#threebrain

Rest In Peace threebrain.com

1999 - 2021

Thomas Lee, who had made the video for the Star Wars Gangsta Rap, discussed in last week's FLASHBack, was asked to make a video for I'll Sue You, Al's "Style Parody" of Rage Against The Machine.

David Lovelace, the mind behind the Newgrounds series, Retarded Animal Babies, was tapped by Al to make Virus Alert, which was another style parody, this one of the band The Sparks (who regular FLASHBack readers may recall had a keyboardist, Ron Mael, who was the direct inspiration for the look of Roscoe Thunderpants from the Flash-only band Savlonic).

Ren & Stimpy creator and general garbage human being John Kricfalusi was brought in to animate Close But No Cigar, his first time animating in Flash. As with the others this one doesn't parody any specific song, but is instead Al's style parody of the band Cake.

Digital Entertainment company JibJab was hired to apply their animated photocollage style of Flash to Al's Do I Creep You Out?, which finally is an actual direct song parody, in this case of Taylor Hicks' "Do I Make You Proud?".

Doug Bressler, from Doogtoons, made the video for Al's 11 minute epic Trapped in the Drive-Thru. This too, is a song parody, of the even more epic 33 Chapter Rap Opera "Trapped in the Closet" by R. Kelly. There are diagrams. Al's version is simpler at only 3 chapters long but he did get to have his own fun with it. Years earlier he had approached Led Zeppelin about doing a polka medley of their songs for his movie UHF. Jimmy Page declined at the time, but when Al asked him if he could use a sample a few seconds of their song Black Dog to use in this song, Page again said no to the sampling, but did give them the green light for Al's own band to re-record a few seconds of the song's instrumentals. Al's band did such a good job, that many just assume that it was a sample.

  Yankovic kept up the practice for his 2011 release Alpocalypse, but this time around the Flash artists he engaged were the kind who were drawing regular paychecks from their work in the medium.

The video for Skipper Dan, a style parody of the band Weezer, and based on DisneyLand & Disneyworld's Magic Kingdom's Jungle Cruise Ride was by Divya Srinivasan who had previously done music videos in Flash for They Might Be Giants, as well as Flash trailers childrens' books she's self authored and illustrated.

The video for CNR, a style parody of The White Stripes, and celebrating comedian and Hollywood Squares fixture Charles Nelson Reilly, was another JibJab collaboration.

The video for Ringtone, Al's style parody of Queen was animated by the Flash artists responsible for SuperNews! on Current TV.

The video for Whatever You Like, a song parody of the T.I. song of the same name, was done for Al in Flash by Cris Shapan, Lead Artist on Cartoon Network Adult Swim's Tom Goes to the Mayor, Art Director on Season 1 of the Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!, and motion graphics designer from seasons 2 & 3 of Yo Gabba Gabba!

The video for Party in the CIA, a parody of Miley Cyrus's "Party in the U.S.A.", was animated by Ghostbot Inc. the same company that had also used Adobe Flash to create the Erin Esurance ad campaign, a campaign which ultimately had to be pulled when Rule 34 of Erin outstripped search hits for the actual company being advertised by a wide margin.

The video for Another Tattoo, Al's spoof of B.o.B.'s "Nothin' on You", was by Augenblick Studios, who had previously worked on Shorties Watchin' Shorties, Wonder Showzen, Superjail!, Ugly Americans, and the occasional short animation for Yo Gabba Gabba!

The video for If That Isn't Love, a style parody of Hanson, was from Flash animator Brian Frisk of FrownHouse, who had also done segments for Comedy Central's Triptank.

The video for Stop Forwarding That Crap to Me is kinetic typography from Dutch graphic artist Koos Dekker, who unlike the others on this list I can't actually find anything that confirms that this one was actually done in Flash. But I'm throwing it in, just in case (I did read somewhere where someone had guessed that it had been done in Adobe After Effects, so that's gotta count for something.) This song is Yankovic's love letter to producer & songwriter Jim Steinman. Steinman, a long time collaborator with Meat Loaf (and who Meat Loaf describes as "one weird dude") has an immediately recognizable sound even if he's not a household name. He primarily is the songwriter for Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell and Bat Of Hell II, but he also wrote Air Supply's "Making Love Out of Nothing at All", Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart" & "Holding Out For A Hero" and Celine Dion's "It's All Coming Back To Me Now". His musical stylings are ripe for parody, and Al hits it out of the park with this one.

Jimmy Pee Enn Gee