Weird Al Yankovic - Hardware Store
Artist: Weird Al Yankovic
Track: Hardware Store
It’s fashionable to argue that Christopher Hitchens is a ghastly, spit-flecked cretin; but no-one ever thinks to mention the five pounds twenty he raised for thalidomide victims in the Burwell Fun Run. Similarly, mention the name ‘Weird Al Yankovic’ to Average Joe on the street and he’ll conjure up an image of that disheveled whimsy merchant who parodied ‘Beat it’ as ‘Eat it’. Average Joe, you have erred!
Yankovic is far more than a food-obsessed loon trading on a hackneyed ‘white nerd’ stereotype. His original compositions are, surprisingly, often joyous and chaotic. This song has everything: a stabbing riff, a jauntily danceable chorus and an intro featuring the unmistakable sound of a plytooth saw. Yankovic- as-composer is a deft craftsman fashioning surreal sculptures with a click of his fingers. Whereas Yankovic-as-parodist generates about as much goodwill as a certain gin-soaked British journalist.
