Hey, cool video, I haven't seen anyone else talk about Key of Awesome despite having such vivid memories of it! Small nitpick though: They almost certainly did not have to make fun of the original artists/song in order for the parody to qualify for fair use. Weird Al does get permission before doing all of his parodies, but out of professional courtesy rather than legal necessity. There was even a supreme court case about it, apparently: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campbell_v._Acuff-Rose_Music,_Inc. Basically, the parody just has to be transformative, meaning substantively different from the original work so that it won't "compete" with the original work. The moral here is, don't get information from Quentin Reviews lol
Thank you for the clarification and this important context! I was going by, not just what Quinton Reviews said (haha), but also what Mark Douglas has repeatedly mentioned about being limited by "fair use". But it make sense that anything is fair game as long as they're not in direct competition with the original work. (Although I still think an Uptown Funk parody poking fun at Bruno Mars would go more viral than an Uptown Funk parody about simply being in a bad mood unless it was Weird Al making it. Haha.) I apologize for this oversight, and hope it's okay with you (let me know if it isn't) if I pin this comment so that people will see. Thanks again!
@@fredster2000 Haha was mostly joking about Quentin Reviews. Copyright law is pretty much a mess and hard to understand, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Mark Douglas thought that’s what he had to do for it to be considered fair use. It’s a minor part of the video and doesn’t really affect any points you made. Great video!
@@fredster2000 Not very relevant to this video, but at one point you mention Doug Walker as an online creator that you grew up with, and as someone who also embarrassingly loved Nostalgia Critic videos as a kid, I remember there was one point in his career where RUclips must've just made the copyright claim system stricter so he started this "Where's the Fair Use" campaign, and I think he also used the justification of "criticism is fair use" for why he (and others) shouldn't be copyright claimed. I think this is kind of a unique thing with internet (and especially RUclips) artists, because in the past copyright issues were settled in court, where nuances of any such dispute can actually be examined and copyright isn't settled by just going down a checklist. RUclips's copyright system on the other hand isn't actually bound by any copyright law at all, it's just about making their advertisers comfortable, and so it becomes a very hard line of a video either "violating copyright" or not. And since RUclipsrs can't argue each individual case they also end up trying to fit these really messy legal terms into more rigid fair use-or-not categories. Idk! Sort of interesting. I feel like RUclips copyright stuff is barely talked about at all any more even though the claim/auto-detection system has only more strict over the years. People have just adjusted to it and stopped fighting it I guess?
As much as I hated Bart Baker, his parody of Blurred Lines was spot on. He fully leaned into the genuine issues with that song and Robin Thicke's rapey lyrics.
his parody of Rude (MAGIC!) was also spot on... a story about how an obsessed boyfriend wants to marry the girl he dreams about, even if the father disapproves.. the worst lyric in the original version is "why you gotta be so rude? don't you know I'm human too?" as if the father cares about him..
I'd also add in Anaconda. Admittedly, I'm biased because that song was everywhere when it came out and I was forced to listen to it. So, seeing someone make a parody that points out the vapidness and reliance on sexiness was gratifying.
That's a fair assessment. I agree. RUclips as a platform (minus its users or creators) was exceptionally better in all regards. Dealing with ads now is infuriating,
You are not alone! I found just a bunch of forums about how so many folks loved his parodies growing up but now just cringe watching them back. I read one comment that said "I used to love those videos when I was 9. I guess this is why I'm like this now." Hahaha.
Ugggh similar experience 😭 Same with key of awesome. Tbf, I cringe at old self every 3 years. "Ugh I can't believe I liked this 3 years ago, gonna die from embarrassment"
Never was into Bart Baker, but I did use to religiously watch Shane Dawson’s awful parodies, which I think is a far more embarrassing thing to admit lmao
@@KingofIgors no because me too! And now I’m like 😬 whoops….. it was just the popular thing at the time… we can’t blame our kid selves for being innocent..
One thing I appreciate about KOA is that Mark Douglass didn't make himself the star of every video, which Bart Baker was very guilty of doing. KOA made sure to use singers who are actually pleasant to listen to and actors who at least bare a passing resemblance to whoever they were parodying.
YES! Definitely a factor why Key of Aweome aged so well and Bart Baker's parodies didn't. So much cross-dressing impersonating the popstars. The actors and singers from KOA were insanely good. Shout-out to Tatiana Owens who worked for KOA & impersonated a gazillion different women singers flawlessly.
@@realDonald-trumphe also painted himself black for the pour it up parody. dude could've hired the actress who played rihanna in the "looking at you" and "work" parody
@fredster2000 I still consider KOA's Somebody That I Used to Know peak parody. The chat roulette guy, can't remember his name, had some hilarious videos too, his Wrecking Ball video lives in my head rent free
let's also mention Shane's parody of Blank Space was removed due to gore and the fact that Taylor'd experienced stalking before kinda makes it hard to process.
Bart Baker seemed to dislike a lot if not most of the pop girlies. I seem to remember a lot of things he said that absolutely would not have been okay now
@@wowpoopstaylorsversion3267 yeah. She was literally 13 and he was a grown ass man and he literally sexualised her. As a 13 year old myself, if an adult did something like that to me I would literally cry.
While they've aged terribly I have to shamefully admit that Bart Baker's videos were responsible for teaching me about 90% of the vulgar English slang I know today
i'm glad someone else realized how mean spirited a lot of the parody songs from back in the day were. i grew up on weird al and tom lehrer so my standards might've been too high lol. but it always bugged me how bart baker's parodies of female artists basically boiled down to "HAHA ME STUPID WOMAN"
Yes! I made a comment about this. Many of the parody channel relied on misogyny to create their parodies for the pop girls and men with predominantly female fan bases. And homophobia for the men too
As cringe as they are looking back, you gotta appreciate the work ethic that these channels were pumping out full production parodies damn near the same day the og song dropped 😂
Even as a child, I was so impressed by the set design. I used to watch Bart Baker behind the scenes videos because you could just really see how much effort goes into the visual aspect of the vidoes.
man i still remember watching those bart baker parodies at the ripe age of seven and having no idea what all the innuendoes and sex jokes were about and vibing anyway 😭😭
For me the song was rock you like a hurricane I grew up listening to that kind of rock music and it’s still a great song but it went over my head as a small child lmao, even though it wasn’t even really innuendos it was pretty straightforward 😂
I know it's not quite "old youtube," but I just wouldn't believe that Gangnam Style would've hit 1 million first without all those parodies. That and like, the Harlem Shake were really cultural moments carried by song parody videos being able to get big.
You're right. I do think parodies helped Gangnam Style a lot. I am also convinced you could draw a direct line between Harlem Shake and literally every song that got big on Vine and Tiktok. Harlem Shake feels like Patient 0.
😬 Yeah, that was definitely something that happened when he impersonated Chris Brown and Kanye. And it is reprehensible. I can't possibly excuse or condone it. I just didn't want to include those parts in my main video cause he took the videos down from the channel, and I also didn't to make that kind of expose video. I still felt the need to bring up the trans stuff cause those videos are still up.
I don't know if I imagined this or if she deleted it but I remember Venetian Princess had a video called "Adopt me too" where she sings "i'm not african but I wish that I was" while appearing in blackface
I STILL play the Can’t remember to forget you parody till this day and I just always loved the way The Key Of Awesome would make their parodies seemed fresh
@@famemosterrrrrThe "sensitive generation" that doesn't stand for blackface, misogyny, transphobia, homophobia, fatphobia, and the list goes on? It's ironic that the "legalize humor" crowd is god awful at making jokes. Bart Baker was pitifully unfunny and the majority of his videos were just vicious bigotry with no backbone.
I loved Venetian Princess when I was younger. One of my friends from middle school told me that she was related to her and I thought she was lying (because how many 12 year olds lie about being related to celebrities?) She kept insisting on it but I didn’t believe her until she showed me a picture from a recent family reunion. That’s when I fangirled a bit.
Hahaha. Thank you! I was so proud of that line. And yeah, so many thumbnails looked like that from 2013-2016, but that popularity of that seemed to have waned.
The whole Bart Baker thing is just beyond bizarre. Idk how he convinced so many, er, MATURE individuals to be in his videos. Especially in the beginning when all of them were about creepy old "pdf files". And he definitely wasn't on my list of people most likely to become a Chinese propagandist, yet here we are.
Ooooh, yeah, that is, indeed, one way to look at those uncomfortable early videos. Like, multiple songs about old folks wanting hot young guys. It's so strange.
omg sometimes it feels like i’m the only one who remembers the key of awesome. i used to watch their parodies with my dad. thank you for covering this!!
Fun fact, popular song parodies in the west are as old as at least the 12th century. Medieval trouveres would write something called serventes which were insulting songs commissioned by a nobleman about another nobleman that used the melody of a then popular song precisely because they were meant to spread among the subjects of the target. Also people have been making songs about how other writers and other genres suck for even longer
Even if Bart's content hasn't aged that well, the amount of work put into them is admirable and I find it better than the (Insert Streamer) Reacts to (Insert video) that's got thousands of videos being churned out everyday that flood my feed after watching a video essay like this
Something else that might explain those weird al numbers is that the music videos were originally exclusive to a bunch of different streaming services and only came to RUclips later
That's not true, those videos were on RUclips since the OG days. I clearly remember watching Eat It in 2008. Music streaming didn't even exist back then.
When I was 9 I thought Bart baker parodies were comedy gold. Completely forgot about him for a couple of years until I randomly remembered him again recently and decided to watch one of his parodies again for ‘nostalgia’ omg, I think my skull may have almost collapsed onto itself. The cringe was unbearable. Worst of all I used to watch the parodies at top volume with no headphones or anything right in front of my parents, and I would be genuinely confused as to why they would get upset with me for watching them, cause I was too young to understand what anything in them meant. I so badly wanted to apologise to my parents for everything I put them through when I was 9 💀(btw for anyone who’s curious the parody I watched was the avril lavigne hello kitty parody)
I saw a minecraft parody of 365 On youtube the other day and i was struck with such nostalgia like YES kids are SUPPOSED to be making niche low quality recordings of their own versions of pop songs!!
Yeah! Sometimes, people just wanna dance and have fun, and early 2010's pop just scratched that itch so well. I will always throw on Fame/Fame-Monster Gaga for a night out.
Song parodies, for me at least was a very easy way to learn English at the time or the "slang" like i remember trying to translate both original and parody versions
That is awesome! I'm from the Philippines, so I know a lot of people who learned English primarily through online content. The parody vs. original comparison seems like a particularly good way to do that.
Thanking the RUclips algorithm for sending this my way. I feel honored to be among your first 100 subs. Edit: And I commented this before you even mentioned my king Weird Al. Respect.
I didn't hear of him at the time but Rucka Rucka Ali was around too, my girlfriend remembers hearing his kinda racist Thrift Shop parody about Obama in school
His most known Thrift Shop parody is actually I'm Osama, which was him throwing his own song in his offensive parody factory. Annoyingly offensive but he's somehow still around
I looked for the ruka ruka comment. I remember these and never saw the Bart barker ones actually. I guess my company at the time was much more crude and edgy
Yes, absolutely. Recently did a binge of their stuff (not my first time) and I think most of it holds up extremely well due to their talent and attention to detail.
Oh gosh. Not the token. 🫣🫣🫣 hahahaha. But for real, thank you for watching, and I deeply appreciate the compliment. You may also like @DonnaIRL who is another fantastic video essayist of Filipino descent who makes video essays on online culture.
The only musical “parodies” I remember having any good feelings toward were those “How to Sing Like” videos Ryan Higa made. I still occasionally think of his 2 Chainz segment.
i’d been thinking about how popular parodies were during the early era of youtube & how crazy it is that i watched so much of them. these videos were such a huge part of my online experience during childhood! this was a really awesome video. i think you’re super entertaining to watch & i love your insights + humor. excited to see more from you!
From my point of view, the fact that i.e. Bart Baker re-used the same joke for his Taylor parodies made them very consistent, so you can see them as a whole piece with a consisten story rather than seperate videos.
this was before streaming was commonplace, so most artists were not posting their songs or music videos online for free. for me, watching “like it’s quidditch” that still had the beat of like a g6 was plenty when i really didn’t care about the lyrics. spotify gained popularity in 2013, which is when a lot of the parody trend ended
My cousin liked College Humor music parodies which comes to mind that was also somewhat popular as well. I would like to mention that there were shows before the 2000s that did parodies like In Living Color and Mad TV
I watched a lot of Ryan Higa parodies as a teen and the way that his Gucci Gang as a Country Song is still stuck in my head to the point that I forgot what the original was is insane.
For a while in 2008 and into 2009, Venetian Princess was the most subscribed female RUclipsr and she had a lot more than just the three parody videos. Her whole channel was parody videos and she was within the top ten most subscribed.
When Mark points out that One Thing is the same song as I Want It That Way, that was so iconic. Hahaha. Also, Sleep on You is their best Bieber parody because it implicitly points out how Bieber was just inappropriately young to be doing any of this. Which hits hard knowing how his story turns out.
I remember thinking about 'recording' Taylor's Versions of each parody both Bart and KOA have done of Taylor only for me to find out that I couldn't sing..
Dude, what an incredible amount of research and coverage! You're gonna hit that subscriber growth spurt on this one, I feel it. It's criminal you don't have more already.
That is so kind of you to say. Thank you! I'm just a tiny baby RUclipsr right now, so I'm really not expecting much just yet. But I appreciate this so much.
I was already an adult in the 2010s, so these channels are not childhood memories for me, but that also means I'm old enough for the nostalgia of "better days". Every now and then I still watch random parodies from key of awesome, they were my favorite and I don't think a lot of them are or were mean-spirited. Also a shout-out to The Midnight Beast, loved them and miss them as well.
The fact that Vsauce is the Bearded Nun is absolutely uncanny, I had no idea. 😂 This video is amazing, subscribing instantly I can't wait to see where you take this channel. 💖
"If you can't love me at my Bearded Nun, then you don't deserve me at my VSauce". Hahaha. Thank you so much for the kind words, and there is definitely more videos to come!
This was surprisingly thorough, and the little history lesson on pre-youtube parodies was well structured. The first song parody i watched on RUclips was a Ke$ha TiK ToK parody made by a high schooler with a non-monetized channel. I also remember "The 7 Things I Hate About Miley" parody by two girls on their laptop--just smaller scale stuff that felt more approachable and was a huge hit in middle school. Bart Baker always rubbed me the wrong way, but im fascinated by his descent into "white monkey" jobs in China. In the end, Weird Al, and maybe The Lonely Island, are the parodists I will always come back to, but they are so different from the casual style of old RUclips, which has such charm... This video brought up a lot of memories! Very happy to subscribe
Thank you for the wonderful feedback. Your comment did touch on the endearing amaterurness of early RUclips. Before virality was everyone's primary concern, I remember being a teen just watching other people from halfway around the world just chill and vibe on camera. That is one thing about early RUclips I miss. I didn't want to go too deep into the Bart-Baker-China situation since other creators (like Pinely) have deep-dived on it. Bart insists he loved doing those Chinese tiktoks, and I don't want to speculate how he actually feels. Haha. But it is fascinating! Thank you also for weighing in on all this, and providing that perspective! (EDIT: Weird Al and Lonely Island will live on forever as far as I'm concerned. Hahaha.)
I was born in 2009 but caught this while it was popular. I was in first grade-fifth grade. I cringe when I think of the shit I watched back then, not even just parodies, I die inside everytime.
One early RUclips parodist you didnt mention was ComputerNerd01 with hits like jalapeno (lady gaga’s alejandro) and his tiktok by kesha parody. these follow the same form at Weird Al’s parodies.
My brother had a t shirt with the Creepy Owl from thecomputernerd01's videos that said "THIS GUY IS A CREEP". To this day I only refer to plastic owls as Creepy Owls.
Tbh I don't believe people actually moved on from that kind of comedy. There's always a place somewhere for any kind of content. The real issue here is: RUclips itself. It just keeps on screwing up content maker over and over again, it's 100% valid that everyone started to move to Tiktok, where you can find literally ANYTHING, any kind of content subject, and yes, even including the poorest kinds of humor. Music parodies are thriving there, and they're actually getting the views they barely get here on RUclips. So now you see why the US is trying to hard to ban TT
Idk if the video touches on this since I haven't watched yet but I find it important to mention that most of these parodies/channels were built off of misogyny. The artists made fun of were mostly women or men with a predominantly female fan base. That's not even touching on the lyrical content and the frequent homophobia present there.
oh thank god i thought i was crazy because my younger siblings would put Bart Baker on and i HATED him but i loved Key of Awesome and Venetian Princess THANK YOU SO MUCH
Parody that I can no longer see on RUclips: *Poker face-SW Jabba the Hutt parody. *I kiss a girl but it's an old lady singing the song. *My name is Malfoy(HP My name is slim Shady parody.)
@@fredster2000 update: rewatch some videos featured & Outer Space was the parody I have on the list. Other 2 still could not find them. "My Name if Malfoy" must have been taken down for cipy right reason as it used scene from Harry Potter 1-5. Video was released before Half Blood Prince was released in theaters.
story about the bart baker parody of baby justin bieber "horny" my friend as a kid (we were 11) didnt know what the word horny meant & showed the whole summer camp bc he thought it was funny 😭
You know, I liked and watched some of these parody channels back then as a young teen (specifically KoA - i'm ashamed to admit that I knew all the lyrics to the Not Afraid parody by heart), but even then Bart Baker evoked some primal sense of revulsion in me, so much so that I think he was what totally killed my interest in that genre of online content pretty quickly. Could be that I ended up being gnc and queer, and on some subconscious level I could recognize the fact that subtextually, the punchlines to most of his shit seemed to boil down to 'lmao look at me I'm dressed like a woman, isn't that weird/gross?!!?!', and it didn't sit right with me at all.
YES. I agree with what you said. If I had had more time, I could easily go into how messed up the whole cross-dressing-as-a-punchine was, and how that would distort kids' images of gender non-conforming people growing up. And it wasn't just Bart! It was Shane Dawson and so so many others too. Oh boy, that era was wild.
Kids at school (age 10-12 approx.) would sing these, but I didn't have much internet access back then. The only lyrics I remember are "this song was made by a gay computer" and "my grandmother's nickname is nana". These two get stuck in my head with alarming frequency. 😂
WAIT OMG I FORGOT I did actually watch one or two and I remember can't remember to forget you, but the only line I remember is "ohh Shakira I cannot hear ya" soooooo uhhhh yay for correctly calling me out?
The way I SCREAMED when I saw your name. I remember binge-watching your 'Wait.. Remember' series quite recently. I love animation media channels like yours. (Also thank you for making a video on The Weekenders, the best animated show of the 2000's haha.) You are a legend in my eyes. And thank you for leaving such a kind comment on my tiny baby channel.
@@fredster2000 Hey thanks so much for the kind words, I truly appreciate them! Your content is great and I will be watching as a subscriber! Can't wait to see what else you create!
I loved the Key of Awesome/Barely Political as a kid, but weirdly don’t remember much about the parodies despite watching all of them multiple times. However, there is one skit that continues to live in my head. It was about the Migos recording a song for the Handmaid’s Tale soundtrack. It was from the later years of the channel so I don’t think it was big, but I think about it every time someone asks for my Hulu password or mentions the Bechdel Test. Idk why, maybe it was bc the triplet flow is so catchy or just the absurdity of hearing them sing Bechdel Test! Motherfuckin Bechdel Test
Their 'In the Booth' segments toward the latter end of their channel's run were great cause they were commentary about pop artists and their image without being too mean-spritied.
That's Tatiana Owens! Amazing vocalist, and she also impersonated Rihanna in the same video, as well as Ariana, Iggy Azalea, Meghan Trainor, Taylor Swift, etc.
MAD TV was kinda my first introduction to parody songs as a kid. I still remember the classic parody songs that come from that edgy version of SNL to this day, like Trapped in the Closet, Hiding in my Closet, Bomb Bomb Bomb or Sake of My Fame.
Thank you very much! Speaking of VenetianPrincess, I regret that I didn't include her 7 Things / Miley Cyrus parody, which I actually did remember watching as a teen. And that video even went viral before her Womanizer parody did. (I just forgot about it when I was scripting this haha)
It's actually sad what happened to VenetianPrincess. Despite her early YT success, she struggled financially and became homeless for a while. She survived on fan donations and appears to be stable now
Algorithm brought me here, it heard my call for more video essays. So I shall leave a comment for the algorithm and a thank you for my new binge watch!
OH MY GOD THANK YOU. Dude i used to watch parody videos 24/7…and they the key of awesome left. Then that one dude who does chinese crypto now 😖 Edit: his name is bart baker LMAO
Thank you for also being a Key of Awesome fan. I knew I'd find some of us here out in the wild! Also calling Bart "the one dude who does chinese crypto" is such shade. That is just very funny to me. Hahaha.
I used to love Bart Baker and you’re right by saying I know the words to his parodies more than the actual songs. The key of awesome remember to forget me parody is genuinely one of the best ever too
The part about people knowing the lyrics of the parody better than the original is spot on, I couldn't tell you the lyrics of I'm so Fancy with a gun on my head but boy do I remember the lyrics of I'm so Pregnant and I can still sing it 😂😂😂😂
there’s NO way you only have two videos from the last few weeks. i got halfway through this one and was prepared to binge the entire channel of what i expected to be a seasoned youtuber! great video man, you just gained a subscriber!
All these horrendous song parodies that have aged horribly make me have even more appreciation for weird Al. I can still watch many of his videos and laugh decades after they were made
![Chlöe - Shake (Feat. Jeremih) [Official Visualizer]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/aDs_1ufpfv8/mqdefault.jpg)
Hey, cool video, I haven't seen anyone else talk about Key of Awesome despite having such vivid memories of it!
Small nitpick though: They almost certainly did not have to make fun of the original artists/song in order for the parody to qualify for fair use. Weird Al does get permission before doing all of his parodies, but out of professional courtesy rather than legal necessity. There was even a supreme court case about it, apparently: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campbell_v._Acuff-Rose_Music,_Inc.
Basically, the parody just has to be transformative, meaning substantively different from the original work so that it won't "compete" with the original work.
The moral here is, don't get information from Quentin Reviews lol
I was going to add this!
Thank you for the clarification and this important context! I was going by, not just what Quinton Reviews said (haha), but also what Mark Douglas has repeatedly mentioned about being limited by "fair use". But it make sense that anything is fair game as long as they're not in direct competition with the original work.
(Although I still think an Uptown Funk parody poking fun at Bruno Mars would go more viral than an Uptown Funk parody about simply being in a bad mood unless it was Weird Al making it. Haha.)
I apologize for this oversight, and hope it's okay with you (let me know if it isn't) if I pin this comment so that people will see. Thanks again!
@@fredster2000I was dying for someone to talk about this
@@fredster2000 Haha was mostly joking about Quentin Reviews.
Copyright law is pretty much a mess and hard to understand, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Mark Douglas thought that’s what he had to do for it to be considered fair use. It’s a minor part of the video and doesn’t really affect any points you made. Great video!
@@fredster2000 Not very relevant to this video, but at one point you mention Doug Walker as an online creator that you grew up with, and as someone who also embarrassingly loved Nostalgia Critic videos as a kid, I remember there was one point in his career where RUclips must've just made the copyright claim system stricter so he started this "Where's the Fair Use" campaign, and I think he also used the justification of "criticism is fair use" for why he (and others) shouldn't be copyright claimed.
I think this is kind of a unique thing with internet (and especially RUclips) artists, because in the past copyright issues were settled in court, where nuances of any such dispute can actually be examined and copyright isn't settled by just going down a checklist. RUclips's copyright system on the other hand isn't actually bound by any copyright law at all, it's just about making their advertisers comfortable, and so it becomes a very hard line of a video either "violating copyright" or not. And since RUclipsrs can't argue each individual case they also end up trying to fit these really messy legal terms into more rigid fair use-or-not categories.
Idk! Sort of interesting. I feel like RUclips copyright stuff is barely talked about at all any more even though the claim/auto-detection system has only more strict over the years. People have just adjusted to it and stopped fighting it I guess?
As much as I hated Bart Baker, his parody of Blurred Lines was spot on. He fully leaned into the genuine issues with that song and Robin Thicke's rapey lyrics.
his parody of Rude (MAGIC!) was also spot on... a story about how an obsessed boyfriend wants to marry the girl he dreams about, even if the father disapproves.. the worst lyric in the original version is "why you gotta be so rude? don't you know I'm human too?" as if the father cares about him..
I'd also add in Anaconda.
Admittedly, I'm biased because that song was everywhere when it came out and I was forced to listen to it. So, seeing someone make a parody that points out the vapidness and reliance on sexiness was gratifying.
Literally came just to say this!
I don't think youtube CONTENT used to be better, but youtube itself was better before it was SO ad-heavy
That's a fair assessment. I agree. RUclips as a platform (minus its users or creators) was exceptionally better in all regards. Dealing with ads now is infuriating,
The fact you have to pay for features the website had over ten years ago for free lmao
For me, I predicted YT's quality was going to go down when Vevo started advertising on here. I WAS RIGHT. RAAH 🦅🦅
absolutely; RUclips as a COMPANY were better, but yikes some of the content
Yeah, you could make a small fortune by being a moron, pretty sure COVID wouldn't have hurt that much if the adpocalypses never happened.
I used to be sooo obsessed with Bart Baker parodies. Watching them now I cringe so hard 😭
You are not alone! I found just a bunch of forums about how so many folks loved his parodies growing up but now just cringe watching them back. I read one comment that said "I used to love those videos when I was 9. I guess this is why I'm like this now." Hahaha.
Ugggh similar experience 😭
Same with key of awesome. Tbf, I cringe at old self every 3 years. "Ugh I can't believe I liked this 3 years ago, gonna die from embarrassment"
Never was into Bart Baker, but I did use to religiously watch Shane Dawson’s awful parodies, which I think is a far more embarrassing thing to admit lmao
Oh my God I thought I was the only one!
@@KingofIgors no because me too! And now I’m like 😬 whoops….. it was just the popular thing at the time… we can’t blame our kid selves for being innocent..
bart baker was my skibidi toilet
Bart Baker and also Fred feel like the spiritual predecessors to skibidi toilet. Lol.
felt this hard
real
Same here 😂
@@fredster2000i cant believe that’s a real sentence
One thing I appreciate about KOA is that Mark Douglass didn't make himself the star of every video, which Bart Baker was very guilty of doing. KOA made sure to use singers who are actually pleasant to listen to and actors who at least bare a passing resemblance to whoever they were parodying.
YES! Definitely a factor why Key of Aweome aged so well and Bart Baker's parodies didn't. So much cross-dressing impersonating the popstars. The actors and singers from KOA were insanely good. Shout-out to Tatiana Owens who worked for KOA & impersonated a gazillion different women singers flawlessly.
@@fredster2000 Also, brat brake did blackfac...No, he painted himself BLACK.... to impersonate Kanye West in a parody of Bound 2
@@realDonald-trumphe also painted himself black for the pour it up parody. dude could've hired the actress who played rihanna in the "looking at you" and "work" parody
@fredster2000 I still consider KOA's Somebody That I Used to Know peak parody. The chat roulette guy, can't remember his name, had some hilarious videos too, his Wrecking Ball video lives in my head rent free
And KOA treated every parodied singer the same whereas BB was bashing some of them (TS and Meghan Trainor to mention some)
I remember how much Bart Baker disliked Taylor Swift in his parodies of her songs
None of that would fly now. Lol.
let's also mention Shane's parody of Blank Space was removed due to gore and the fact that Taylor'd experienced stalking before kinda makes it hard to process.
Bart Baker seemed to dislike a lot if not most of the pop girlies. I seem to remember a lot of things he said that absolutely would not have been okay now
@@sugarysubs7821 especially about Rebecca Black
@@wowpoopstaylorsversion3267 yeah. She was literally 13 and he was a grown ass man and he literally sexualised her. As a 13 year old myself, if an adult did something like that to me I would literally cry.
While they've aged terribly I have to shamefully admit that Bart Baker's videos were responsible for teaching me about 90% of the vulgar English slang I know today
Bart Baker was a global phenomenon, an international superstar, you could even say.
same...
Doug Walker was that kind of guy for me.
I am ashamed to say that I was a Bart baker kid. Don’t worry, I got better.
Glad to hear about your recovery! Hahaha.
You aren’t alone, I was too 😭😭
@@majiwarusentosen praying for us 🙏
I was a Bart Baker kid too.. But I've embraced the hell out of it. Damn life was better back then
Same!!!
i'm glad someone else realized how mean spirited a lot of the parody songs from back in the day were. i grew up on weird al and tom lehrer so my standards might've been too high lol. but it always bugged me how bart baker's parodies of female artists basically boiled down to "HAHA ME STUPID WOMAN"
Yes! I made a comment about this. Many of the parody channel relied on misogyny to create their parodies for the pop girls and men with predominantly female fan bases. And homophobia for the men too
Or just straight up racism. Shane dawson had that “humor” as well in his parody
Fr, I mostly stuck to key of awesome cause they had *some* parodies that weren't just mean
+1
Blacken my eye, set fire to my tie
And now we are ruled by Cupcakke and kpop getting remixed together forever
imagine Bart doing a parody of Cupcakke 💀
@@wowpoopstaylorsversion3267I pray to god he doesn't
@@el-karasu6070 I don't think he will since Cupcakke went out with Shane
@@wowpoopstaylorsversion3267 pretty sure that never happened
@@fruitystarstar949 he made a carpool karaoke with Cupcakke
As cringe as they are looking back, you gotta appreciate the work ethic that these channels were pumping out full production parodies damn near the same day the og song dropped 😂
The devil works fast, but Bart Baker works faster. Haha.
Even as a child, I was so impressed by the set design. I used to watch Bart Baker behind the scenes videos because you could just really see how much effort goes into the visual aspect of the vidoes.
dj’s got us falling in love again still gets comments about the minecraft parody
I'm listening to a Resession Pop playlist on Spotify, and every time that song comes on I can only think of the Minecraft parody 😂
man i still remember watching those bart baker parodies at the ripe age of seven and having no idea what all the innuendoes and sex jokes were about and vibing anyway 😭😭
Me, but with the song 'Lady Marmalade' from Moulin Rouge OST. I found out embarrassingly late in life what that song was actually about. Lmao.
For me the song was rock you like a hurricane I grew up listening to that kind of rock music and it’s still a great song but it went over my head as a small child lmao, even though it wasn’t even really innuendos it was pretty straightforward 😂
I know it's not quite "old youtube," but I just wouldn't believe that Gangnam Style would've hit 1 million first without all those parodies. That and like, the Harlem Shake were really cultural moments carried by song parody videos being able to get big.
You're right. I do think parodies helped Gangnam Style a lot. I am also convinced you could draw a direct line between Harlem Shake and literally every song that got big on Vine and Tiktok. Harlem Shake feels like Patient 0.
A year ago, I wanted to torture myself. So, I watched every Bart Baker parody, my mind still hurts from that.
Praying for your speedy recovery. That can cause psychic damage. Haha.
The esekeetit parody actually good tho
My biggest issue with Bart Baker is the blackface.
😬
Yeah, that was definitely something that happened when he impersonated Chris Brown and Kanye. And it is reprehensible. I can't possibly excuse or condone it. I just didn't want to include those parts in my main video cause he took the videos down from the channel, and I also didn't to make that kind of expose video. I still felt the need to bring up the trans stuff cause those videos are still up.
@@fredster2000 He's still got his videos of him as The Weeknd up though. Which definitely border on blackface/brownface... 😬
@@fredster2000 Rihanna too 😞
I don't know if I imagined this or if she deleted it but I remember Venetian Princess had a video called "Adopt me too" where she sings "i'm not african but I wish that I was" while appearing in blackface
@@fredster2000 You used clips of him in blackface though. It's kinda negligible to avoid discussing it.
I STILL play the Can’t remember to forget you parody till this day and I just always loved the way The Key Of Awesome would make their parodies seemed fresh
"Ass Telepathy" still lives rent-free in my head.
SO REAL
@@fredster2000 same with "vocal prison cell"
I used to love Bart Baker back in the day, but rewatching them, good god they meanspirited, misogynistic, and so lowbrow it hurts.
Ands that’s why he left, those parodies wouldn’t slide in this sensitive generation.
@@famemosterrrrrThe "sensitive generation" that doesn't stand for blackface, misogyny, transphobia, homophobia, fatphobia, and the list goes on? It's ironic that the "legalize humor" crowd is god awful at making jokes. Bart Baker was pitifully unfunny and the majority of his videos were just vicious bigotry with no backbone.
@@famemosterrrrrNah he just became a China simp on Douyin. These music videos were expensive to produce.
I loved Venetian Princess when I was younger. One of my friends from middle school told me that she was related to her and I thought she was lying (because how many 12 year olds lie about being related to celebrities?) She kept insisting on it but I didn’t believe her until she showed me a picture from a recent family reunion. That’s when I fangirled a bit.
That basically makes you famous-by-association too! Haha.
"clickbait Cerberus" 😂 youre so right though. Those thimbnails were horrific
Hahaha. Thank you! I was so proud of that line. And yeah, so many thumbnails looked like that from 2013-2016, but that popularity of that seemed to have waned.
The whole Bart Baker thing is just beyond bizarre. Idk how he convinced so many, er, MATURE individuals to be in his videos. Especially in the beginning when all of them were about creepy old "pdf files". And he definitely wasn't on my list of people most likely to become a Chinese propagandist, yet here we are.
Yeah I learned about the old guys while still watching his height, then saw him fumble after the ad crackdown.
Ooooh, yeah, that is, indeed, one way to look at those uncomfortable early videos. Like, multiple songs about old folks wanting hot young guys. It's so strange.
I miss when people would make Smosh-esque sketches of every big moment in pop culture.
1:35 one of those kids here 🙋🏾♀️ I know Bart Baker’s version of Anaconda better than the actual song and that very embarrassing to admit
It really is.
Finding out after all these years that Bart Baker is now an influencer in China is crazy
Key of Awesome was totally my happy place.
It is my happy place too. :(
My grandma used to play the same pop songs on a CD in 2010 over and over until I was sick of them all, KOA was my coping mechanism.
I was so obsessed with key of awesome as a kid....i looked up a video a few years ago and wanted to die.
That's sad honestly their parody still holds up
omg sometimes it feels like i’m the only one who remembers the key of awesome. i used to watch their parodies with my dad. thank you for covering this!!
Thank you for deciding to watch. I'm just glad to see so many people in the comments who remember KOA fondly. Haha.
Fun fact, popular song parodies in the west are as old as at least the 12th century. Medieval trouveres would write something called serventes which were insulting songs commissioned by a nobleman about another nobleman that used the melody of a then popular song precisely because they were meant to spread among the subjects of the target.
Also people have been making songs about how other writers and other genres suck for even longer
Even if Bart's content hasn't aged that well, the amount of work put into them is admirable and I find it better than the (Insert Streamer) Reacts to (Insert video) that's got thousands of videos being churned out everyday that flood my feed after watching a video essay like this
Sorry but Vsause the lore reveal was actually insane, honestly changed my life
Something else that might explain those weird al numbers is that the music videos were originally exclusive to a bunch of different streaming services and only came to RUclips later
That's not true, those videos were on RUclips since the OG days. I clearly remember watching Eat It in 2008. Music streaming didn't even exist back then.
@@bezoekers I am referring specifically to the album Mandatory Fun, which had 8 different videos on 8 different platforms.
When I was 9 I thought Bart baker parodies were comedy gold. Completely forgot about him for a couple of years until I randomly remembered him again recently and decided to watch one of his parodies again for ‘nostalgia’ omg, I think my skull may have almost collapsed onto itself. The cringe was unbearable. Worst of all I used to watch the parodies at top volume with no headphones or anything right in front of my parents, and I would be genuinely confused as to why they would get upset with me for watching them, cause I was too young to understand what anything in them meant. I so badly wanted to apologise to my parents for everything I put them through when I was 9 💀(btw for anyone who’s curious the parody I watched was the avril lavigne hello kitty parody)
I saw a minecraft parody of 365 On youtube the other day and i was struck with such nostalgia like YES kids are SUPPOSED to be making niche low quality recordings of their own versions of pop songs!!
man i remember when everybody claimed to hate pop music back then but looking back some are bops compared to the later 2010s-now
Yeah! Sometimes, people just wanna dance and have fun, and early 2010's pop just scratched that itch so well. I will always throw on Fame/Fame-Monster Gaga for a night out.
Song parodies, for me at least was a very easy way to learn English at the time or the "slang"
like i remember trying to translate both original and parody versions
That is awesome! I'm from the Philippines, so I know a lot of people who learned English primarily through online content. The parody vs. original comparison seems like a particularly good way to do that.
haha same.
Let’s all take a moment and be thankful that Bart Baker quit before he could come for Chappell Roan…
Or worse yet: Charli XCX and brat.
@@fredster2000 THAT TOO
Even more for Taylor Swift's newer productions after LWYMMD.
@@wowpoopstaylorsversion3267 All hail the Queen of 4chan.
Yep. I don't know about Chapel Roan but yo Charli XCX is not it bro I am not a 14 year old bratty girl or a braindead girly pop.
Thanking the RUclips algorithm for sending this my way. I feel honored to be among your first 100 subs.
Edit: And I commented this before you even mentioned my king Weird Al. Respect.
I'm honored that you're here, and willing to listen to my ramblings about pop culture. More to come, and thank you! Also, Weird Al really is the GOAT.
@@fredster2000 a music hall-of-famer in my book
I didn't hear of him at the time but Rucka Rucka Ali was around too, my girlfriend remembers hearing his kinda racist Thrift Shop parody about Obama in school
😬
2012-2015 as really a time for that sorta stuff.
Unfortunately there are still 2 or 3 songs that I hear the Rucka lyrics for every time the song plays.
his voice always gave me a headache, bro sounds like a sinus infection
His most known Thrift Shop parody is actually I'm Osama, which was him throwing his own song in his offensive parody factory. Annoyingly offensive but he's somehow still around
I looked for the ruka ruka comment. I remember these and never saw the Bart barker ones actually. I guess my company at the time was much more crude and edgy
Every now and again I'll remember venetianprincess and davedays fake feud sing off pop tarts marketing campaign.
Not familar with that specifically, but the fake fueds were always fun! Way better than the real fueds we have now. Haha.
i was just wondering if anyone remembered davedays too!
This has really awakened some half forgotten memories.
The key of awesome was my childhood
The Hillywood show also was a parody of movies and tv show with parody songs. I absolutely loved them as a kid.
Yes, absolutely. Recently did a binge of their stuff (not my first time) and I think most of it holds up extremely well due to their talent and attention to detail.
I was looking for someone to mention them. I loved watching their Twilight parodies
My new fav token filipino youtuber who talks at length abt obscure pop culture AAAAA
Oh gosh. Not the token. 🫣🫣🫣 hahahaha. But for real, thank you for watching, and I deeply appreciate the compliment. You may also like @DonnaIRL who is another fantastic video essayist of Filipino descent who makes video essays on online culture.
The only musical “parodies” I remember having any good feelings toward were those “How to Sing Like” videos Ryan Higa made.
I still occasionally think of his 2 Chainz segment.
Ryan Higa is great. Now that's nostalgia.
i’d been thinking about how popular parodies were during the early era of youtube & how crazy it is that i watched so much of them. these videos were such a huge part of my online experience during childhood!
this was a really awesome video. i think you’re super entertaining to watch & i love your insights + humor. excited to see more from you!
DUCKY OF AWESOME😢
Iconic. 🦆
After over ten years, I finally know why a duck showed up when they said that.
From my point of view, the fact that i.e. Bart Baker re-used the same joke for his Taylor parodies made them very consistent, so you can see them as a whole piece with a consisten story rather than seperate videos.
A part of me does admire the lore continuity and ambition.
VenetianPrincess was a huge part of my early 2010's
She sure was for a lot of people! She's great.
this was before streaming was commonplace, so most artists were not posting their songs or music videos online for free. for me, watching “like it’s quidditch” that still had the beat of like a g6 was plenty when i really didn’t care about the lyrics. spotify gained popularity in 2013, which is when a lot of the parody trend ended
“I’m scared! Im old and I’m scared!” Same lol it’s getting bad
My cousin liked College Humor music parodies which comes to mind that was also somewhat popular as well. I would like to mention that there were shows before the 2000s that did parodies like In Living Color and Mad TV
MadTV and In Living Color parodies were huge on RUclips too, but they were obviously illegally uploaded. Haha.
We truly had No idea what chocolate rain was about
We did not deserve that song in that era.
Its a porn parody
I watched a lot of Ryan Higa parodies as a teen and the way that his Gucci Gang as a Country Song is still stuck in my head to the point that I forgot what the original was is insane.
For a while in 2008 and into 2009, Venetian Princess was the most subscribed female RUclipsr and she had a lot more than just the three parody videos. Her whole channel was parody videos and she was within the top ten most subscribed.
My favorite parody has be “Carly Rae Jepsen CALL ME MAYBE - Rolanda & Richard”
WASABI PRODUCTIONS!!! Iused to watch those videos all the time with my friends
I still sing the KOA lyrics to 1D’s “one thing” whenever I hear it. Also, “sleep on you” is low key hilarious
When Mark points out that One Thing is the same song as I Want It That Way, that was so iconic. Hahaha.
Also, Sleep on You is their best Bieber parody because it implicitly points out how Bieber was just inappropriately young to be doing any of this. Which hits hard knowing how his story turns out.
Same!!!
I remember thinking about 'recording' Taylor's Versions of each parody both Bart and KOA have done of Taylor only for me to find out that I couldn't sing..
Key of Awesome was my jam. I still watch those videos whenever I need a good laugh. I also can't believe I used to watch Bart Baker too.
Dude, what an incredible amount of research and coverage! You're gonna hit that subscriber growth spurt on this one, I feel it. It's criminal you don't have more already.
That is so kind of you to say. Thank you! I'm just a tiny baby RUclipsr right now, so I'm really not expecting much just yet. But I appreciate this so much.
Incredible research and effort that went into clipping all these RUclips classics. Nice video!
Indeed, The Lonely Island and The Key of Awesome absolutely deserve to be in the parthenon of "RUclips classics". Haha. Thank you so much!
I was already an adult in the 2010s, so these channels are not childhood memories for me, but that also means I'm old enough for the nostalgia of "better days". Every now and then I still watch random parodies from key of awesome, they were my favorite and I don't think a lot of them are or were mean-spirited.
Also a shout-out to The Midnight Beast, loved them and miss them as well.
The fact that Vsauce is the Bearded Nun is absolutely uncanny, I had no idea. 😂 This video is amazing, subscribing instantly I can't wait to see where you take this channel. 💖
"If you can't love me at my Bearded Nun, then you don't deserve me at my VSauce". Hahaha. Thank you so much for the kind words, and there is definitely more videos to come!
I’m happy my algo served me this, as this was extremely detailed and thoughtful. Love seeing this kind of work coming from new creators, keep it up!
Really appreciate this feedback! Thank you!
Venetianprincess deserved more respect than that tbh, she ruled the early parody days.
This was surprisingly thorough, and the little history lesson on pre-youtube parodies was well structured. The first song parody i watched on RUclips was a Ke$ha TiK ToK parody made by a high schooler with a non-monetized channel. I also remember "The 7 Things I Hate About Miley" parody by two girls on their laptop--just smaller scale stuff that felt more approachable and was a huge hit in middle school. Bart Baker always rubbed me the wrong way, but im fascinated by his descent into "white monkey" jobs in China. In the end, Weird Al, and maybe The Lonely Island, are the parodists I will always come back to, but they are so different from the casual style of old RUclips, which has such charm... This video brought up a lot of memories! Very happy to subscribe
Thank you for the wonderful feedback. Your comment did touch on the endearing amaterurness of early RUclips. Before virality was everyone's primary concern, I remember being a teen just watching other people from halfway around the world just chill and vibe on camera. That is one thing about early RUclips I miss.
I didn't want to go too deep into the Bart-Baker-China situation since other creators (like Pinely) have deep-dived on it. Bart insists he loved doing those Chinese tiktoks, and I don't want to speculate how he actually feels. Haha. But it is fascinating!
Thank you also for weighing in on all this, and providing that perspective! (EDIT: Weird Al and Lonely Island will live on forever as far as I'm concerned. Hahaha.)
I was born in 2009 but caught this while it was popular. I was in first grade-fifth grade. I cringe when I think of the shit I watched back then, not even just parodies, I die inside everytime.
disney princess shake it off had me in a chokehold for like 3 years of my life for no good reason 😭😭
born too late to be times person of the year smh 😔
I was born 2010 so I kinda missed it and watched the 3 am click bait and “I shipped myself in a box” videos instead😭
@@minecraftwithgadget1848 Born too late for everything smh
One early RUclips parodist you didnt mention was ComputerNerd01 with hits like jalapeno (lady gaga’s alejandro) and his tiktok by kesha parody. these follow the same form at Weird Al’s parodies.
yesss he was my fav
My brother had a t shirt with the Creepy Owl from thecomputernerd01's videos that said "THIS GUY IS A CREEP". To this day I only refer to plastic owls as Creepy Owls.
thecomputernerd01's parodies were my favs like those were peak tbh
Tbh I don't believe people actually moved on from that kind of comedy. There's always a place somewhere for any kind of content. The real issue here is: RUclips itself. It just keeps on screwing up content maker over and over again, it's 100% valid that everyone started to move to Tiktok, where you can find literally ANYTHING, any kind of content subject, and yes, even including the poorest kinds of humor. Music parodies are thriving there, and they're actually getting the views they barely get here on RUclips. So now you see why the US is trying to hard to ban TT
Idk if the video touches on this since I haven't watched yet but I find it important to mention that most of these parodies/channels were built off of misogyny. The artists made fun of were mostly women or men with a predominantly female fan base. That's not even touching on the lyrical content and the frequent homophobia present there.
That parody of Stitches turned too gay in the end
I don't know if you already watched the video yet, but yes he does mention that.
@KamenSentaiMetalHero I have by now, lol. I wished it had been a bit more in-depth.
oh thank god i thought i was crazy because my younger siblings would put Bart Baker on and i HATED him but i loved Key of Awesome and Venetian Princess THANK YOU SO MUCH
u should def do a video about those short skits youtubers like smosh, shane dawson, etc, made in like 2011-2015 and they called them "spoof"
Parody that I can no longer see on RUclips:
*Poker face-SW Jabba the Hutt parody.
*I kiss a girl but it's an old lady singing the song.
*My name is Malfoy(HP My name is slim Shady parody.)
Those all sound very vaguely familiar, and I will definitely check them out because they all sound like peak-2009.
@@fredster2000 update: rewatch some videos featured & Outer Space was the parody I have on the list. Other 2 still could not find them. "My Name if Malfoy" must have been taken down for cipy right reason as it used scene from Harry Potter 1-5. Video was released before Half Blood Prince was released in theaters.
I think you can still find that IKAG video (Venetian Princess remix)
The early days of RUclips was probably the last great internet frontier before everything became monetized and corporate. Those were the days.
i’m so glad someone is finally talking about this, i used to be obsessed with song parody channels + epic rap battles of history
story about the bart baker parody of baby justin bieber "horny" my friend as a kid (we were 11) didnt know what the word horny meant & showed the whole summer camp bc he thought it was funny 😭
You know, I liked and watched some of these parody channels back then as a young teen (specifically KoA - i'm ashamed to admit that I knew all the lyrics to the Not Afraid parody by heart), but even then Bart Baker evoked some primal sense of revulsion in me, so much so that I think he was what totally killed my interest in that genre of online content pretty quickly. Could be that I ended up being gnc and queer, and on some subconscious level I could recognize the fact that subtextually, the punchlines to most of his shit seemed to boil down to 'lmao look at me I'm dressed like a woman, isn't that weird/gross?!!?!', and it didn't sit right with me at all.
YES. I agree with what you said. If I had had more time, I could easily go into how messed up the whole cross-dressing-as-a-punchine was, and how that would distort kids' images of gender non-conforming people growing up. And it wasn't just Bart! It was Shane Dawson and so so many others too. Oh boy, that era was wild.
Kids at school (age 10-12 approx.) would sing these, but I didn't have much internet access back then. The only lyrics I remember are "this song was made by a gay computer" and "my grandmother's nickname is nana". These two get stuck in my head with alarming frequency. 😂
WAIT OMG I FORGOT I did actually watch one or two and I remember can't remember to forget you, but the only line I remember is "ohh Shakira I cannot hear ya" soooooo uhhhh yay for correctly calling me out?
This was such a fun nostalgic throwback! Thanks for making a really interesting and fun video!
The way I SCREAMED when I saw your name. I remember binge-watching your 'Wait.. Remember' series quite recently. I love animation media channels like yours. (Also thank you for making a video on The Weekenders, the best animated show of the 2000's haha.) You are a legend in my eyes. And thank you for leaving such a kind comment on my tiny baby channel.
@@fredster2000 Hey thanks so much for the kind words, I truly appreciate them! Your content is great and I will be watching as a subscriber! Can't wait to see what else you create!
I used to look forward Bart Baker upload days 😂😂 what a time
I loved the Key of Awesome/Barely Political as a kid, but weirdly don’t remember much about the parodies despite watching all of them multiple times. However, there is one skit that continues to live in my head. It was about the Migos recording a song for the Handmaid’s Tale soundtrack. It was from the later years of the channel so I don’t think it was big, but I think about it every time someone asks for my Hulu password or mentions the Bechdel Test. Idk why, maybe it was bc the triplet flow is so catchy or just the absurdity of hearing them sing
Bechdel Test!
Motherfuckin Bechdel Test
Their 'In the Booth' segments toward the latter end of their channel's run were great cause they were commentary about pop artists and their image without being too mean-spritied.
damn that KOA singer absolutely nailed the shakira impression
That's Tatiana Owens! Amazing vocalist, and she also impersonated Rihanna in the same video, as well as Ariana, Iggy Azalea, Meghan Trainor, Taylor Swift, etc.
MAD TV was kinda my first introduction to parody songs as a kid. I still remember the classic parody songs that come from that edgy version of SNL to this day, like Trapped in the Closet, Hiding in my Closet, Bomb Bomb Bomb or Sake of My Fame.
I wanted to include a segment on MadTV parodies on RUclips, but those were illegally uploaded even though they got kinda viral. Haha.
@@fredster2000if we see their parodies from current perspective, their most shocking parody would be of Baby one more time.
What an era
i was so obsessed with bart but i regret it now but i loved key of awesome so much and sad they stopped
God, I Miss Parody RUclips
But does anyone remember Rucka Rucka Ali? Those videos were so great when I was a teen
The VenetianPrincess parodies were definitely my favourite, I still get some of those stuck in my head to this day. Awesome video!
Thank you very much! Speaking of VenetianPrincess, I regret that I didn't include her 7 Things / Miley Cyrus parody, which I actually did remember watching as a teen. And that video even went viral before her Womanizer parody did. (I just forgot about it when I was scripting this haha)
It's actually sad what happened to VenetianPrincess. Despite her early YT success, she struggled financially and became homeless for a while. She survived on fan donations and appears to be stable now
I didn't realize that had happened to her. That's so sad. Glad she's doing better now!
Her lady gaga outerspace parody still pops in my head to this day 😂
Algorithm brought me here, it heard my call for more video essays. So I shall leave a comment for the algorithm and a thank you for my new binge watch!
Thank YOU for stopping by, and I will absolutely provide more video essays that you may like in the coming weeks, hopefully!
OH MY GOD THANK YOU. Dude i used to watch parody videos 24/7…and they the key of awesome left. Then that one dude who does chinese crypto now 😖
Edit: his name is bart baker LMAO
Thank you for also being a Key of Awesome fan. I knew I'd find some of us here out in the wild! Also calling Bart "the one dude who does chinese crypto" is such shade. That is just very funny to me. Hahaha.
@@fredster2000 I forgot his name, i knew it started with B but when i played the video u said it 😭
Another legend from the peak-parody era was TheComputerNerd01. Bro literally said let’s punch Captain Crunch then we’ll eat his face for lunch hahaha
I used to love Bart Baker and you’re right by saying I know the words to his parodies more than the actual songs. The key of awesome remember to forget me parody is genuinely one of the best ever too
Just waiting for my wedding night to play "I Just Had Sex"
Ugh I stopped watching Bart baker after the blank space parody, wasn’t even a fan of swift then, but somehow it made me cringe so bad
Bart Baker OWNED that genre
True. For better or worse, he's who most Zoomers associate with for any kind of music or music video parody. Haha.
The part about people knowing the lyrics of the parody better than the original is spot on, I couldn't tell you the lyrics of I'm so Fancy with a gun on my head but boy do I remember the lyrics of I'm so Pregnant and I can still sing it 😂😂😂😂
"I'M OLD AND I'M SCARED" I felt that in my creaky bones.
See you in the retirement home!
Your narrative style is amazing, well researched yet personal and fun c: can't wait to see where your channel goes!
Wow. That is incredibly kind of you. Will keep this comment close to my heart. Thank you!
I love that these youtube parodies are like, what weird al was to the 80s/90s. Human creativity and resources are fascinatingggggg.
there’s NO way you only have two videos from the last few weeks. i got halfway through this one and was prepared to binge the entire channel of what i expected to be a seasoned youtuber! great video man, you just gained a subscriber!
That is so kind of you. I am really just a tiny baby RUclipsr so this comment means the world. Thank you!
All these horrendous song parodies that have aged horribly make me have even more appreciation for weird Al. I can still watch many of his videos and laugh decades after they were made
Not to exaggerate, but The Key of Awesome basically formed me into the person I am.
Honestly, same.