Al’s worst selling album of new material. And not really a surprise, since the album itself got no promotion at all (they were focused on promoting the film itself, which still managed to be a flop), and it was usually cataloged in the soundtrack section of Sam Goody, rather than in the comedy section, so many people didn’t even know it existed. This album had all of the music from UHF which Al wrote (he didn’t compose the score, except for Fun Zone, the clubhouse theme song), a couple of non-music skits from the film (which I’m leaving off this poll since they aren’t songs)…but it also had about a half hour of Other Stuff, parodies and originals that were typical Weird Al album material. This album would be one of a number of bad decisions Al made at this point in his career, resulting in that hilarious King of the Hill exchange (Al Yankovic blew his brains out in the late 80s when people stopped buying his records). I personally think he should have held onto the non-film song/parodies and released a real album in 1990 that wasn’t connected to UHF. He even could have carried over Beverly Hillbillies and UHF the song to it.
I’m gonna have a tough time picking between Generic Blues and Twine, both amazing originals which have probably been overlooked by most of his casual fans, and also had incredible live performances.
A bit of trivia:
The Beverly Hillbillies covers have been around since before Al even had a band. It was originally sung to Miss You by the Rolling Stones, and then to Let’s Go Crazy by Prince. They finally got approval from the Dire Straights to do Money For Nothing, but under the conditions that the original song stay in the title, and that Mark Knoffler play the guitar part for Al’s version.
This was the first album with a rap parody
This was the last album to get released on vinyl
This was the only album with an instrumental track
This album had the shortest song and at its time, the longest song
Don’t be discouraged! As your OP noted, this one was an unjustly neglected, low-selling album. Plus, it’s the weekend.
But there’s some good stuff on this album! “Beverly Hillbillies” is brilliant; the “UHF” title song isn’t particularly funny but works just fine as a movie theme; and “Spam” is Al’s best song about processed lunch meat. But I had to give the nod to “Biggest Ball of Twine.”
It’s actually really tough to choose between UHF and Beverly Hillbillies. Both are excellently done songs, even if UHF isn’t that funny of a song. The music video for UHF is better than the video for Beverly Hillbillies mainly due to the rapid-fire artist parodies.
But as the songs by themselves go, Beverly Hillbillies takes it. It’s one of those parodies that manages to outdo the already-excellent original, which is pretty funny considering a couple of the Dire Straits guys were in on the parody recording.
Tough call, but Generic Blues got my vote. The lyrics are some of my all-time Al favorites (“My brothers and sisters all hated me, 'cause I was an only child…”) And heck, when I was listening to a Tom Morello guitar solo this afternoon, I was reminded of the solo in GB and Al’s, “Okay, now make it shut up.”
If I could vote for more than one, it’d be a 3-way tie with GB, Biggest Ball of Twine, and Let Me Be Your Hog. (BABYBABYBABYBABYBABABABABABABABABABA–zzzppp!)
Absolutely concur on both counts.
“I ain’t got no money,
I’m just walkin’ down the road.
Said I ain’t got no money, honey,
I’m just walkin’ down this lonely ol’ road.
I wish I could get me some money,
But I forgot my automated teller code.” Slays me every time.
Slays me every time.