Bart Baker

Bart Baker (born May 5, 1986) is an American social media personality, musician, and comedian. He is best known for making parody videos of notable songs, for which Billboard dubbed him one of the most prolific makers of music parodies.

Baker is prominent on YouTube, where at one point his self-titled channel peaked at 10 million subscribers. Baker was also a top-earning broadcaster on the platforms Vine and Live.ly. His subsequent ventures include appearing in the 2016 film Laid in America, and uploading content onto the social media app Kuaishou and Douyin, where his English covers of Chinese songs have gained a following.

In 2018, Baker released satirical music on WorldStarHipHop and a new YouTube channel using the stage name of Lil Kloroxxx.

Early life Baker was born in Chicago, Illinois to parents, Janet and Walter Baker, on May 5, 1986. He attended high school at New Trier High School and film school at the University of Miami. After realizing the potential of video sharing on the internet, he started filming comedy videos in his backyard on a green screen. The Lonely Island was described as a 'big inspiration' to Baker when he first started.

Career

Baker portraying Justin Bieber in the music video for Mockstars' "Deadpool Epic Rap", 2016 The first video he posted on YouTube, "Look into My Eyes While I Masturbate", about men masturbating in a future world where robots have replaced all women on Earth, quickly received about 100,000 views. This encouraged Baker to make more videos.

Baker worked with his friend Austin Smith from the channel's launch until early 2011, when the duo mutually decided to part ways. During his time with Smith, they were sponsored and signed to RKShorts.com.

Not long after leaving RKShorts, Baker signed on with Maker Studios in Los Angeles and began recording with them. In 2013, Baker's parody of "Royals" by Lorde was taken down by Matt Pincus, CEO of Songs Music Publishing, for alleged copyright infringement. Baker responded by posting a video accusing Songs Music of not understanding US laws governing fair use and encouraging fans to tweet about it. A few days later, Songs Music released their take-down, and the parody was restored to Baker's channel.

It was reported on November 26, 2014, that Baker had reached one billion views in total on YouTube. Around the same year, Baker's videos aired on Music Choice along with a TV special titled Bart Baker's Funniest Videos. In 2015, Baker signed with Hollywood talent agency Creative Artists Agency. It was the second time in four months Baker had signed with a major Hollywood talent agency, the first being WME, when he was one of seven people who signed deals at about the same time. As of October 9, 2021, Baker has over 9 million subscribers and 3 billion lifetime views on his YouTube channel. Since starting the channel in 2009, he has created over 100 parody videos that have featured guest stars like Joan Rivers and Stan Lee. Speaking about YouTube, he said, "YouTube is honestly one of the only platforms that has proven it's not going anywhere". On September 23, 2016, it was announced that Baker would feature in a film titled FM starring fellow internet personalities Jason Nash and Brandon Calvillo.

On September 6, 2019, Vice News reported that after YouTube's demonetization of several YouTubers to satisfy family-friendly advertisers, Baker shifted his career to the Chinese market. His works consist of translating and singing Chinese songs on the social media app Kuaishou, and his English covers of Chinese songs have been gaining a following on Douyin. He moved to Shanghai to further develop his career as an internet content creator in China. Since Baker had moved to the Chinese market following the drastic change of YouTube's policies to satisfy family-friendly advertisers, his channel had dropped from 10 to 9.8 million (as of August 31, 2024). He announced that he would be returning to the United States in September 2021, and added that he would be able to afford making new content, including occasional parodies, using cryptocurrency. Baker's most recent music video, "PolyDoge", was released in November 2021.

Other ventures In November 2016, Baker released his first non-parody single, titled "Drake". The album was subsequently released through his own record label alongside indie label 26 Music, a division of 26 Entertainment. In 2018, Baker collaborated with producer Jason Nelken to create an official rap persona known as Lil Kloroxxx. The video for his song "Popper" was released on the WorldStarHipHop YouTube channel on July 21. He then went on to release two more songs nearly a month later, "4 Xanny" and "Prom Queen". Online sources have said that Lil Kloroxxx is fake and heavily spoofs off of SoundCloud rappers such as 6ix9ine and Lil Pump, but Baker himself has confirmed that this persona is "real".

In 2016, Baker announced he was running for President of the United States by setting up a large billboard in Times Square, dressed in American-flag boxer-shorts. He believed that his presidential candidacy would shed light on the nature of celebrity and how it has influenced the election cycle. In a 2015 livestream podcast, Baker discussed his involvement with "Fuck Cancer", a nonprofit charity that is dedicated to early detection, prevention, and providing support to those affected by cancer, and an online fundraiser where fans could participate to win an appearance in one of his videos while donating money to the cause. The disease has impacted people in his own life including his mother, who survived breast cancer when he was a child.

Filmography

Film TitleYearRoleLaid in America 2016Blindr SpokespersonFMLSwagg

Television

Music videos Title Artist Year "Fireball" ) TitleDetailsCelebritease Released: March 1, 2017 Label: 26 Music, LLC Format: Digital download, CD

Singles

TitleYearAlbum "Drake" 2018non-album singles"Prom Queen" "Savior" "Feelin U" "Poly Doge" 2021

Parodies