“Gangsta’s Paradise” is, at heart, a very serious song. An anguished song. A tragic song. And a pop song whether Coolio wanted it to be one or not. And the least generous read of “Amish Paradise” that I can offer you is that for some large percentage of Weird Al’s target audience (and Coolio’s less-targeted audience), the Amish lifestyle and the gangsta lifestyle are equally remote, equally exotic, equally unimaginable.
