiddie show. You should be aware there is some cartoon violence and a little bit of what some people might call "adult themes." But there's no harsh profanity, and nothing that I think you would find terribly offensive. As always, you should use your best judgment as a parent, but if your child wouldn't be traumatized by, say, an issue of MAD Magazine or an episode of The Simpsons, I'm pretty sure he or she wouldn't have any problems at all with my live show.

Susan M of Tallahassee, FL asks: How come the DualDisc doesn't contain the video for "White & Nerdy"? It's a fantastic disc, a fantastic song, and a fantastic video; I just don't understand why there are lots of other (great) videos but not that one.

We weren't able to finish that video until just a couple weeks before the scheduled release of the album. I would have included that video if I could have, but to do so would have meant delaying the release of "Straight Outta Lynwood" by a couple months, and obviously I wanted to get the album out as soon as possible (before the parodies got too dated). Of course, the video is available on iTunes (in fact, it was the #1 best-selling music video for a couple months!) and I'm hoping it will also be available on some kind of DVD compilation in the future. Actually, I can't wait until HD-DVD or BluRay discs are more prevalent in the marketplace – most people have only seen the video in low res on MySpace or on You Tube, and as I've said before, we shot the thing in HD… it looks gorgeous!

Ally of Ohio asks: Hey Al, in your video for "Trapped In The Drive-Thru" why doesn't the cartoon look like you???

Actually, when the animator Doug Bresler sent me his original animatic, the character in the video did in fact look a lot like me. But my note to him was that the video should not be too "cartoony" – it should be more or less an animated version of what the video would have looked like if we had shot it in live action. (And before you ask, no, it wasn't ever in our budget to shoot an 11-minute live-action music video.) Anyway, if we were doing the video in live action, I would almost certainly be playing a character, not "Weird Al" – and therefore I instructed Doug to give the guy a more generic hairstyle. So if you don't like that, blame me.

Mike of Phoenix, AZ asks: Al, can you list some of the actors with cameos in the "White & Nerdy" video? I think I got Donny Osmond...

Right – of course, that's Donny Osmond dancing behind me (playing "Krayzie Bone" to my "Chamillionaire")… Seth Green is the guy obsessed with action figures (he's basically playing himself)… Judy Tenuta is the woman on the couch who graciously accepts my gift of a surge protector… the two gangstas in the car at the beginning of the video are Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele from MAD TV… and of course there are the 18 MySpace friends that I cast as extras.

Howard & Cindy Wilson of Hamilton, Ontario asks: On the back page of the CD insert, you mention Nickelback in the credits. Can we ask what inspiration they provided you with? P.S. We ourselves are not beer-swilling hockey nuts, but we do know several, eh.

Nickelback was nice enough to give their permission for me to use their song "Photograph" in the latest polka medley. I typically get clearances for the songs in the medley before I actually arrange it… and when I was putting "Polkarama!" together, I just couldn't find a way to incorporate the Nickelback song into it where it didn't sound wedged in or tacked on – so unfortunately I had to leave it off. You may notice that I also mentioned T Pain in the "special thanks" – similarly, he had given his blessing for me to do a parody of one of his songs. At the last minute, I decided against recording the song for the album, but if you come to one of my live shows this summer, you may hear a snippet of it somewhere in the medley…

Off to Oz!

Yep, I'm leaving for Australia today – the tour has officially begun! We've been busy getting ready for the last couple months, and everything's coming together really well. We now have a larger video screen, nicer projectors and a fancy high-tech media server, and we've made a few other major improvements as well. (No, it's not what you're thinking – Ruben is still in the band.) Anyway, it should be a really fun show.

We WERE hoping to have a small European tour in late April, but I'm sorry to say that it doesn't look like it's going to happen at this time. We got solid offers for shows in London, Amsterdam and Frankfurt, but we would have needed a few more shows just to break even due to the expense of dragging all of our stuff over to Europe. Sorry to all my European fans – I'm disappointed too.

But we ARE doing a North American tour, and it's gonna be a big one. We start in early May and will go pretty much non-stop until mid-October. If you're freaking out because you don't see your city listed in the tour dates yet, don't worry – we have a whole lot more dates to post (and we will, as soon as they've been officially confirmed).

Congrats to Lewis Black and Donald Fagen, who won the Grammys for Best Comedy Album and Best Surround Sound Album respectively. Hey, it was an honor just to get free tickets to the show. We'll get 'em next time.

I'm excited to announce that on March 19, MySpace will world premiere an animated music video for "Trapped In The Drive-Thru." It's being done by Doug Bresler (of Doogtoons fame), and everything I've seen of it so far looks great… hope you guys like it!

Speaking of MySpace, I just did an interview with Seth Green for their "Artist on Artist" series... hopefully it'll be online any day now.

By the way, you've probably seen it by now, but I posted Donny Osmond's very first take of "White & Nerdy" online a while ago. He was just so amazing, I had to share the footage with the world.

And finally, we just started offering presale tickets for select concerts. If you're interested, click here.

See you on the road!

2:04 PM - 313 Comments - 510 Kudos - Add Comment

Back in the Top 20!

All I can imagine is, a lot of my fans must've gotten iTunes gift cards for Christmas, because "White & Nerdy" inexplainably shot from #44 all the way up to #19 on the Billboard chart! Nice way for me to start the new year… thanks! Also, W&N has sold more than half a million digital downloads at this point, so it's going to be a Gold single (as soon as the RIAA officially certifies it)!

And glad everybody enjoyed AL-TV! Yeah, I know… making fun of Jessica Simpson and K-Fed is kind of like shooting fish in a barrel, but… hey, it had to be done.

At the moment we're slowly gearing up for our big tour. I've got a couple other projects in the works, but mostly this year is going to be all about me getting out there and playing live with my band – I'm really looking forward to it. We're touring Australia and New Zealand in March (the dates are posted here and at weirdal.com)… it's currently a longshot at best, but we may be doing a European tour in late April… and then we'll definitely be doing a North American tour, most likely starting in early May and going all summer long.

I also wanted to take a moment and clear up some questions regarding my participation in MySpace…

Yes, this is really my page - I designed it and I do the upkeep on it personally.

And as I've said before, I do not comment people or respond to comments. It's not because I don't want to… it's just that if I started doing that, I would not ever have time to do anything else in life.

And if you've sent me a personal message in the last several months, I apologize – I haven't read it. I try to look at all the comments, but that's about all I can handle right now – I'm saving all the private messages so that I'll have something to read in my old age. So if you'd like to get a message to me this decade, you should probably just post it in the comments.

Also, a few pet peeves – please do not post the same message a hundred times. Even two times is once too many. If you post the same message a zillion times – even if it's a really nice message - you will be deleted and/or blocked. I wish MySpace had a filter to eliminate repeat posts, but unfortunately, they don't. And comments that are blatantly self-promotional or gratuitously profane will be deleted as well.

Also, I strongly doubt that there are any spammers reading this blog right now, but just for the record… NO, I don't care that you're on a diet, NO, I don't want to know who's been looking at my profile, and NO, I don't want to see what you're doing on your webcam.

Sorry, I just had to get that all off my chest.

Anyway, have a great '07 everybody… looking forward to seeing you all on the road!

2:30 PM - 363 Comments - 624 Kudos - Add Comment

Grammy nominations!

The nominations for the 49th annual Grammy Awards were announced today, and I'm very happy to say that I made the cut! "Straight Outta Lynwood" was nominated for 2 awards: Best Comedy Album (the other nominees are George Carlin, Lewis Black, Bill Engvall and Ron White) and Best Surround Sound Album. The winners will be announced at the awards show on February 11. Unfortunately, this is one time when you guys won't be able to help me out (unless you happen to be a voting member of the Academy!)... but if you could just - you know - put out some positive energy into the universe, that would be great. Anyway, yay! I'm very pleased.

I've had a lot of fun doing awards shows lately... including the "Big In '06" awards which is airing all this month on VH-1 (check out our big "White & Nerdy" production number if you haven't seen it yet) and the American Music Awards, where I got to present with Chamillionaire. We were originally supposed to announce the award for "Best Male Country Artist," but literally 5 minutes before we walked out on stage, we found out that we were just introducing the accountants who tabulated the ballots instead (because the show was running long). Anyway, I thought Chamillionaire was an incredibly nice guy with a great sense of humor - ditto for Taylor Hicks, whom I met on the red carpet. (Apparently Taylor has taken to singing "Do I Creep You Out" in his sound checks!)

By the way, if for some reason you haven't picked up a copy of "Straight Outta Lynwood" yet, and you're not the kind of person that likes to own actual, real-life CDs... you may be interested to know that iTunes is having a special right now on a "deluxe version" of the album. You can download the album, plus all 6 animated music videos and the making-of-the-album documentary at a special low price. You can also now buy the videos a la carte if you want to.

And speaking of iTunes - the "White & Nerdy" video was the number one most downloaded music video for two months! How crazy is that?

Oh, and if you haven't seen the featurette on the making of the "White & Nerdy" video yet, check it out - it's the last video on my page right now.

I'm hard at work editing AL-TV at the moment. I'm doing it at home on my computer, which is nice because I get to stay around my family instead of having to basically live in an editing room for a week. The show is going to mostly feature all the new videos, but don't worry, there will be a couple new celebrity "interviews" (which are kinda harsh - but I think they're pretty funny). AL-TV will hit the airwaves of VH-1 on the 15th - be sure to tune in!

And speaking of December 15th, that's the night I'll be going straight INTO Lynwood... to be the Grand Marshall of the Lynwood Christmas parade! I've got to start practicing my wave.

Anyway, thanks, everybody, for such a great year!

9:45 AM - 463 Comments - 791 Kudos - Add Comment

New video!

Just in case you haven't checked weirdal.com... or didn't get the bulletin I sent... or didn't see the big announcement on this page... yes, there's a new video out! Several weeks ago, the amazing team at JibJab had me come into their offices, where they shot a zillion still pictures of me emoting to the song "Do I Creep You Out," which they then fashioned into a wonderfully creepy music video. It's getting a major promotion on msn.com right now, and it will probably pop up on TV here and there. Like, oh... AL-TV next month.

Yes, it looks like we've gotten an official green light to do AL-TV on VH-1! We don't have an air date yet, but we're guessing mid-December. It will be an hour show, mostly just showcasing all the videos from the new album... but I have a feeling one or two of my close, personal celebrity friends will be dropping by for some exclusive, revealing interviews as well.

And speaking of VH-1... can you believe it? Number 1 on the Top 20 Countdown for the last two weeks!! That's insane! And "White & Nerdy" is entering into its third week on the TRL countdown on MTV (which, prior to this album, I'd never even been on before!) And "White & Nerdy" is STILL the number 1 top-selling music video on iTunes! Wow - I'm really kinda overwhelmed by all this. Thanks so much, everybody, for your support!

Oh, and it was a real thrill for me to do the Tonight Show, but I'm kinda glad it's over... that was a LOT of pressure. Maybe it wasn't my absolute best performance, but I consider the mere fact that I didn't forget the words, pass out, throw up or soil my underwear on live television a major success. Now that I've had the chance to work out some of the bugs (in front of a worldwide audience) hopefully the performances will go more smoothly in the future... like when we perform it at the VH-1 "Big In '06" Awards on December 3!

And thanks to everybody who participated in the Yahoo "Get Your Nerdy On" promotion... that was a really great video you all made! I could have saved a bunch of money and just had YOU guys do the video for me!

What else... hmm... oh, I'm going to be presenting at the American Music Awards next Tuesday (the 21st)... um... I've got a dentist appointment next Friday... well, I guess I've run out of things to say.

Thanks again, everybody!

9:21 AM - 366 Comments - 561 Kudos - Add Comment

TRL!

First of all, thanks so much for all the wonderful birthday wishes! Aw, you guys... you remembered! That was very nice.

Also, you've probably heard the news by now (cnn.com, yahoo.com, etc.)... Not only is "Straight Outta Lynwood" my first Top 10 album ever, but also "White & Nerdy" hit number 9 on the Billboard hot singles chart this month, surpassing "Eat It" to become my highest-charting single of all time! Unbelievable... I still haven't stopped smiling about all this.

I'm on the road doing radio promotions right now, but next week I'll be back in L.A. to rehearse for my Tonight Show appearance on Nov. 2, where my band and I will be performing "White & Nerdy" live for the first time. Of course - the first time we ever play that song live, it's going to be in front of a gazillion people... yikes!

Oh, and if I didn't mention it before, I'm going to be on the American Music Awards next month (presenting, not performing)... that should be fun.

I sent out a bulletin recently, but in case you didn't get it... my MySpace password was apparently "phished," and some Weird Al impostor has been sending out announcements asking people to sign up for a bunch of crap online so they can go to a Weird Al show in Las Vegas or something. I guess some other faux Weird Al was trying to get people to buy ringtones. I promise you, those invitations were NOT from me... those fake Weird Als have been booted off of MySpace (at least for the time being) and I've changed my password. Thanks to everybody who had my back and realized immediately that I wasn't that big of a jerk.

And a big, big, big thank you to everybody for keeping me in the Top 5 of the VH1 Countdown for a solid month ("White & Nerdy" even made it to number 1 last week)! That was really amazing! Thank you all so much.

Speaking of stuffing the ballot box, I've got another mission, should you choose to accept it...

VH1 was extremely supportive of the "White & Nerdy" video from day one, but "M"TV decided that they weren't ever going to play it because they "didn't have room for it"... Well, now that all of you have undeniably made the video such a HUGE STINKING HIT, "M"TV has decided to... what's the term?... re-think their position. So they're actually going to play it (well, most likely about half a minute of it) on TRL tomorrow (Thursday, Oct. 26). I'd really appreciate it if you guys could do for TRL what you did for VH1... If you'd care to show the love for W&N on TRL, the voting link will be on my MySpace page and on weirdal.com shortly.

By the way, we're not 100% certain, but the "Straight Outta Lynwood" tour may very well be starting in... New Zealand! We're hoping to play New Zealand and Australia in March, with a North American tour to follow in the summer. And I'd really, really like to work in a European tour next year as well... but we'll just have to wait and see how well the record does over there.

And not to get your hopes up, but cross your fingers... another installment of AL-TV may very well be happening after all. I'll let you know if and when we get the official green light.

Obviously, these are extremely exciting times for me... and as always, thank you all so much for your support!

1:04 AM - 514 Comments - 794 Kudos - Add Comment

Top 10 Debut!

I would like to personally extend a warm hug and/or hearty handshake to the 73,000 people who purchased a copy of Straight Outta Lynwood last week. (Or maybe it was just 73 people who purchased 1,000 copies each - I guess I'll never really know for sure.) Anyway, thank you, thank you, thank you! Because of your support, the album will debut at number 10 on this week's Billboard album chart! Yes, that's right, I've got a Top 10 album - for the very first time in my life! Also, I don't have a chart number yet, but I just found out from my label that "White & Nerdy" is expected to debut in the top 30 on the Billboard hot singles chart - which would make it my highest charting single in over 22 years (since "Eat It")! Like VH-1 says, I'm having the Best Week Ever!

And speaking of VH-1, the video debuted on their Top 20 Countdown last week at number 5! Wow... you guys sure know how to stuff a ballot box, don't you? Thanks so much!

As you can imagine, my life has been pretty crazy lately. I'm going to be bouncing around the country for the next month or so, tormenting local radio and TV stations and doing the occasional in-store appearance. I also just found out that I've been asked to perform "White & Nerdy" live on the Tonight Show. That'll be fun (if I don't pass out!)

By the way, the White & Nerdy hoodies are apparently in stock now - you can get 'em at the merch page at weirdal.com. I've seen a couple samples, and they look pretty sweet!

That's pretty much all the headlines for this week. Thanks again for giving me a Top 10 album. You guys are the best.

11:00 AM - 1062 Comments - 1580 Kudos - Add Comment