"Weird Al" Yankovic is nowhere to be found on the singles or albums charts at the moment. But he hasn't budged from the Top 30 playlist of Radio Disney since his "Star Wars" parody "The Saga Begins" was issued last summer.
That may or may not make him "The Elvis of Radio Disney," as he says over the phone from Los Angeles.But the king of pop parody certainly must have a lot of younger fans since the kids' radio station adopted his work.
"I wouldn't say that exactly," says Yankovic, who was to open his 2000 tour this week.
"My audience has always been pretty multigenerational. Radio Disney always made sure a newer generation gets a daily dose of Al. But I don't notice predominance of kids at the shows.
"The greatest thing about Radio Disney that I'm thrilled about is that they've taken to 'The Saga Begins' even though they're not familiar with the original song. That was really important to me."
When he first grafted the plot of "The Phantom Menace: Episode One" to the tune of Don McLean's 1971 hit "American Pie," "I was really worried that I was blowing off my kid audience," Yankovic says. "How will they know this old song?"
In the end, though, he was determined to match the latest "Star Wars" parody to "a song that had weight to it, and not a song that was just the most popular flavor of the moment."
McLean's eight-minute song was a perfect setting for telling an epic story line, he says. "But the icing on the cake was that it also began 'A long, long time ago.' " To which "Weird Al" added, "in a galaxy far away."
How did Weird Al get the song out so quickly after the movie opened? He didn't get a preview copy from director George Lucas.
"Lucas Films were helpful but secretive," he says. If they didn't want to tell him the story, there were a half-dozen "Star Wars" Web sites that purported to have the whole plot, six weeks early.
Yankovic wrote and recorded his song, but held off on its release until the movie opened.
"I wanted to make sure I wasn't basing the song on erroneous information."
In fact, seeing the movie made him go back in the studio and change a few details. "There were a couple of things the Web sites said were going to be in there, but weren't."
Yankovic says he heard that Lucas himself was amused at the parody. "I was thrilled that they gave the album and video a nice plug on the Official 'Star Wars' Web site."
He's happy, too, that his young audience picked up on the song even though they may have never heard the original "American Pie."
"I'm curious to see what will happen when Madonna releases her new version of 'American Pie,' " Yankovic says. "Kids'll think that she's ripping off 'Weird Al'"!