Like a Surgeon

"Like a Surgeon"
Song
B-side	"Slime Creatures from Outer Space"

"Like a Surgeon" is a song by "Weird Al" Yankovic. It is a parody of "Like a Virgin" by Madonna.

Track listing

1985 release

The following tracks are on the single:

1. "Like a Surgeon" – 3:27
2. "Slime Creatures from Outer Space" – 4:23

The promo single only contains "Like a Surgeon".

1985/1993 re-release

The following tracks are on the single:

1. "Like a Surgeon" – 3:27
2. "King of Suede" – 4:12

Writing and development

Although Yankovic refuses to take, hear, or use parody ideas from people other than himself, Madonna is partly responsible for the "Like a Virgin" parody. Madonna asked one of her friends how long it would take until Yankovic would parody her song "Like a Virgin" as "Like a Surgeon". This friend was a mutual friend of Al's manager, Jay Levey. When word got back to Yankovic, he decided it was a good idea and wrote the song. This is the only known time that Yankovic has gotten a parody idea directly from the original artist.

Music video

The music video, which takes place in a hospital, can be considered an extension of the parody. Several features of "Like a Virgin"'s promotional video - famously set in Venice - are mimicked: shots of Yankovic singing on a moving gurney are substituted for footage of Madonna on a canal boat, and both videos feature a lion at the beginning.

• The video was shot in an actual hospital that had recently gone out of business.
• In the beginning of the video, a voice pages "Doctor Howard, Doctor Fine, Doctor Howard". This is a nod to the Three Stooges' short Men in Black (which incidentally took place in a hospital and featured incompetent doctors).
• At the beginning of the video, Yankovic steps into the ICU, and sees a person who has flatlined. At first he doesn't realize it, but then he begins banging on the heart rate monitor and finally resorts to hitting the person in the chest, which causes the patient's heart to start again.
• As the music begins, there is a person on a bed that is being pushed along who has feet at both ends of the body.
• One of the X-rays that Yankovic shows is of a man with a nail in his head.
• there is a x-ray of a monkey.
• A male lion walks across the hallway of the hospital.
• The sinks are being used for washing hands, feet, and pots and pans.
• When Yankovic says he was "last in the med class," several doctors are seen preparing tools for operation. Some of those tools are: a butcher knife, a razor, hedge clippers and a blowtorch.
• In the operating room, the game Operation can be seen hanging on the wall.
• The same lion appears in the operating room.
• The table of operating tools includes a hand drill, crayons, a rubber frog, drinking straws, a thin razored saw, salt and pepper, a blacksmith tool, a troll doll, kitchen knives, a corkscrew, and various others.
• Many of the operating instruments used are unorthodox: chainsaws, drills, blowtorches, etc.
• While doing a heart transplant, Yankovic accidentally drops the heart. A nurse subsequently slips on it.
• When Yankovic sings the line "better give me all your gause nurse" a nurse hands him two proper operating instruments, then a hamburger.
• When the nurse is giving Yankovic the scalpel, she accidentally cuts his finger off.
• The IV has a fish swimming in it.
• Yankovic removes a patient's operation cap to reveal a lobotomized brain.
• The lobotomized patient is reading the Midnight Star, the titular tabloid from Yankovic's earlier song "Midnight Star."
• After Yankovic gives the patient the anaesthetic mask, a nurse in the background is seen putting on the mask, and then fainting.
• A football player can be seen in the "nurse huddle" near the middle of the video.
• During the "It's a fact, I'm a quack" verse, Yankovic is seen pulling objects out of the patient's body such as: a heart, an old-fashioned film case, an accordion toy, a line of colored-tissue cloths like people see in the circus, and a rabbit.
• When the verse "My patients die before they can pay" is sung, Yankovic and a group of his nurses are seen operating, but the video zooms in to reveal that they are actually extracting money from a wallet.
• A Madonna lookalike is seen as a nurse in the video (see the single artwork).
• Yankovic dances like Madonna near the end of the video, parodying scenes from her video of "Lucky Star" (with the camera at one point focusing on his bellybutton as it does Madonna's) as well as "Like a Virgin". Also, when Yankovic is dancing in the hallway near a sign that says "X-Ray", he swings his right arm back and hits another nurse reading a newspaper, and falls unconscious.
• One of the monitors features a clip from George of the Jungle. The theme song for this show was covered by Yankovic on the Dare to Be Stupid album, which also included "Like a Surgeon".
• One of his patients has a sign that reads "27", and in the background a sign reads "Now Serving: 27". This, along with a 27 that appeared in "This Is the Life" is considered to be the beginning of Yankovic's recurring 27 joke.
• When the verse "I can hear your heart beat... For the very last time" is sung, Yankovic falls flat on his back, and remains there for the remainder of the video.

Live performances

For the 1990 Blond Ambition Tour, Madonna re-invented "Like a Virgin" with a middle-eastern arrangement and risqué, and ultimately infamous, choreography. Yankovic ultimately decided to parody her performance (a bit less risqué): when played live in concert, the song features Yankovic rolling around on a hospital bed that is placed in the middle of the stage while keyboardist Rubén Valtierra belly dances next to him. This version of "Like a Surgeon," often called the "Like a Surgeon (Truth or Dare Version)" is currently performed in concert by Yankovic.

Chart positions

Chart (1985)	Peak Position
Australian ARIA Singles Chart	19
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	47

See also

• List of singles by "Weird Al" Yankovic
• List of songs by "Weird Al" Yankovic