Steve Lukather of Toto Addresses Band’s Spoofs on ‘South Park’ & ‘Family Guy’
Recently Steve Lukather, the guitarist for legendary rockers Toto, chatted with the New Times Broward-Palm Beach and answered a variety of questions about the band’s past, present, and future. Eventually the topic shifted to lampoons of the band in popular culture, most notably on South Park and Family Guy.
“We take our music seriously, but not in any other area,” Lukather said. “We’re the first guys to laugh at ourselves.”
The references in question are from South Park’s Season 2 episode, “Gnomes,” and Family Guy’s Season 10 episode, “Internal Affairs.” In the former, the infamous Trey Parker and Matt Stone were actually surprisingly nice to the band, with the South Park Mayor character referring to them as “a band everyone likes.” They were later shown performing and being cheered on by an overly-enthusiastic fan.
On Family Guy, Toto’s hit “Africa” was used in the Season 10 episode, “Internal Affairs,” as the song playing in the strip club where Joe first met his wife Bonnie. They later reconciled after a fight with the song in the background once again.
In another show’s ode to the band, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon performed a skit in which Justin Timberlake and Jimmy played sleep-away campers sand “Africa” as a duet inside their cabin instead of going to bed.
“That stuff killed me,” Lukather said. “I loved that! We can have the piss taken out of us and we love it. We just laugh our asses off. We’ve become a part of pop culture, and we consider it a great honor.”
