Ahead of a Syracuse, New York, stop on his “Bigger & Weirder” tour, Yankovic revealed to Syracuse.com in an interview published this week that he was offered “a nice pile of money” to appear in a commercial for business-focused software, but he backed out once he realized the ad would involve AI. “I’m not a fan of AI,” he said.
As I understand it, lots of musicians consider it an honor to have Weird Al approach them for a parody. He’s respectful, appreciates creativity, and up front about everything he does. IIRC Lady Gaga was thrilled when approached. And the man is seriously talented; he can reproduce songs by ear, which is incredible, and if I believe me actually wrote The Saga Begins before the movie was actually in theaters, based entirely off of trailers and stuff. Which that’s true that’s fucking incredible.
Only really Prince ever constantly denied Al a parody. Some have denied for specific songs, even Micheal Jackson denied Al at one point. Even Coolio came around in the end. He said he was too full of himself but eventually thought “Micheal didn’t care and he’s the king of pop. Who am I to be mad.” It’s only ever a sense of how serious they think the message is.