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Bill Wurtz

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Bill Wurtz
Logo as of January 2019
Personal information
Occupations
  • Musician
  • Video blogger
Websitebillwurtz.com
YouTube information
Channel
Created byBill Wurtz
Years active2000 (on YouTube from 2013) – present
Genres
Subscribers3 million[1]
Total views305 million[1]
100,000 subscribers2016
1,000,000 subscribers2017
Last updated: January 20, 2019

Bill Wurtz (stylized as bill wurtz) is an online video creator and multi-instrumentalist based in New York City.[2] Wurtz is known for his distinctive style of song and video, including dry delivery and singing, paired with colorful surrealist, psychedelic, and non-sequitur graphics.[3] Wurtz posts jingles and songs on his website and on his YouTube channel and has been actively making music since 2005.[4]

Popularity

Vine

Wurtz first gained a following on Vine, where he began by taking short videos he had previously only published to his website and Twitter account and repackaging them to fit Vine's 6-second restrictions.[5] Before transitioning fully to YouTube, Wurtz was uploading a video to Vine nearly every day. His most popular vines were "still a piece of garbage" (~343,000 likes with ~168,000 revines), "what are you waiting for you dumb stupid fuck" (~117,000 likes with ~52,000 revines), and "i don't want to go to school" (~88,000 likes with ~45,000 revines).

"history of japan"

Despite some interest on Vine, Wurtz broke into the spotlight with "history of japan", a 9-minute YouTube video that outlines Japan's history from 40,000 B.C.E to 1991 C.E.[6] It fully showcases Wurtz's quirky visual and comedic style through a mixture of fast-paced narration and animation. It went viral after its release on February 2, 2016,[7][3][8][9] receiving 1.7 million views in two days[citation needed] and more than quadrupling Wurtz's subscriber count in 1 week.[citation needed] As of November 13, 2018, the video currently has over 44 million views.

"history of the entire world, i guess"

However, Wurtz is best known for "history of the entire world, i guess", a 19-minute follow-up to "history of japan" released on May 10, 2017.[10] Expanding greatly on the subject matter — the video took over 11 months to produce, including almost 3 months of research[11] — it briefly covers the topics of natural history and human civilization spanning from the Big Bang to the near future (specifically the year 2028). It went viral after its release,[12][13] receiving 1.1 million views in its first 8 hours, 3.2 million views on its first day, and 13 million views in its first week. It was the top video on the YouTube trending page on the day of its release,[14] and would later be named No. 8 on YouTube's list of the top 10 trending videos of 2017.[15] As of January 24, 2019, it has over 60 million views.

"hi, i'm steve"

The recognition that Wurtz received after "history of japan" and "history of the entire world, i guess" led to a boost in popularity of his subsequent videos. On July 6, 2017, nearly two months after releasing "history of the entire world, i guess", Wurtz uploaded a one-minute video titled "hi, i'm steve".[16] The video describes the life of a fictional character (though it is not clear whether the character's name is Steve). The video went viral upon being uploaded, gaining over 1 million views within the first day,[17] and peaking at #2 on the YouTube trending page in the same day. As of November 13, 2018, it has over 9.6 million views.

Artistic style

Wurtz employs a rich and complicated musical style which blends progressive jazz with pop and easy listening. He frequently makes use of unusual time signatures and chord progressions, often finishing his songs on dissonant or atonal notes and chords.[18] Overall, his music is of an uplifting nature which is often paired with dire circumstances[19] or sobering undertones.[20]

Lyrically, Wurtz has an aphoristic, economical, and absurdist style, resembling his website's "notebook".[21]

Visually, his videos are lively and often involve cheap clipart, system fonts, and hand-drawn graphics which are digitally manipulated, layered, and animated in time with the music. Common patterns that Wurtz follows are to layer copies of shapes and text together with clashing colors,[22] to show screencaps from built-in MacOS applications,[23] and to show himself playing air drums but overlaying images where drumheads would be.[24] He has stated that this basic style arose out of necessity to publish content regularly and evolved naturally over time, particularly after appearing on Vine.[25] He uses Final Cut Express 4 to create his videos.[26][27]

During the Vidcon 2018 panel "Finding a niche and making it work for you", Wurtz answered a question about why his style is so different from other YouTube musicians. He explained that he doesn't watch any other creators on the platform. Instead, he simply does what he himself thinks is normal: "My secret is just live under a rock, and stay there."[28]

Music videos

Since May 2014, Wurtz has published full-length music videos, following the same format of his shorter videos, and made them available on his YouTube channel:

Date Name Number of views Notes
May 6, 2014 "new canaan"[29] 600,000 (as of Jan. 2019)
May 8, 2015 "i'm crazy / it's raining"[30] 1 million (as of Jan. 2019)
August 3, 2017 "i wanna be a movie star"[31] 3.3 million (as of Jan. 2019)
September 28, 2017 "outside"[32] 4.6 million (as of Jan. 2019)
January 16, 2018 "La de da de da de da de day oh"[33] 8.2 million (as of Jan. 2019) Peaked at #1 on the YouTube trending page upon being released
April 25, 2018 "and the day goes on"[34] 4.4 million (as of Jan. 2019) Amassed over 2 million views and more than 150,000 likes within 2 weeks of release
June 21, 2018 "hello sexy pants"[35] 2 million (as of Jan. 2019)
August 21, 2018 "hallelujah"[36] 1.2 million (as of Jan. 2019)
September 4, 2018 "i'm Best Friends with my Own Front Door"[37] 1.5 million (as of Jan. 2019)
September 18, 2018 "Mount St. Helens is about to Blow Up"[38] 3.6 million (as of Jan. 2019)
October 3, 2018 "the Moon is made of Cheese (but i can't taste it)"[39] 1.5 million (as of Jan. 2019) Reached #8 on the YouTube trending page within 2 days of its release
October 16, 2018 "When I Get Older"[40] 1.2 million (as of Jan. 2019) Despite having been uploaded during the worldwide YouTube outage,[41] after just 2 days, it reached #37 on YouTube trending, and received nearly 700,000 views.
October 30, 2018 "long long long journey"[42] 1 million (as of Jan. 2019) After 17 hours of being uploaded, it received nearly 300,000 views.
November 13, 2018 "Slow Down"[43] 900,000 (as of Jan. 2019)
November 27, 2018 "christmas isn't real"[44] 1.2 million (as of Jan. 2019)
December 25, 2018 "i just did a bad thing"[45] 1.3 million (as of Jan. 2019)
January 15, 2019 "at the airport terminal"[46] 600,000 (as of Jan. 2019) Released to other platforms on January 10.

There are other songs Wurtz has created which he has published to his own website, Amazon Music, and Spotify, but not uploaded to YouTube. They include:

  • "in california" (released May 30, 2017)
  • "i love you" (released June 7, 2017)
  • "got to know what's going on" (released June 20, 2017)

Awards

  • On April 11, 2016, Wurtz won the Shorty Award for "Best in Weird" at the 8th Shorty Awards for his six-second videos on Vine (history of japan was released after the voting and so was not included in the award consideration).[47] His acceptance speech for the award was notably curt, as he simply walked up to the mic, said "Thank you", and walked off the stage right after.[48] He has stated in a video on his website that this was entirely intentional, having been directly inspired by an acceptance speech given by Andre 3000.[49]

Discography

Source:[50]

References

  1. ^ a b "About billwurtz". YouTube.
  2. ^ Wurtz, Bill. "questions". billwurtz.com. Retrieved June 22, 2017.
  3. ^ a b "History lesson with a difference: Surreal 'History of Japan' video goes viral". RT International. Retrieved December 28, 2016.
  4. ^ stuck in a rut, retrieved September 8, 2018
  5. ^ H3 Podcast #96 - bill wurtz, 4:55, retrieved January 31, 2019
  6. ^ bill wurtz (February 2, 2016), history of japan, retrieved November 14, 2018
  7. ^ "r/videos - History of Japan". reddit. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  8. ^ "WATCH: Trippy Video Teaches The Entire History Of Japan In Just 9 Minutes". The Huffington Post. February 8, 2016. Retrieved December 28, 2016.
  9. ^ Strange, Adario. "Psychedelic history of Japan turns learning into an acid trip". Mashable. Retrieved December 28, 2016.
  10. ^ Wurtz, Bill (May 10, 2017), history of the entire world, i guess, retrieved May 14, 2017
  11. ^ H3 Podcast Highlights, Bill Wurtz On The History of the World, retrieved December 9, 2018{{citation}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  12. ^ "r/videos - history of the entire world, i guess". reddit. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  13. ^ Gartenberg, Chaim (May 11, 2017). "History of the Entire World, I Guess could have been the best online video of 2005". The Verge. Retrieved June 24, 2017.
  14. ^ Gutelle, Sam (May 11, 2017). "Bill Wurtz's "History Of The Entire World" Gets 3.2 Million YouTube Views In Its First Day". Tubefilter. Retrieved May 12, 2017.
  15. ^ Allocca, Kevin (December 6, 2017). "It's time for #YouTubeRewind: Celebrating what you watched, shared, and created in 2017". Official YouTube Blog. Retrieved October 8, 2018.
  16. ^ Wurtz, Bill (July 6, 2017), hi, i'm steve, retrieved August 27, 2017
  17. ^ "History of Japan's Bill Wurtz Creates 'Steve' and a Viral Video", Memeburn, July 7, 2017, retrieved September 17, 2017
  18. ^ "Meet Bill Wurtz, the Internet Musical Genius You've Never Heard Of - MEL Magazine". MEL Magazine. October 12, 2018. Retrieved October 26, 2018.
  19. ^ bill wurtz, Mount St. Helens is about to Blow Up, retrieved January 31, 2019
  20. ^ bill wurtz, i'm a loser, retrieved January 31, 2019
  21. ^ "billwurtz". billwurtz.com. Retrieved October 26, 2018.
  22. ^ bill wurtz, it's ok to have feelings, retrieved January 31, 2019
  23. ^ bill wurtz, unboxing video, retrieved January 31, 2019
  24. ^ bill wurtz, La de da de da de da de day oh, retrieved January 31, 2019
  25. ^ H3 Podcast, H3 Podcast #96 - bill wurtz, 35:27, retrieved January 31, 2019{{citation}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  26. ^ "What editing software do you use? I'm very new to your videos and I always ask that question as I'm into the editing field :} | ask.fm/billwurtz". web.archive.org. June 17, 2016. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  27. ^ "r/editlines - Bill Wurtz's timeline for his 'History Of Japan' video [Final Cut Express 4]". reddit. Retrieved January 31, 2019.
  28. ^ WintersDays (June 23, 2018), MIRANDA SINGS & THE EXPO HALL | VidCon US 2018 | Day 2, retrieved October 26, 2018
  29. ^ bill wurtz (May 6, 2014), song: new canaan, retrieved November 13, 2018
  30. ^ bill wurtz (May 8, 2015), song: "i'm crazy / it's raining", retrieved November 13, 2018
  31. ^ Wurtz, Bill (August 3, 2017), i wanna be a movie star, retrieved August 3, 2017
  32. ^ bill wurtz (September 28, 2017), outside, retrieved November 13, 2018
  33. ^ bill wurtz (January 16, 2018), La de da de da de da de day oh, retrieved November 13, 2018
  34. ^ bill wurtz (April 25, 2018), and the day goes on, retrieved November 13, 2018
  35. ^ bill wurtz (June 21, 2018), hello sexy pants, retrieved November 13, 2018
  36. ^ bill wurtz (August 21, 2018), hallelujah, retrieved November 13, 2018
  37. ^ bill wurtz (September 4, 2018), i'm Best Friends with my Own Front Door, retrieved November 13, 2018
  38. ^ bill wurtz (September 18, 2018), Mount St. Helens is about to Blow Up, retrieved November 13, 2018
  39. ^ bill wurtz (October 2, 2018), the Moon is made of Cheese (but i can't taste it), retrieved November 13, 2018
  40. ^ Wurtz, Bill (October 16, 2018), When I Get Older, retrieved October 18, 2018
  41. ^ "YouTube Service Restored After Users Experience Worldwide Outage". October 16, 2018. Retrieved November 13, 2018. {{cite news}}: no-break space character in |title= at position 58 (help)
  42. ^ bill wurtz (October 30, 2018), long long long journey, retrieved November 13, 2018
  43. ^ bill wurtz (November 13, 2018), Slow Down, retrieved November 13, 2018
  44. ^ bill wurtz (November 27, 2018), christmas isn't real, retrieved November 28, 2018
  45. ^ bill wurtz (December 25, 2018), i just did a bad thing, retrieved December 25, 2018
  46. ^ bill wurtz, at the airport terminal, retrieved January 31, 2019
  47. ^ "Bill Wurtz – The Shorty Awards". shortyawards.com. Retrieved December 28, 2016.
  48. ^ "Bill Wurtz accepts the Shorty Award for Best in Weird". youtube.com. Retrieved June 5, 2017.
  49. ^ ""201604121847.mp4"". billwurtz.com. Retrieved November 25, 2018.
  50. ^ "Bill Wurtz discography". RateYourMusic. Retrieved October 18, 2018.
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