Death To The Meme - Empire States of Parody.

I was charmed, today, by the Alex Warren/Temera Wainwright Welsh parody of Jay-Z/Alicia Keys' 'Empire State of Mind', 'Newport State of Mind'.  The 'comedy Welsh rapper' thing takes a few minutes to disassociate itself from GLC, but still.

Though, being an enormous nerd, my heart has to lie with CollegeHumour's Star Wars-themed parody, 'Galactic Empire State of Mind'.  For one thing, the singers both actually do an astonishing impersonation of their targets, and anyone who doesn't think Darth Vader rapping while Imperial Stormtroopers breakdance and Princess Leia plays that weird blue elephant's keyboard thing has never had a childhood.

A meme gets off to a good start.

But I am afraid of the Internet parody, for it spawns more parodies.  'Newark State of Mind', 'Minnesota State of Mind', 'DC State of Mind', 'Jewish State of Mind' - all of them take the original's lyrics and replace them with in-joke references to their hometown...or, in the last case, their religious culture.  The worrying thing is that I can't place exactly why these should be any less funny than the 'original' parodies, if only that I saw them afterwards.  The joke wears out fast.

So beware; 'Newport' has just been mentioned in the Guardian, which means there'll be more small-town parodies on the way, each one butchering the humour more and more.  Swindon State of Mind.  Weston-Super-Mare State of Mind.  I am already troubled by a repeated Youtube comment left by 'Mr Maraxx3' - "Not much, Czech parody ore from Ostrava - Ostrava is better".  Yes, Mr Maraxx, I feel certain people worldwide will be chuckling at the zingers concerning Ostrava's coal deposits and candidacy for European Capital of Culture 2015.

A meme doesn't.

Neither is this eternal, hellish Internet repetition of songs a new problem.  I'm sure we all remember the amateur parodies of the Lonely Island's already awful, one-joke R & B parody, 'I'm On A Boat', which I will not link here, lest by clicking on the Youtube video, I end up indirectly supporting them.  'I'm On A Float', 'I Need Your Vote', and the now-notorious 'I'm On A Couch'.  (Which actually seems to have been made twice, for no reason that I can fathom.)  Cheeseburgerz are funnier than this.  Cheeseburgerz.