The last time "Weird Al" Yankovic released an album, the year was 2014 and his 14th full-length, Mandatory Fun, went on to be his most critically acclaimed record.
It was the first comedy album to ever debut at No. 1 on the Billboard albums chart, it won the Best Comedy Album award at the 57th Annual Grammy Awards, and, as he implied it might to people like Exclaim! during its promotion cycle, it proved to be Yankovic's final album.
"Yeah, and I still feel that that's the case," Yankovic says from his Los Angeles home. "I mean, I said even before I released Mandatory Fun that, once my record contract was fulfilled, I wouldn't be pursuing any more conventional albums. And, y'know, it's a personal thing. I think that as a format, albums are slowly fading away."
It appears Yankovic said this after casting a sidelong glance at my record collection, visible on our Zoom call, and so it feels germane to mention that vinyl sales are certainly much higher than they were 10 years ago.
"I think it's just a rise in the overall hipster population," he says, and we both laugh. "I remember when vinyl was not hip. It was sort of like, 'Oh, who wants vinyl anymore?' In fact, my wife talked me into getting rid of 95 percent of my vinyl collection because, 'Oh, you've got it on CD,' or, 'You've got a digital copy — why in the world would you want vinyl?'
He adds, "And I do see the charm and appeal of vinyl. Personally, I do like the idea of listening to music without surface noise and pops and ticks and scratches. But, yeah, you get a 12-inch piece of vinyl in your hand and wobble it back and forth and hear the lovely sound it makes — that's great!"
Jokes aside, Yankovic understands that full-length artistic statements still resonate, but they aren't the kind of recording projects that suit his very topical satire and parodies, which demand an urgent release to pop at the right time.
But, that said, does he miss any part of the creative and collaborative process involved in making albums?
"Obviously certain parts of it," Yankovic admits. "It's fun to release singles, but when you release an album, it's really an event — it's a big deal, it's a major project. It's also a lot of pressure. There's a lot of focus on you. It's like releasing a movie or any other major project and there are a lot of people that are rooting for you."
He continues, "There are still obviously people that are doing quite well solely with albums, but it's just not been my favorite way to get my music distributed. And this sounds very ironic because I haven't exactly been super productive or prolific in the last 10 years, recording-wise, but I like having the freedom and the option of just putting out stuff whenever I feel like it — not having to wait until I have a dozen songs and just release them all at once. So, I mean, it feels kind of weird to do an interview tour to promote a single, but that's my only option at this point, because I'm probably never going to be promoting an album."
Case in point, today, to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Mandatory Fun, Yankovic has released his first new music in years via one of his trademark polka medleys, "Polkamania!" Unlike his song and style parodies that feature modified lyrics, Yankovic's medleys tend to be polka-fied covers that respect the original lyrics (other than some family-friendly adjustments).
"Polkamania!" includes Miley Cyrus's "Flowers," Billie Eilish's "Bad Guy," Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee's "Despacito," Lil Nas X's "Old Town Road," Adele's "Hello" and Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off," among others. Even a casual music listener would know that these are recent hit singles — but not that recent.
"That was by design," Yankovic explains, "because I hadn't done a pop-culture time-capsule polka medley since Mandatory Fun, and that's one of the hooks of this release — to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the release of Mandatory Fun. So, I wanted to have a polka medley that spanned 10 years and try to evenly disperse it through the years, so it's not exactly one song per year, but it's pretty much spread out over 10 years. And to narrow it down to make life easy for me, I only chose songs that had made it to No. 1 on Billboard.
From there, it came down to crafting the funniest, most seamless medley: "Then it was just a matter of like, 'Which Taylor Swift song am I going to pick?' and [after that] it came down to personal choice, what songs I thought would be funnier done polka style, and which songs had the right tone or chord changes or vibe for the flow of the medley."
It's mid-July when we speak, and Yankovic says, "We recorded it about a month ago. And then we've been working on the video since then. Before recording it, obviously we had to get clearances and permission and there's a bit of arranging of such things. And some permissions were extremely easy to get. Lin-Manuel Miranda's an old friend of mine, so that was me texting him about 'We Don't Talk About Bruno,' and he got back to me like 30 seconds later. Others were a little harder to come by."
One artist in particular didn't give permission to be included: "The one person we never even got a response from was SZA," Yankovic says. "I thought 'Kill Bill' would have been really funny in the polka medley, and we just couldn't get a yes or no or anything. She just would not return our phone calls."
Since the release of his final album, Yankovic's own phone has been ringing off the hook. In 2018, he wrote the "Hamilton Polka," riffing on Miranda's hit Broadway play. Yankovic did several different kinds of tours — ones in which his music was presented stripped-down with minimal instrumentation and no frills, and others that found him accompanied by symphony orchestras and elaborate staging.
And, beyond an array of voice acting roles, he was deeply involved in the years-long production of Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, the award-winning biopic in which he was portrayed by Daniel Radcliffe and contributed new music to its soundtrack.
"I knew when we were making it that it was going to be good," Yankovic says of the film. "But you never know how people are going to react to it. I certainly was flabbergasted by the fact that we got eight Emmy nominations. I've got an Emmy on my shelf over there, just out of arm's reach, so that's a big deal to me."
With an Emmy in his house, plus a previous Grammy win, "Weird Al" Yankovic is now halfway to an EGOT.
"I'm going for it!" he says. "It took me 40 years to get this far. So, in another 40 years, I think I'll get there."