Posting on Bluesky, the singer wrote, “‘Lost media’ no longer! I finally got permission to upload “AL’S BRAIN,” an 11-minute educational 3-D film attraction which ran at the Orange County and Western Washington fairs, and hasn’t been seen publicly since 2009.” And true to his frequently tested word, Al dropped the entire, delightfully silly, surprisingly star-studded film on his YouTube channel.
In the video, Al, resplendent in a signature Hawaiian shirt, presides over a Mr. Wizard-style laboratory, where he fields questions about just what lives inside his (and everyone’s) head from from such luminaries as Fabio and Sir Paul McCartney, while Thomas Lennon, Patton Oswalt, and Tim & Eric pop up in various skits. And if the wise owl providing actual brain facts sounds familiar, that’s because he’s performed by Futurama‘s Billy West, while the boring human professor Al ditches in favor of the owl is character actor Bob Bancroft, best known to Parks & Recreation fans as Frank, one of the accountants who found Ben Wyatt so hilarious.
Sadly, as Al explains, the original, no doubt mind-blowing 3-D aspect of Al’s Brain didn’t make the transition to boring old 2-D computer screens, the short is still a, well, hoot. (Al whacks a paddle ball into the screen for “a gratuitous 3-D shot” at one point, and dons a bald cap to portray Phineas Gage, the poor guy who famously got an iron rod rammed through his skull.) Naturally, the whole science lesson concludes with a delightfully catchy “Weird Al” song all about the workings of the brain. You’ll never take your funky, funky neurons for granted again.
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