Michelle Duggar Roller Skates To YMCA

Raw Story reports:

The Duggar family is clearly not sulking around their aircraft carrier of a house and hanging their heads in despair after being dumped from TLC last week. E! Online reported Thursday that the reality-TV family posted a grainy cell phone video to their Facebook page this week of family matriarch Michelle Duggar roller skating to the Village People’s 1978 hit single, “YMCA.” “Check this out,” wrote daughter Jinger. “Our mom is so much fun! We had a blast skating together yesterday. Check it out. Her skills are mad! She out-skated the whole place…backwards!”

The Duggar family’s TLC program, 19 Kids and Counting was canceled by the network after admissions by eldest son Josh Duggar that he inappropriately touched and fondled his sisters and another girl when he was a teenager. Michelle Duggar was instrumental in helping the effort against a nondiscrimination law in Fayetteville, Arkansas. She recorded a robocall that went out to thousands of households in which she urged voters to strike down a city ordinance outlawing discrimination against LGBT people in housing, health care and other critical services.

Musicless Music Video - YMCA

A popular YouTuber has been posting music videos with the music removed and sound effects added. Today's target is Village People. In the background at the 40-second mark you can see the old Ramrod, where Al Pacino danced in Cruising.

Columbia Law Review Students: D-O-M-A

The Village People classic meets activism in a parody that also teaches the Edie Windsor story.

(Via Towleroad)

Original Cop Sues Village People

Victor Willis, the original "cop" in Village People, is suing the band for $1.5M in royalties. Willis left the band in 1980 and was later arrested several times for drug possession.

The village person penned the band's most infectious hits -- including "Y.M.C.A.," "Macho Man," "In the Navy," and "Go West" -- and deserves his fair share of the funky financial windfall, Willis claims in a federal lawsuit filed last week. Willis is suing Can't Stop Productions, which handles the rights to the band's songs. Willis was inspired to write "Y.M.C.A." after a clueless Morali asked him about why people went to the Y. The lyrical licks described "what it was like going into a new town and not having a lot of money and needing a place to stay," he said. Willis is still blown away by the heavy airplay of the disco ditty.

Ray Simpson has performed as the cop since 1987.

Village Puppets

Terrifyingly amazing.

Evening View - THE Village People

Maybe "party" makes "the" OK. But still.

Village People Want To Know Y

"We are deeply dismayed by today's announcement from the YMCA that they feel a name change and a rebranding are in order after 166 years. Some things remain iconic and while we admire the organization for the work they do, we still can't help but wonder Y." - Village People, responding the YMCA changing their name to "The Y."

UNRELATED PET PEEVE: The group's name is Village People. Not THE Village People. I have the same nomenclature issue with folks who insist on writing THE Pet Shop Boys. See also: Scissor Sisters.

80's Flashback

Village People, Sex Over The Phone, 1985. After a four album downward spiral that began with 1980's Can't Stop The Music, Village People's ninth and final album scored a moderate hit with this tribute to two new phenomenons, commercial phone sex lines and safe sex. Ray Stephens made his only appearance as lead singer on this album, replacing Ray Simpson (brother of Ashford & Simpson's Valerie), who replaced original frontman Victor Willis. Although it sold relatively poorly, Sex Over The Phone has a place in musical history as it was not only the first pop song about phone sex lines, it was supposedly the very first song condemned by Tipper Gore's brand new Parents Music Resource Center, the nudges responsible for the "Parental Advisory!" warnings you see on most of today's hip-hop. (Although it didn't make their Filthy Fifteen.) This clip is terribly, wonderfully silly and possibly NSFW due to hotties in tighty-whities.

Macho, Macho Yanks

The Yankees held their annual hazing of the rookies this weekend, forcing the newbies to dress as the Village People and parade around Boston. I watched it on the news, wondering if there might be a faint hint of homophobia in making the players dress as the most famous gay group of all time, but everybody seemed to be having a ball with it. I gotta wonder who got them the outfits, isn't that a Nasty Pig shirt on the cop?

Village People: The Straight Story

Former Village People frontman and songwriter Victor Willis (seen here during a 2006 drug arrest) is planning a tell-all book about his days with the legendary disco group. Willis, who left the group in 1980, begins his musical comeback attempt on August 31 in Las Vegas, with a worldwide tour to follow the launch of his autobiography in 2008.

Willis, who is straight, left Village People claiming to be upset over the public's misconstruing of his songs like YMCA - which Willis says was written with no homosexual subtext intended. In fact, Willis claims all of the songs he wrote, such as In The Navy and Go West, were meant to be taken with absolutely no gay meaning.

Totally not gay lyrics:

Young man, there's a place you can go.
I said, young man, when you're short on your dough.
You can stay there, and I'm sure you will find
Many ways to have a good time.

Many ways to have a good time, such as "hanging out with all the boys." After all, they have "everything that you need to enjoy." Nope, not gay at all.

Afraid the group was doomed as a gay niche act, Willis quit. After leaving the group (effectively ending their string of hits), Willis refused to perform publicly again and his life spiraled into a 25-year cycle of drug abuse and numerous arrests. In 2005, while a fugitive evading drug charges, he was featured on America's Most Wanted. Despite this, he remains the wealthiest of the original members, thanks to lucrative publishing royalties.

TRIVIA: The first Village People album was recorded using Willis and professional background singers. Producer Jacques Morali then built the Village People group concept around Willis, hiring the other five members for the second album, Macho Man. During this period, Willis was married to The Cosby Show's Phylicia Rashad, who was attempting a disco career of her own.