YouTube Tour: Dadrock Special!

This article is part of the YouTube Tour series.

Today, America celebrates Father's Day, a Sunday set aside for purchasing neckties and last-minute cards to show our dads how much we love them and how much better they are mom's new dickwad boyfriend Steve. We here at Something Awful observe these mythical creatures with a reverence generally set aside for albino tigers. Most pertinent to this column is the unique dad mating call, dadrock. Dadrock lets fathers express themselves using a mysterious language of beaten animal skins and struck metal strings. I enlisted the help of dadficionado Satellite High to help me investigate these sounds and the power they hold over these distinguished patriarchs.

Daryl "Fucking" Hall: I think we may have found the total distillation of dadrock in the first video - "Artificial Hip" covering Steppenwolf's dad-classic "Magic Carpet Ride."

Satellite High: OKAY

SH: so basically i'd like to state up front that i actually like this song, and i LOVE it when old people ruin it

SH: has this guy actually played his acoustic guitar yet or is he just kinda swinging it around idly

DFH: The organist looks like his left hand is being controlled by a muppeteer.

SH: i think he might be john locke from lost

SH: they're like "hey dude stop soloing" and he's like "DON'T TELL ME WHAT I CAN'T DO"

SH: normally when a band takes turns soloing like this, they stop when the next guy begins, but this just kind of evolves into a cachophony of iroc-z

DFH: I do appreciate them finding room for the wives in the band.

DFH: "Fine, Helen, you can sing backup, but just let me and Bill have our beers and tab this thing out in peace, please."

SH: wow.

SH: that was super bad.

SH: super DAD.

DFH: Alright now, I know you hate Steely Dan.

DFH: But they're the best dadrock covers because Steely Dan songs are agonizingly overcomplicated, which means dads love em

SH: his shirt is pretty cool, it's covered with little cartoon guitars

SH: he puts that on just for playing guitar, it's his 'shred shirt'

SH: what's fun when you see stuff like this is to try to imagine the teen the dad used to be

SH: like from this dude's surly-yet-confused expression, i can totally see him hanging outside a 7-11 in a denim jacket kinda staring at people with his mouth hanging open

DFH: "Hey man can you get me a six pack of Coors"

SH: "Hey man wanna hear me play Steely Dan"

DFH: Both propositions are arrestable offenses

SH: It's like a Winn-Dixie came to life and took three guitar lessons

SH: there are a lot of people writing very positive comments about this video by the way

SH: i'm losing hope

DFH: "I've been trying to figure this out for a while-nice work man. Can't believe you did vocals AND guitar at the same time. Thanks for the video."

SH: Can't believe you fumbled your way through a bad solo and some mumbling at the same time!

DFH: Holy shit, this guy has 62 other videos

SH: this is honestly a good thing because when i was a kid if your dad played the guitar there was a very good chance he was going to make you and all of your friends watch him do so when he got drunk

DFH: Nothing like the intro to Smoke on the Water punctuated by "Hold on"s every chord change

SH: the "gimme shelter" one

SH: he picture-in-pictured himself

DFH: Oh cool, he has at least two really fucking expensive guitars he can't play.

SH: Hey Guitar Center what's up, it's me, Fat Dad, and I'm here to get fleeced

SH: Could you possibly show me a selection of expensive instruments I will never play to their potential? Or some Monster cables?

SH: Oh, I see you're checking out that Les Paul. Let me grab that from you for a sec and play some Def Lep. Oops, hang on man, gotta go talk to this guy about my cover band.

DFH: Oh yeah dude come check us out, we play every Wednesday night at Phil's Beer Hut. Yeah man, maybe after a couple weeks of lessons you can sit in on a solo or two, for sure.

SH: BUT ONLY IF YOU BUY THE THREE YEAR PROTECTION WARRANTY