I saw a few friends post a link on facebook this week to a article from some Norwegian website containing a rap parody music video.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=369FGAb1iI8]
It’s quickly gone viral due to it being funny on several levels (it’s a well formed parody, it takes a weird absurdist turn about halfway through and those accents are just so goddamn funny!) but it left me wondering where the hell this came from? The article is all Ikea gobbledygook (yes I know Ikea is Swedish but Norway doesn’t have any recognizable multinational corporations for the gag)and I couldn’t even figure out the name of the group. Thank god for google translator.
Translated from the article – “After just one week on YouTube music video for Ylvis had over 420,000 hits. It initially was intended as a video to a television series on TV Norge is now around the world.
– It’s really fun that we’ve created a video that appears to be a hit on YouTube, says Bård Ylvisåker to bt.no.
unusual lyrics
In the music video lampoons Bård and Vegard Ylvisåker with rapsjangeren, and drag a typical rapvideo with scantily clad women and sex in focus in a somewhat unexpected, and very literal direction.”
Okay, the translator’s not perfect but it showed me that the band’s name is Ylvis. A little Wikipedia search tells us that Ylvis is a comedy music duo that’s been doing stuff in Norway since 2000.
Well hey, that video was pretty funny. I wonder what their earlier stûff is any good?
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUDIr4lr5FA]
Okay. Were they parodying a boy band? Was that sign language? What’s with the little chairs? Are little chairs a joke thing in Norway?
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yz7Ak7tyUQE]
Here we have Ylvis and the Ë Street band performing Kjempeform which, according to Google translate, means “Good Shape”. I guess it’s about a guy being an asshole to everybody so he can bang an old lady?
Norwegian humor is weird.
(UPDATE:While drinking with the wife and talking about Ylvis we dove deeper into their youtube video archive and stumbled upon this little beauty. I give you “9/11 On Ice”.)
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hv0xq0_1lZY&w=560&h=315]