Music Blog

Weird Al Wednesday 3.5.25

Nancy's Notes 🖊️🎶

Hey! Welcome back to Weird Al Wednesday
featuring the comedic genius of Al Yankovic.
“Say, Al! Someone told me you directed the
music for your recording of ‘Jurassic Park’.
That’s amazing! Can you give us a sample
of your crazy-good conducting skills?”

With Steven Spielberg’s blessing, Al takes us on a trip to “Jurassic Park“, parodying the Richard Harris extravaganza, “MacArthur Park”, which Harris insists on calling “MacArthur’s Park”. I wonder how many times the people in the recording studio corrected him before they just gave up. The video is done in Claymation and in the style of Will Vinton’s educational film strip “Dinosaurs! – A Fun-Filled Trip Back in Time!” This is Al’s first video to be done exclusively in animation, which eventually becomes a staple of his later videos. On a personal note, it never gets old seeing Barney’s head ripped off. On another personal note, Jimmy Webb’s “MacArthur Park” has been dissected more times than the frogs in my freshman year high school biology class. In my opinion, it is a brilliant composition.

This is an incredible computer generated video of “MacArthur Park” by Richard Harris (extended version)


LYRICS

[Verse 1]
Spring was never waiting for us, girl
It ran one step ahead
As we followed in the dance
Between the parted pages and were pressed
In love’s hot, fevered iron
Like a striped pair of pants

[Chorus]
MacArthur’s Park is melting in the dark
All the sweet green icing flowing down
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don’t think that I can take it
‘Cause it took so long to bake it
And I’ll never have that recipe again, oh no

[Verse 2]
I recall the yellow cotton dress
Foaming like a wave
On the ground around your knees
The birds like tender babies in your hands
And the old men playing checkers
By the trees

[Chorus]
MacArthur’s Park is melting in the dark
All the sweet green icing flowing down
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don’t think that I can take it
‘Cause it took so long to bake it
And I’ll never have that recipe again, oh no

[Bridge 1]
There will be another song for me
For I will sing it
There will be another dream for me
Someone will bring it
I will drink the wine while it is warm
And never let you catch me
Looking at the sun
And after all the loves of my life
After all the loves of my life
You’ll still be the one

[Bridge 2]
I will take my life into my hands
And I will use it
I will win the worship in their eyes
And I will lose it
I will have the things that I desire
And my passion flow
Like rivers through the sky
And after all the loves of my life
Oh, after all the loves in my life
I’ll be thinking of you
And wondering why

[Instrumental Interlude]

[Chorus]
MacArthur’s Park is melting in the dark
All the sweet green icing flowing down
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don’t think that I can take it
‘Cause it took so long to bake it
And I’ll never have that recipe again
Oh no
Oh no

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Jimmy Webb
MacArthur Park lyrics © Spirit Music Group, Universal Music Publishing Group, Warner Chappell Music, Inc

This is “Jurassic Park” by Weird Al Yankovic. For whatever reason, Al chose not to include the slower bridge section is his parody.

LYRICS

I recall the time they found those fossilized mosquitoes
And before long, they were cloning DNA
Now I’m being chased by some irate velociraptors
Well, believe me this has been one lousy day

Jurassic Park is frightening in the dark
All the dinosaurs are running wild
Someone shut the fence off in the rain
I admit it’s kinda eerie
But this proves my chaos theory
And I don’t think I’ll be coming back again, oh no!

I cannot approve of this attraction
‘Cause getting disemboweled always makes me kinda mad
A huge tyrannosaurus ate our lawyer
Well, I suppose that proves they’re really not all bad

Jurassic Park is frightening in the dark
All the dinosaurs are running wild
Someone let T- Rex out of his pen
I’m afraid those things’ll harm me
‘Cause they sure don’t act like Barney
And they think that I’m their dinner, not their friend, oh no!

Jurassic Park is frightening in the dark
All the dinosaurs are running wild
What a crummy weekend this has been
Well, this sure ain’t no e-ticket
Think I’ll tell them where to stick it
‘Cause I’m never coming back this way again, oh no, oh no!

Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Weird Al Yankovic/Jimmy Webb
Jurassic Park lyrics © White Oak Songs

Thanks to you, my faithful fellow Weirdos, for coming back each Wednesday; this could be the most fun you’ll have all week! Come on back next time when we can embrace the weirdness.

And remember what I like to say …. it’s good to laugh!

That’s all she wrote. See you on the flip side. 😎

NAR©2024

All text, graphics and videos are copyright for Nancy’s Notes 🖊️🎶, The Sicilian Storyteller, The Elephant’s Trunk and The Rhythm Section, et. al., and are not to be used without permission. NAR©2017-present.

32 thoughts on “Weird Al Wednesday 3.5.25”

  4. I sure enjoyed both these videos, and I’d not seen either one before. Al had some clever lyrics to the parody and claymation is so fun to watch. I’m sure it took a long time to do it. The Camelot movie and song done by AI was really good, too. 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

        1. This is what Al had to say: After being hired for the project, they basically turned a private residence in Los Angeles into a clay animation studio. They worked between July and September 1993, and slept in shifts, so that the final project would be ready for its release in October 1993.

          Liked by 1 person

          Reply

  5. Okay, so I just watched that AI video of McArthur Park by Harris, and it cracked me up. Guy riding a tuba, A Scooter Muppet banging on a drumset. Such a silly song, being made proper fun of. And that Harris never got the name of the park correct? Priceless!

    Like

    Reply

  8. Got Me! Never saw that video, funny stuff. A good parody of a good song. Richard Harris was a darn good singer as well as actor. I like Claymation. My cousin, Jok, and me would spend hours building elaborate things out of clay and then destroy them, and that led to blowing up things with firecrackers and Cherry Bombs as we got older. We came close to being juvenile delinquents.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. Hahaha! Can’t beat a good cherry bomb!

      I had completely forgotten about this WA parody. I agree with your assessment of Richard Harris. I don’t know why so many people don’t like this song; I think it’s a masterpiece. Donna Summer’s disco version is a trainwreck.

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      Reply

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