Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
Beat the crowd
10 questions No timer
60 free Weird Al trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
52 free Weird Al trivia questions with answers. "Weird Al" Yankovic has outlasted most of the artists he has parodied, and this quiz covers the whole four-decade run. Fifty questions take you from the accordion lessons in Lynwood and the bathroom recording of My Bologna to Dr. Demento's radio show, the Michael Jackson parodies, the UHF flop that became a cult classic, the Nirvana comeback, the polka medleys, and the 2014 album that finally hit No. 1. The easy questions ask what he studied at Cal Poly and who plays him in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story. The hard ones want the backmasked message in Nature Trail to Hell, the company whose mail room he quit, and why the Grammys ignored him for fifteen years. Along the way you get the permission stories: Coolio, Prince, Paul McCartney, Lady Gaga's manager and the Cobain phone call. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on Yankovic, his albums, singles and films, and each question links to the page and quotes the line that backs it up. Lyrics are never quoted; the questions are about the songs, not in them.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which California city was Alfred Matthew Yankovic born in 1959?
Downey
He was raised in nearby Lynwood, and his 2006 album title is a nod to that hometown.
Q 02Which instrument did Yankovic begin learning the day before his seventh birthday?
Accordion
A door-to-door salesman offered his parents a choice of lessons, and his parents figured the world needed one more Yankovic playing it, a nod to polka star Frankie Yankovic, no relation.
Q 03What subject did Yankovic earn his bachelor's degree in at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo?
Architecture
He was valedictorian of his high school class and started kindergarten a year early, so he was two years younger than most classmates.
Q 04'Belvedere Cruisin'', the first Yankovic song Dr. Demento aired in 1976, was about what?
His family's car
The 16-year-old handed Demento a homemade cassette recorded in his bedroom on a cheap tape recorder, and it went on air immediately.
Q 05'My Bologna' (1979) is a parody of which hit by the Knack?
My Sharona
Knack singer Doug Fieger liked it so much he pushed Capitol Records to release it as a single, and Yankovic got $500 for the master tape.
Q 06Where did Yankovic record the original 1979 version of 'My Bologna'?
A tiled men's restroom
The room sat across the hall from campus radio station KCPR, where he was a DJ, and he chose it because the tiles made an acoustically perfect echo chamber.
Q 07How did Yankovic originally get the nickname 'Weird Al'?
Fellow residents of his college dorm used it as an insult
He first took it as an insult, then adopted it as his on-air persona as a DJ at Cal Poly's radio station.
Q 08'Another One Rides the Bus' (1980) parodies a hit by which band?
Queen
Queen guitarist Brian May has said he was amused by it, and the song gave Yankovic his first TV appearance on The Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder in 1981.
Q 09Who produced Yankovic's first six albums before he took over production himself?
Rick Derringer
The former McCoys guitarist won two Grammys for the work; he also recreated Eddie Van Halen's solo for 'Eat It'.
Q 10In which country did 'Eat It' reach No. 1 on the singles chart?
Australia
It outranked 'Beat It' there, which had peaked at third, and remains his only No. 1 single anywhere.
Q 11Yankovic's "Al TV" specials, with fake celebrity interviews and phony ads, first aired on which network?
MTV
Ten specials aired in all: the first eight on that network from 1984, and the last two on VH1 in 2006.
Q 12Which star reportedly came up with the title 'Like a Surgeon' for 'Weird Al' Yankovic?
Madonna
She wondered aloud to a friend when the parody would happen; the friend knew Yankovic's manager Jay Levey and the idea travelled from there.
Q 13For the 'Fat' video, Michael Jackson let Yankovic use the subway set built for which of his own videos?
Bad
The set had not yet been torn down in Culver City, and the video went on to win a Grammy for Best Concept Music Video.
Q 21Michael Jackson refused to let Yankovic parody which song as 'Snack All Night'?
Black or White
Jackson felt the original's message was too important, and the refusal pushed Yankovic toward the grunge parody that revived his career.
Q 22Which artist maintained he never gave permission for 'Amish Paradise', even though his label had?
Coolio
The two made peace at a 2006 Consumer Electronics Show booth, and he later called his own refusal stupid.
Q 23Yankovic's 1998 laser eye surgery cost him nothing because he agreed to what?
Let a TV news show broadcast it live
Q 14How many Grammy Awards has Yankovic won?
5
He has been nominated a further eleven times and has four gold and six platinum records in the U.S.
Q 15'Dare to Be Stupid' is a style parody of which band?
Devo
The song later landed on the soundtrack of The Transformers: The Movie (1986), which Yankovic reckons introduced more people to it than his own album did.
Q 16Who played janitor-turned-children's-TV-host Stanley Spadowski in UHF?
Michael Richards
The film also gave Trinidad Silva his final role, and it is dedicated to his memory.
Q 17UHF (1989) was shot in and around which city?
Tulsa, Oklahoma
Orion agreed to finance the film on a $5 million budget, and it delivered the studio's best test scores since RoboCop before flopping against Batman and Indiana Jones.
Q 18Under what title was UHF released in some overseas markets?
The Vidiot from UHF
The term UHF meant little to overseas audiences, so the film got a more explanatory name; it later became a cult title on home video.
Q 19Which snack, created on screen in UHF, became Yankovic's signature food?
Twinkie Wiener Sandwich
It is a hot dog in a split Twinkie with squirt cheese, dipped in milk; he now makes it with tofu dogs.
Q 20Yankovic got Kurt Cobain's OK for 'Smells Like Nirvana' by phoning him on the set of which show?
Saturday Night Live
Cobain's one question was whether the parody would be about food; the answer was no, it would be about nobody understanding his lyrics.
He considered wearing fake glasses afterward to keep his look, decided against it, and shaved his moustache too.
Q 24Which artist repeatedly refused Weird Al's parody requests and had management tell him not to make eye contact?
Prince
Yankovic got around it once by borrowing the 'When Doves Cry' video look for his 'UHF' clip, and wrote 'Traffic Jam' as a style parody without asking.
Q 25Which strict vegetarian turned down 'Chicken Pot Pie', a parody of 'Live and Let Die'?
Paul McCartney
He suggested 'Tofu Pot Pie' instead, but the chorus was built around clucking sounds, so Yankovic only ever played it in concert medleys.
Q 26What prompted Yankovic to become a vegetarian in 1992?
A book his girlfriend gave him
The book was John Robbins' Diet for a New America; he says he tries to be vegan but might sneak a slice of cheese pizza on the tour bus.
Q 27In which year did Yankovic finally receive his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame?
2018
A fan-run fund had been raising the nomination fee and reapplying every year since 2006; he got the 2,643rd star, across the street from the Chinese Theatre.
Q 28Which album became Yankovic's first to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200?
Mandatory Fun
Instead of a lead single he dropped eight music videos over eight straight days, and they racked up more than 20 million views in the first week.
Q 29Yankovic flew to Denver to personally ask which artist for permission to parody 'Fancy'?
Iggy Azalea
He gauged the song's saturation by asking his daughter whether kids at school were talking about it yet; the parody became 'Handy'.
Q 30Whose manager initially rejected 'Perform This Way' without ever forwarding it to the artist?
Lady Gaga
After the singer heard it online she approved it and called being parodied a rite of passage; all proceeds went to the Human Rights Campaign.