The pop music parody in US-American and German Late-Night Shows

Parodies of pop music are a popular instrument of entertainment in US-American Late-Night Shows. Next to pop music itself, they have reached an equal status of interest and influence in popular culture mainly in dependence of the online format YouTube. After a short historical overview of the pop music parody on US-American television and YouTube, this study observes why the genre is such a profitable selling strategy of pop music. This work gives an overview of the most popular musical performances on THE TONIGHT SHOW STARRING JIMMY FALLON on NBC and demonstrates how German shows like NEO MAGAZIN ROYALE on ZDFneo, with talk show host and comedian Jan Böhmermann, copy this concept and translate it into a German context. Pop culture will be discussed as a global self-referential system of communication in the sense of Niklas Luhmann, while the musical parody in the pop genre is analyzed on the level of performance focusing on the specific way of voice acting and the index effect in the sense of Diedrich Diederichsen. To achieve this observation, two examples will follow a detailed analysis: Ariana Grande’s performance Wheel of Musical Impressions in Jimmy Fallon’s show and Dendemann’s performance Eine deutsche Rapgeschichte in Jan Böhmermann’s show.

tics) (Hofacker 2012, 354) multiple ways to use his voice. The performative level of singing becomes important, which is why the parody of a pop singer has much more to do with acting and imitation sounds than with semantic or syntactic changes.
When Sheinberg (2000, 149) notes that »none of those studies explicitly offers a comprehensive structural scheme into which all parodies can fit«, he points out how important the structural level of the parody is and shows how the correlations of structure, content and techniques lead to a continuing circle of tradition and innovation (151). While the fact that a parody switches »between the original work and its 'imitation' and transformation« is not new, the relevance of the pop music parody on television and YouTube leads to a global supremacy of the US-American pop music market and a worldwide influence on popular culture not observed previously. Jean Burgess and Josua Green describe that YouTube videos »are not representations of reality, but technologies of re-presentation. Because they communicate to the audience what counts as popular on YouTube, these metrics also take an active role in creating the reality of what is popular on YouTube: they are not only descriptive; they are also performative.« (Burgess/Green 2009, 41) This level of representation is similar to Niklas Luhmann's theory of the Realität der Massenmedien, as a reality of observation in secondary order: Es geht um ein Realitätsverständnis, das Realität als eine Zwei-Seiten-Form des ‚Was' und des ‚Wie' annimmt -des ‚was beobachtet wird' und des ‚wie es beobachtet wird'. Und das entspricht genau der Beobachtung von Kommunikation im Hinblick auf eine Differenz von Information und Mitteilung. (Luhmann 1995, 104s) Kieler Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung 15: Music in TV Series & Music and Humour in Film and Television // 214 Even though Luhmann's system theory was formulated when the internet was not yet common practice and the participatory possibilities of distribution websites like YouTube were not on his mind, the pop parody functions as an autopoietic system as such. A system that is autopoietic produces itself out of itself and is based on communication (Luhmann 1995, 20). It is operatively closed, which means that one thought presupposes another thought, but it also has a cognitive openness, which is why irritations inside the system can occur.
Its structure is determined and it defines itself through its environment and produces itself temporary (Luhmann 1995, 20). Following the definition of Luhmann's autopoietic systems it becomes clear, why the parody is the perfect instrument for a market interested in selling pop music: The pop parody produces itself out of pop music (operatively closed) and becomes a piece of pop music itself (cognitively open), therefore its autopoiesis is structured in a circle of imitation and transformation. The structure is determined because dependent to its original it is temporary because it is affiliated to the time in which it is produced. Before demonstrating the link of the parody as an autopoietic system, a brief historical overview of musical parody in US-American television will be highlighted.

Musical parody in US-American television
The pop music parody arises from artists like Spike Jones (1911-1965), Allan Sherman (1924-1973) or Stan Freberg (1926-2015, to name but a few, be- and by changing the cue cards of the live performing singer to mess with him, they discovered that »funny was better than singing good« (212). The pop mu- The analysis is going to focus on Ariana Grande's performances, but here it is already important to mention that the show host has to prove his talent as well and it turns out that hosts like Jimmy Fallon can compete with the invited singers on a high level, just like James Cordon.
Ariana Grande starts to push the button and is asked to sing the children song All musical performances in the mentioned Late-Night Shows play with this acting-voice in different ways. Paula Bishop, who observed the Lip Sync Battle category of Jimmy Fallon speaks in this context about »re-embodying the voice«, saying in fact that »in these performances, the body substitutes for the voice, and more specifically, for a voice that does not belong to the visible body.« 8 While in the Lip Sync Battle, the body becomes a substitute of the voice because the performer has to do a playback primarily by acting or dancing without using the voice, it is the acting voice which becomes a substitute for the parodied artist who is not present, but whose presence is felt through the voice-acting.
Second, a parody is performed by rounding out the voice-acting with dramatized acting. Ariana, for example, imitates a significant nod with the head and a »ha« as an affirmative expression, which is typical for Christina Aguilera ending a phrase of belting. Or when Ariana is imitating Celine Dion, she includes typical phrases like »should we go for it« or »come on«, a typical way in which Celine communicates with the audience, which again, just the insider would recognize as a parody. As a result, the parody is only as good as the actingvoice, the imitation of the voice, the genre, the song or the artist and a bad parody is one that cannot be recognized as one. A parody only works, when the af-

Late-Night in Germany: Jan Böhmermann
German comedian Harald Schmidt hosted Late-Night Shows on German television (1990-1994WDR, 1995-2003Sat1, 2004-2011  The video, which is 4:35 minutes long, was first aired in Böhmermann's Late Night Show NEOMAGAZIN ROYALE and has subsequently been uploaded on to YouTube where it has had more than 32 million clicks so far. The scenery starts with a bird's eye view scanning the periphery of a city by night and starts its narrative at the back door of an unknown real estate that looks like a warehouse. Böhmermann exits the door that carries the sign »backstage« and unlocks his car (a BMW), the sole car in the otherwise empty yard with an automatic key. Suddenly five suspicious men wearing dark clothes pop up threatening Böhmermann with a huge knife, a baseball bat and a menacing chain. In slow motion, they are about to attack Böhmermann, who looks scared until he steps back, gets hold of his mobile phone and dials three digits which can be deduced from the different beeping tones. Because of the digit's sound, which indicate the number 110, the gangsters get scared themselves as they realize that Böhmermann is about to call the police. In minute 0:45, the narration of the background story stops in terms of the turnaround of the situation. Böhmermann puts on dark sunglasses, suddenly wears a hood and a leather jacket with the words »cop life« printed on it in white and switches his emotion from scared to powerful while the music starts. Clearly Böhmermann's changed look demonstrates his change of role. Böhmermann now plays the gangster as his pseudonym »Pol1z1stensohn« by decoding the genre gangsta rap antithetic. Antithetic means that while in gangster rap music videos the police is staged as the enemy, the police now takes on the gangster role itself. The narration of a story line stops here and changes into a sequence of sections that, typical for the genre gangsta rap, are made up of overlaid pictures. A group of police men imitate the »cool pose« (Jeffries 2011, 7) of the crew of gangsta rappers, the police officers demonstrate their power by showing their guns and the police car, motorcycle, horse or helicopter become the protagonist similar to the BMW in the gangsta rap videos, while the police dog substitutes the fighting dog of the streets. All these sections function to demonstrate power, masculinity, and illegal business mainly to construct the fiction of a ghetto which is copied from the US American context. In Germany, socially disadvantaged communities live in areas called »soziale Brennpunkte«, but the dimensions of the US American ghettos do not exist. Also, the conflict of police violence, which is still a current problem in the USA, for example in Baltimore, has a racist dimension that leads to the common theme of staging the police as the enemy of the gangster rapper.
While the rapper would celebrate this »thug life« not only by staging it but also by using the name like a tattoo similar to the rapper Tupac Shakur, the »thug life« becomes a slogan that promotes the life of a gangster whose enemy is the police. This is why one often hears of or sees the sprayed signs »fuck cops« expressing anger against the injustice of the police system. spelling of online communities that often listen to gangsta rap), is not only in effect parodying the role of the police inside German gangster rap videos, but is actually based on his biography. While one could argue that police brutality also exists in Germany, Böhmermann is positively influenced by his father, who was a police officer and a role model to him, assured by the loss due to his early death. By calling himself »Polizistensohn«, he does not only parody German gangsta rap but also refers to his own biography. By using that name he proves authenticity and he is not only proud of his father but also brags about having the whole police system on his side. Böhmermann manages to attach personal feelings to his video and parodies himself in it which makes him untouchable to other rappers' 'beef'. With this video, he managed to create a parody on every level. His voice-acting, his mumbling with vulgar puckered lips, the special pronunciation of the words and grammatical mistakes, associated with talking slang or dago-German, symbolize the change of his sociolect. It is a perfect imitation of rappers like Haftbefehl or Bushido, his behavior, his cool pose and his clothes with the significant embroidery or the pullover tattoos. The music video gives an exact imitation of German gangsta rap performances in general, the significant video composition with the overlaid sequences parodies the format, the lyrics and the beat all create an ironic distance to the original.
Next to this pop music video parody, Böhmermann copied Jimmy Fallon's concept of performing a song by the invited band with classroom instruments and extended the idea to a song being performed with a »geekchester» (»Orchestra« and »Geek« meaning a person obsessed with computer technology), which  performing on stage with Dendemann, gets a skype phone call and while answering it, the scene changes and the viewer of the video sees the screen of the computer receiving the skype call (6:00). The person calling is Jan Delay and the voice he uses saying »Ja Hallo« (6:14) is exactly the same he has been using in the song Füchse, a legendary rap song from 2007 with Jan Delay as part of the crew Absolute Beginner featuring Samy Deluxe. At the end of the song Füchse, Jan Delay ironically imitates a phone call of a person that corrects the lyrics of the song by saying: »Ja Hallo, ich wollt' ma' sagen, Füchse sind gar keine Rudeltiere«. This phrase has become an insider joke for rap music fans as it is just the short version of the original, the words »Ja Hallo«, imitated in this specific way are significant for the song.
The performance of Eine deutsche Rapgeschichte continues until minute nine by filming the computer screen that accepts call after call from other rappers performing their own raps during the skype conference. Samy Deluxe, Alligathoa, Kollegah, Smudo, Curse and the rap crew Blumentopf appear and continue to perform while the next call is accepted. At the same time, the skype profile adds ironic messages. For example, a contact request and a call from gangsta rapper Bushido is not accepted (7:10), the rappers Farid Bang and Fler are sending different text messages and the singer and dancer DJ Bobo from Switzerland, who became famous for the genre eurodance (a sort of sprechgesang that is not rap) texts: »Schweizer können aber auch gut rappen« (8:00).
The conference call of all the rappers ends with Jan Delay rapping, as he was