Weird Al: "Mission Statement" spoofs corporate jargon in style of "Judy Blue Eyes" by CSN (VIDEO).

Weird Al Skewers Corporate-Speak to the Tune of “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”

Weird Al Skewers Corporate-Speak to the Tune of “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”

Brow Beat has moved! You can find new stories here.
Brow Beat
Slate's Culture Blog
July 21 2014 12:12 PM

Weird Al Skewers Corporate-Speak to the Tune of “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”

weirdal_mission
A still from the new Weird Al video, which was animated by TruScribe.

Vevo/Weird Al Yankovic

The Wall Street Journal seems like an odd outlet for a Weird Al video premiere—until you listen to “Mission Statement,” and realize that it sends up the kind of business jargon that WSJ readers presumably know well. Yankovic wrote the song to the tune of “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” by Crosby, Stills & Nash, explaining to the Journal that he “thought it would be ironic to juxtapose” corporate buzzwords “with the song stylings of CSN, whose music pretty much symbolizes the antithesis of corporate America.”

I’m guessing he also liked the idea of singing the word synergy in three-part harmony. The video will be available below later; for now, you can watch it at the Wall Street Journal. This, by the way, is the eighth and final video in Weird Al’s eight-day Web blitz marking the release of his new album, Mandatory Fun.

David Haglund is the literary editor of NewYorker.com.