Bringing the world one step closer to making UHF’s Channel 62 a reality, IFC has announced that “Weird Al” Yankovic has joined Comedy Bang! Bang! as bandleader and co-host of the show. Yankovic takes over for Kid Cudi, who took over for Reggie Watts when Watts left the show to serve as bandleader on James Corden’s edition of The Late Late Show last year. He’s appeared on Comedy Bang! Bang! a couple of times in the past, each time wearing a different Hawaiian shirt. Whether his wardrobe contains enough Hawaiian shirts for an entire 20-episode season remains to be seen, but if anyone can accomplish such a feat, it’s “Weird Al” Yankovic.
Co-hosting a surreal comedy talk show with “Weird Al” is, of course, every 13-year-old comedy fan’s dream come true. Comedy Bang! Bang! host Scott Aukerman confirms (as if we ever had any doubt) that he was one of these nerds in his youth in a press release: “If you would have told me, when I was a teenager, listening and laughing along to Al’s In 3-D album, that one day I would partner up with him, I would have asked who you were and how you got in my room,” he says. “Then I would have politely shown you the door. Because that’s how I was raised.”
Production on the new season of Comedy Bang! Bang! begins today, and the show will air on IFC sometime this spring.