Weird Al Yankovic Again

Last night The Wife and I headed into town, which is rare enough on a weekend, to go and see Weird Al Yankovic play the Hammersmith Apollo. Or Eventim Apollo. Whatever it’s called these days. The second time he’s been to England in five years, this time to promote his Mandatory Fun album.

His shows are a mixture of his songs and comedy sketches, the latter being used to give him time to go through his many costume changes. We took our place amongst the nerds and geeks (bit harsh, I could be one of them!) and waited for the show to start.

He started off with Tacky, his parody of Happy by Pharrell Williams, and he even parodied the video with his performance as he started outside and walked into the theatre in the style(ish) of the original music video. He then did a few more of his newer songs before launching into a mixture of his older, more famous ones such as Fat and Smells Like Nirvana and a medley of other ‘hits’.

He toned it down a little bit with an acoustic set of four songs, the highlight being Eat Itbeing sung to the tune of Layla by Eric Clapton, followed by his Robin Thicke-inspired Word Crimes before finishing off with Amish Paradise.

Naturally he came back on stage to do his encore of two Star Wars songs The Sage Begins (American Pie parody) and Yoda

The set list in full:
Tacky
Lame Claim to Fame
Now That’s What I Call Polka!
Perform This Way
Dare to Be Stupid
Fat
First World Problems
Foil
Smells Like Nirvana
Party in the CIA/It’s All About the Pentiums/Handy/Bedrock Anthem/Another One Rides the Bus/Ode to a Superhero/Gump/Inactive/eBay
Canadian Idiot
Wanna B Ur Lovr
Eat It/I Lost on Jeopardy/I Love Rocky Road/Like a Surgeon
White & Nerdy
Word Crimes
Amish Paradise

Encore:
We All Have Cell Phones
The Saga Begins
Yoda