Bad Lip Reading is an American YouTube channel that makes videos dubbing TV shows, movies, political speeches, political debates, campaign advertisements, and any other video that has been on television based on what it looks like the speakers are saying, resulting in nonsensical dialogue.
History[]
The "Bad Lip Reader" behind the channel is an anonymous music and video producer. The first Bad Lip Reading video released was a spoof of Rebecca Black's song "Friday", titled "Gang Fight". New music and lyrics were matched to Black's video to make it appear as though she were singing about gang warfare. The "Gang Fight" YouTube video, released in March 2011, earned BLR a million hits and thousands of subscribers.
More spoof videos followed, including interpretations of the Black Eyed Peas' "Boom Boom Pow" and Michael Bublé's "Haven't Met You Yet". The latter was transformed into the "electronica inspired" "Russian Unicorn", which Bublé himself praised as his "new favorite song" and "one of the coolest things I've ever seen."
In September 2011, BLR branched out from pop singers to politicians with a "bad lip-reading" of Texas governor and US Presidential hopeful Rick Perry. BLR replaced clips of Perry with invented dialogue matched to his lip movements. After airing on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, the video was featured by news and media outlets across the United States, leading to a sudden surge in Bad Lip Reading's popularity. Following the Perry spoof, BLR released bad lip-readings of President Barack Obama, as well as Republican presidential candidates Michele Bachmann, Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, Ron Paul, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum.
The channel found even more success in November 2012 when it began overdubbing popular movie and televisions shows. BLR's version of Twilight quickly went viral, followed by bad lip-readings of The Hunger Games, The Walking Dead, and Game of Thrones. The videos have been well-received not only by the public, but also by the cast and creators of the properties being spoofed.
The cast of Hunger Games also reacted to BLR. In her online blog, Elizabeth Banks said, "Bad Lip Reading is awesome. I was introduced to it by none other than Jennifer Lawrence. Yup - she saw this, people. And she laughed. And so did I. A lot." Lawrence's co-star Josh Hutcherson also praised the video, tweeting it to his fans. The cast and creators of TWD have publicly praised BLR's TWD videos on several occasions.
Expanding his scope yet again, in January 2013, BLR released a "bad lip-reading" of NFL players, coaches, and referees - a video that would go on to become the channel's most popular video. A second NFL video followed in 2014, and a third was released in 2015.
In a Rolling Stone interview, the producer behind BLR said that he first encountered the technique of lip reading when his mother, then in her 40s, lost her hearing due to unknown causes. While she excelled at lip reading, he was unable to pick up the skill despite trying. "I was terrible at it."
In 2013, BLR won the Webby Awards' "People's Choice" award for Best Comedy Series. In April 2014, BLR won the American Comedy Award for Best Viral video for its "NFL: A Bad Lip Reading" video. Patrick Stewart accepted the award on BLR's behalf during the televised ceremony on NBC.
On June 8, 2014 the BLR Facebook page announced the release of the full version of "Modify" by Kniles, a song that has been used in multiple BLR videos. The fact that this song was used without previous attribution, as well as stylistic similarities to other BLR-produced songs, have prompted speculation that Kniles is another pseudonym for the individual behind BLR.
Copyright issues[]
"Dirty Spaceman" (a bad lip-reading of will.i.am's "Check It Out") was taken down due to a claim of copyright infringement. It is unclear whether Universal Music issued a formal DMCA takedown request or else YouTube's Content ID Match system detected the work and removed it automatically.
In March 2012, "Beard With Glue" (a bad lip-reading of James Blunt's "You're Beautiful") was taken down by Warner Music Group on a copyright claim. Unlike "Dirty Spaceman", the claim was soon released, however, and the video was returned in October 2011. "Gang Fight" had been similarly taken down the previous year, in 2011, but returned. UMG also took down "(Rockin') All Nite Long" (Taylor Swift's "Our Song"). BLR's parody "Time to Rock" (Double Take's "Hot Problems") was also taken down, but later returned.
BLR did a redubbing of Maroon 5's "Girls Like You" ("Haiku") released on 12 October 2018, but the video was taken down later the same day. Another bad lip-reading of Taylor Swift's "You Need To Calm Down" ("Lushfull") was taken down in June 2019.
Subscriber Milestones[]
- 1 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 2 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 3 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 4 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 5 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 6 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 7 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 8 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 9 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 10 Thousand Subscribers: Mar 2011
- 20 Thousand Subscribers: Apr 2011
- 30 Thousand Subscribers: Jun 2011
- 40 Thousand Subscribers: Jul 2011
- 50 Thousand Subscribers: Jul 2011
- 60 Thousand Subscribers: Aug 2011
- 70 Thousand Subscribers: Sep 2011
- 80 Thousand Subscribers: Oct 2011
- 90 Thousand Subscribers: Oct 2011
- 100 Thousand Subscribers: Oct 2011
- 200 Thousand Subscribers: Jul 2012
- 300 Thousand Subscribers: Oct 2012
- 400 Thousand Subscribers: Oct 2012
- 500 Thousand Subscribers: Nov 2012
- 600 Thousand Subscribers: Dec 2012
- 700 Thousand Subscribers: Jan 2013
- 800 Thousand Subscribers: Jan 2013
- 900 Thousand Subscribers: Jan 2013
- 1 Million Subscribers: Feb 2013
- 2 Million Subscribers: May 2013
- 3 Million Subscribers: Feb 2014
- 4 Million Subscribers: Dec 2014
- 5 Million Subscribers: Feb 2016
- 6 Million Subscribers: Feb 2017
- 7 Million Subscribers: Jun 2018
- 8 Million Subscribers: Jan 2021
Preview[]
"Ron Paul" — A BLR Soundbite
