Back in the day, when two artists didn’t like each other, they’d deal with it in relatively low-profile ways: A snippy backstage comment, or a pointed interview comment. Maybe they’d toss in a lyrical jab, the way Lynyrd Skynyrd did toward Neil Young on “Sweet Home Alabama,” but that would be just about it. That’s all changed. If, say, the Kurt Cobain/Axl Rose VMA-backstage kerfuffle had happened today, the resounding Twitterpocalypse would have the over-capacity whale showing up for three solid days whenever you tried to reload the site. And every time an artist is even vaguely annoyed at something another artist says or does, they seem to get on their blackberries to air it out. Impulse control, after all, is a tough thing to master when you’ve got a computer sitting in front of you and a few hundred thousand followers eager to soak up whatever you might give them. Meanwhile, sites like ours live for these instantaneous bursts of conflict because, honestly, who doesn’t love reading about this stuff? So here we are: The unranked list of 2011′s biggest, dumbest, best inter-band squabbles.

When life champions collide:

(via TeamCoco)

Weird Al has a new album out next week and as you might’ve guessed it includes a medley of polka versions of recent pop hits. Check out the song below and see if you can name all fourteen songs he’s covering.

Read More...

Weird Al told the New York Times that Lady Gaga personally said no, but the always-vague “sources close to the singer” told TMZ that she hasn’t even heard the “Born This Way” parody yet, let alone vetoed it. Weird Al put the parody on YouTube, so you can judge it yourself. Think Lady Gaga should approve this?

Read More...

As mentioned, Dresden Doll Amanda Palmer’s teamed up with Jason Webley for the concept album Evelyn Evelyn, about a pair of fictional conjoined twins who have a really stocked rolodex. The guest list is sprawling, a lively slice thereof — including Andrew W.K., “Weird Al,” and graphic novelist/Palmer fiancé Neil Gaiman — turn up on “My Space,” which hits like the theme song to Cheers gone ’80s power ballad. The theme is finding your place, which makes the track’s most notable cameo a little more poignant: one Frances Bean Cobain, the living embodiment of Nobody’s Daughter (legally speaking), making her recorded vocal debut somewhere inside the mesh of voices lining the song (tough to say who’s doing what away from Palmer and Webley). She’s already a sharp dresser, now a recording artist; no wonder Palmer says Frances has “got her shit together.” All told an unexpectedly busy day for the Love/Cobain gene pool, no?

Read More...

Well, this had to have been the the best thing to attend on so many levels. Background: Jennifer Bertrand, a friend of Frank Black’s wife Violet Clark, has a son named Winston, a ten-month old born with “two rare and complex malformations called lymphatic and venous malformations.” They threaten his life, and his health care costs are astronomical. You can donate, and/or you could have spent $25 and gone to the Echoplex Tuesday night for Pixies (sans Kim Deal, who was in London) and so any of their friends, performing nonstop from 8PM to nearly 2 in the morning. Photographer Andrew Youssef attended and the play-by-play he sent over is staggering. Some highlights (i.e. practically the entire evening):

Read More...

So far on his Internet Leaks EP, Al’s played around with T.I. and the Doors before actually getting weirdly serious, but for now he’s back to the good times pop cultural mishmashing shtick, bringing a Jack and Meg-styled thump to “CNR” — as in Charles Nelson Riley, whose virtues are extolled Chuck Norris facts style. Or maybe ala Bill Brasky. The JibJab crew created a video for the track which is another perfect pairing, unless you are averse to animated manatee humping.

Read More...

Divya Srinivasan made an animated video for the latest single from Al’s “Internet Leaks” collection. While not a parody of anything and actually kind of depressing, it sounds a lot like Fountains Of Wayne. Watch at Videogum.

There are very few constants in life. Friends move. Loved ones die. Americans lack the job security they once considered a reliable fact of quotidian life. But through it all there is Weird Al.

With the Western world’s financial system crumbling, it’s notable that our nation’s #1 single is T.I.’s ode to getting his girl high priced tequila and bottle service all night long (among other things). The irony’s not lost on me, and the irony’s never lost on “Weird Al.” In honor of the moment, Yankovic has rush released a parody of the track straight to iTunes, marking the first time he didn’t bother to pun on a song title (“Whatever You Like” fits his version well, too, if whatever you like is tater tots and clipping coupons) and also the first time he’s parodied a #1 jam while it was still a #1 jam. He explains as only he can:

Read More...