Meet the YouTube Star Who Turned "Kazoo Kid" Into a Viral Trap Remix

Kazoos, the most neglected of birthday party favours, made a triumphant return to pop culture recently in the form of a viral internet video called "Kazoo Kid." The clip, ripped from an 80s children's video called You On Kazoo!, features a young blonde boy whose enthusiasm for a plastic horn with a small vibrating membrane seems almost unfathomable.

But, as with all things, someone decided that the video would be significantly better with trap drops, golden guns, and big twerking butts. That man is Mike Diva, a Los Angeles-based director and YouTube star who's previously directed videos for electronic acts like Kill The Noise and Steve Aoki.

His ludicrous, catchy "Kazoo Kid - Trap Remix" has racked up almost two million views in less than a week, so we hit him up on Skype over the weekend to talk about it.

THUMP: Do you prefer vuvuzelas or kazoos?
Mike Diva: They each have their own merit. I would say that I'm definitely more of a kazoo guy; with a vuvuzela you get that one tone and it's pretty lit, but with a kazoo you can do all sorts of tones.

Is Kazoo Kid is the new epic sax guy?
Oh, man, I hope so. It's weird that you talk about epic sax guy. Have you seen my "Sexy Sax Man" video?

Yeah, of course.
It's weird that I now have two videos that are viral that revolve around really dumb instruments. I think the next one is a vuvuzela video now. You just gave me that idea. I have to do something with vuvuzelas. The stupid instrument viral video triad. That will be my thing.

You don't often do remix stuff, what was it about Kazoo Kid that got your attention?
It's such a fun video and that kid is giving it his all; I respect his gusto and I admire him. How could I not want to sample something like a kid going "fun fun fun fun fun fun fun"? It basically writes itself.

You really tapped into that weird, demonic cuteness he has going on.
There's something very off about it. You know this kid has killed a couple small animals and buried them in the backyard. I wanted to capture that vibe. At the same time, he's a pretty cute kid. I just wouldn't want to be alone with him in a room.

How did you create the climax of the video—this purple scene with twerking butts and golden uzis?
First and foremost, I'm a music video director and that's my main thing. I was dicking around with it I was like, "Why don't I try to make it more like one of my music videos and just add an element of a rap-video-esque scene?" So I just went nuts and it was like 3 AM in the morning. I was a little sleep-deprived and was like whatever, this kid needs to be surrounded by twerking girls. It just felt right.

What one video of yours best defines you?
The video that I'm still the most proud of is "Kill The Noise Part 1" and I feel like it represents the neo-grindhouse, cyberpunk aesthetics that I'm into.

That was one of the first videos I've seen like that, and since then you've got Kung Fury a couple years after, and it was definitely influenced a bit by the KTN video. I'm pretty proud of getting that down before a bunch of other people ended up doing it.

What do you have coming up in the future?
I'll be uploading videos every month. A staple of my channel is that I'm all over the place with my content. One month I'll just do for art's sake and then I'll do a stupid "Sexy Sax Man" prank video and then I'll do a sketch.

Also, can I just give a shout out to the comment section? VICE has one of the harshest comment sections on the internet and I love it. Without a doubt, half the comments on this article are going to be like "I remember when THUMP used to write articles about real musicians."

Mike Diva is on Facebook // Twitter // YouTube

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