Rand Paul Leaving GOP Boy Band For Solo Career [Satire]

Citing irreconcilable artistic differences, prominent Kentucky Senator Rand Paul announced in a press conference Sunday that he is disbanding the GOP boy band, Elephantasy, and embarking on a solo career to focus on his speech-writing, songcraft, and the smooth rhythms of Jeffersonian-style limited government.

Paul rose to prominence during the last decade in a field stacked with male, right-leaning, musical talent, including Ted Nugent and, um, Ted Nugent. Like his ageless father before him, Rand was soon commanding large crowds of college-aged teens yearning for the sweet lyrics of liberty and the unapologetic swagger of a man who knows exactly how much he wants to regulate marijuana use.

Lately, however, Paul has chafed under the restrictive management of key Republican producers such as Karl Rove and Jeff “Jam” Sessions, who have sought to bend his iconoclastic denim wardrobe and disdain for feckless central authority to the whims of a fickle musical electorate. In what many see as his Timberlake moment, Paul took to the congressional microphone for a breathtaking 13-hour performance simulcast around the entire world via noted tastemakers C-SPAN and C-SPAN II. Recordings of that performance, which drew immediate comparisons to both Jimmy Stewart and 70’s-era Springsteen, were immediately taken by courier to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, where they were reportedly archived next to a screenshot of MC Chuck Grassley’s iconic first tweet.

Sources close to Pauk have alluded to a potential collaboration with up-and-coming Grand Rapids wordsmith, Justin Amash and a genre-bending pairing with Oregonian DJ-cum-legislator, Jeff Merkley. Promising opportunities notwithstanding, liberal music rag Rolling Stone has preemptively dubbed Paul the “libertarian Peter Cetera,” predicting blandly successful work as a solo act, but strangely accurate in that most sane libertarians would never want to stay in Chicago.

Ironically, Paul’s unwillingness to censor the internet, though indicative of his strong moral code and keen political instincts, may well serve to undermine his chances of future success. Piracy of Rand’s recordings has been rampant, but if there is a silver lining to be found, the piracy seems to have spread his gospel faster than any biblical Paul could have hoped for. Indeed, rumors have been swirling that Paul will soon take his act on the road, likely in advance of 2016, to take full advantage of both this groundswell of support and the notorious spring lull in eye maladies.

There is plenty of room for speculation as to Paul’s trajectory, but perhaps it is best to leave off with one certain thing: the inevitable R.E.M. cover: