Music / Even Worse

Think you're bad, Michael?

Even Worse is the fifth studio album by "Weird Al" Yankovic, released in 1988 through Rock 'n' Roll Records in North America and Scotti Bros. Records in Europe. It is notably Al's best-selling album to date, and was seen as a return to form for him both critically and commercially after his previous album, Polka Party!, had put his career in a bit of a slump.

Tracklist:

Side One

1. "Fat"^note Parody of Michael Jackson's "Bad." To date, the only time Al has parodied the same artist more than once.
2. "Stuck In The Closet With Vanna White"
3. "(This Song's Just) Six Words Long"^note Parody of "Got My Mind Set On You" as performed by George Harrison
4. "You Make Me"
5. "I Think I'm A Clone Now"^note Parody of "I Think We're Alone Now" as performed by Tiffany

Side Two

1. "Lasagna"^note Parody of "La Bamba" as performed by Los Lobos
2. "Melanie"
3. "Alimony"^note Parody of "Mony Mony" as performed by Billy Idol
4. "Velvet Elvis"
5. "Twister"
6. "Good Old Days"

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This album's just six tropes long. (Actually, it's longer that that!)

• All Just a Dream: "Stuck in the Closet with Vanna White" is about a string of these.
• Anaphora: Most of the lines in "You Make Me" begin with the song's title:
  You make me wanna slam my head against the wall
  You make me do the limbo
  You make me wanna buy a slurpee at the mall
  You make me watch The Gong Show
• Anti-Love Song: "Melanie", with Al as a Stalker with a Crush.
• Big Eater: "Fat" is sung from the perspective of one. One lyric mentions, "When you're only having seconds, I'm having 23rds."
• Black Comedy
  • "Good Old Days" is a sentimental reminiscence from the POV of a literal psychopath.
  • "Melanie" is about stalking a woman he barely knows, ending with him killing himself.
• Blatant Lies: "(This Song's Just) Six Words Long" is lyrically longer than that.
• Chirping Crickets: In the subway station after Al changes into his leather gear and his fat guy posse show up in the video for "Fat".
• Comedic Sociopathy: "Good Old Days", which has the narrator nostalgically reminiscence about his adolescence, where he tortured animals, and committed arson, assault, and kidnapping.
• Divorce Assets Conflict: The subject of "Alimony".
• Face on the Cover: "Weird Al" dressed as Michael Jackson, parodying the cover of his album Bad.
• Fat and Proud: The subject of "Fat".
• Fat Comic Relief: Considering the nature of Al's parodies, everyone in the music video for "Fat" is this.
• Food Songs Are Funny: "Fat" and "Lasagna".
• Gratuitous Italian: Parodied in "Lasagna" which names many Italian foods while rattling off Italian phrases.
• "How I Wrote This Article" Article: "(This Song's Just) Six Words Long" is about this, with "Weird Al" Yankovic spouting verse about how he can't think of any lyrics, so he'll just repeat old ones.
• In the Style of:
  • "Stuck In The Closet With Vanna White" - Van Halen and Aerosmith
  • "You Make Me" - Oingo Boingo (particularly "Grey Matter")
  • "Velvet Elvis" - The Police (particularly "Driven To Tears")
  • "Twister" - The Beastie Boys
  • "Good Old Days" - James Taylor
• Lyrical Cold Open: "Melanie".
• Lyrical Dissonance:
  • "Good Old Days", a James Taylor-esque folk ballad about childhood. However, this particular childhood involved torturing rats with hacksaws, burning down a corner store and brutally beating the shop owner, and taking a girl from highschool to a dance, and then abducting her, shaving her bald, and abandoning her in the desert tied to a chair. Al has said the song was an attempt to write a collaboration between Taylor and Charles Manson.
  • "Melanie", a mellow pop rock song about a stalker who peeps at the titular woman through her bathroom window and does multiple creepy things like sifting through her garbage, giving her cat a mohawk, and tattooing her name across his forehead before finally jumping off the floor of his apartment's sixteen-story window after she rejects him.
• Miniscule Rocking: "Twister", coming in at 1 minute 7 seconds.
• Money, Dear Boyinvoked: In-song reason for making "(This Song’s Just) Six Words Long", which may be a shot at the writers of the original, "Got My Mind Set on You".
• Money Song: "Alimony", which is about not having enough money anymore because it's all going to the ex-spouse.
• Naughty Birdwatching: "Melanie".
• One-Woman Song: "Melanie" and "Stuck In The Closet With Vanna White".
• Parody Assistance: Michael Jackson donated the subway set used for "Badder" (the kid version of "Bad" filmed for Moonwalker) to Yankovic for his parody "Fat".
• Posthumous Narration: "Melanie" ends with the singer revealing that he jumped to his death after Melanie rejected him, but isn't going to let a little thing like being deceased keep him from continuing to stalk his object of affection.
• Record Producer: Rick Derringer.
• Shout-Out: According to "Fat", Al's shadow weighs 42 pounds, a possible reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He also eats twenty-thirds when others are having seconds, another possible reference to The Illuminatus! Trilogy.
• Stalker with a Crush: "Melanie". Complete with peeping into her bathroom with a telescope and being willing to jump out a 16 story window for her love. Even being dead cannot stop him.
• Subverted Rhyme Every Occasion: In "(This Song's Just) Six Words Long":
  I know if I put my mind to it
  I know I could find a good rhyme here ^note Probably a rip on the parodied song rhyming the word "it" with ..."it."
• Talking with Signs: In the final chorus of the video for "Fat," Al sings two "Woo!"s, then holds up a cardboard speech bubble for the final one.
• Too Many Belts: One of the parodic elements of the cover is how Al's jacket has even more belts than Michael Jackson's in Bad. The single for "Fat" has them popping as his Balloon Belly inflates.

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