In An Absurd ClickHole Parody Video, Win Butler Says Great Songs Have ‘A Beak, An Anus, And A Hat’

Between Arcade Fire’s flurry of tongue-in-cheek gags to promote their new album Everything Now and their not-so-sincere apology for those tactics, it seems like the band has no interest in doing anything serious nowadays. Case in point: Win Butler just teamed up with The Onion-owned parody site ClickHole for a video in which he *air quotes* describes his songwriting process step by step.

He begins by explaining the anatomy of a great song: “A really great song has three parts: a beak, an anus, and a hat, and any good artist will be able to tell you when they got all three.” From there, he whips out some lines that, depending on your sensibilities, are actually pretty funny. I personally cracked up at, “I once got a vasectomy in case my vas deferens was making my voice worse. It wasn’t.”

https://twitter.com/DJWindows98/status/902929849207148544

Butler also shared his secret to beating writer’s block, although it probably won’t apply to every struggling songwriter: “Whenever I’m really stuck, I’ll usually email Paul McCartney and say, ‘You got another song in you or what, you old freaky f**ker?’ And every single time, he responds with a fully composed song.”

Watch the video above, and revisit our look at why Arcade Fire’s fake news album promotion tactics didn’t land, right here.