Fat (song)

"Fat"
Single by "Weird Al" Yankovic
from the album Even Worse
B-side"You Make Me"
ReleasedApril 12, 1988 (1988-04-12)
RecordedFebruary 18, 1988
Genre
Length3:36
LabelScotti Brothers
Composer(s)Michael Jackson
Lyricist(s)"Weird Al" Yankovic
Producer(s)Rick Derringer
"Weird Al" Yankovic singles chronology
"Christmas at Ground Zero"
(1986) 		"Fat"
(1988) 		"Lasagna"
(1988)
Music video
"Fat" on YouTube

"Fat" is a song by "Weird Al" Yankovic. It is a parody of "Bad" by Michael Jackson and is Yankovic's second parody of a Jackson song, the first being "Eat It", a parody of Jackson's "Beat It". "Fat" is the first song on Yankovic's Even Worse album.

The video won a Grammy Award for Best Concept Music Video in 1988.[1]

Background

Yankovic was inspired to create "Fat" while watching the "Bad" music video, when he had an epiphany that a parody of that song titled "Fat" would be a good sequel to "Eat It" (a previous Weird Al Michael Jackson parody). While watching the "Bad" video, he imagined an obese version of himself trying to get through the turnstiles on a subway, and resolved that he would do it.[2]

Concert version

When performing in concert, Yankovic wears a costume that makes his body appear pudgy, along with a mask that makes his face look fat. Due to undergoing laser vision correction surgery, he no longer needs to wear glasses, though he wears glasses with non-prescription plastic lenses in order to help hold on the mask.[3]

Yankovic elected not to perform the song or his other Jackson parody, "Eat It", during the Strings Attached Tour in the wake of the HBO documentary Leaving Neverland, in which two men claimed Jackson had sexually abused them when they were children. "I don't know if that's going to be permanent or not," Yankovic said of the decision. "But we just felt that with what's happened recently with the HBO documentaries, we didn't want anybody to feel uncomfortable."[4]

Track listing

  1. "Fat" – 3:36
  2. "You Make Me" – 3:04

Music video

Directed by Jay Levey,[5] the video for "Fat" parodies various elements of the "Bad" video by Jackson; Yankovic was able to get permission from Michael Jackson to use the same subway set from "Bad" for the video, which had yet to be struck in Culver City.[6] Jackson had built an exact replica of the original set for the movie Moonwalker to be used in the segment called "Badder", and before striking it, he offered to allow Yankovic to use it.[7]

The fat suit was created by Camilla Henneman. The circumference of the suit was 111 inches (2,800 mm). The makeup was created by Kevin Yagher, who later worked with Yankovic on the film UHF. Latex bladders were glued to Yankovic's face, along with similar air pockets through his clothes.[6]

Chart performance

See also

References

  1. ^ "GRAMMY Winners Search". grammy.com. Archived from the original on 2008-12-24. Retrieved 2008-01-13.
  2. ^ "The History Behind 12 Great Weird Al Videos". 15 July 2014.
  3. ^ "Ask Al, January 2000". weirdal.com. Archived from the original on 2010-06-24. Retrieved 2010-04-30.
  4. ^ Graff, Gary (2019-06-27). "'Weird Al' Yankovic Explains His Decision to Drop Michael Jackson Parodies From Set List". Billboard. Retrieved 2019-06-29.
  5. ^ "mvdbase.com - 'Weird Al' Yankovic - "Fat"". www.mvdbase.com.
  6. ^ a b Suskind, Alex (July 15, 2014). "The History Behind 12 Great Weird Al Videos". Vulture. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  7. ^ Yankovic, Weird Al (2011-06-09). "Michael Jackson Remembered: "Weird Al" Yankovic on Imitation as Flattery". Rolling Stone. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
  8. ^ "%22Weird Al%22 Yankovic – Fat". ARIA Top 50 Singles. Retrieved October 28, 2022.
  9. ^ "%22Weird Al%22 Yankovic – Fat". Top 40 Singles. Retrieved October 28, 2022.
  10. ^ "Official Singles Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. Retrieved October 28, 2022.
  11. ^ "Top Selling Singles of 1988". The Official New Zealand Music Chart. Retrieved 2023-01-08.