Rob Cantor’s “Perfect” Song Was Hoax: 29 Impressions Weren’t Him

Rob Cantor’s video of his original “Perfect” song went viral in the past 10 days, racking up more than 7 million views. My family probably watched it 20 times, marveling at the impressions — from Randy Newman and Jack Black to Adam Sandler. The most amazing parts were his “impressions” of female singers like Gwen Stefani, Cher, Britney Spears and Billie Holliday.

Cantor appears to nail the impressions even of folks we haven’t likely hear sing — like Christopher Walken, Ray Romano and Steve Buscemi.

But as his “behind the scenes” video revealed, he had some help from some accomplished male and female impressionists.

The full voiceover cast is below, and includes Piotr Michael from “The Impression Guys.” And the cast from “The Impressions Guys” had their own response: a very funny deprecating parody where the voices are clearly dubbed. Check out the “Impression Guys” if you haven’t seen it, and season two starts soon.

I’m usually pretty good about detecting fakes, but I convinced myself it was real based on some nice tricks:

• The lip synching was near flawless
• Cantor’s facial expressions reinforced the  impersonations
• Cantor continued looking at his phone, as if he needed help recalling the next impression (of course the vocals had been prerecorded by pros).
• The video seemed informal and low-budget — a bit out of focus and compressed, and lighting was good but not “perfect”
• Small details helped, including a squeaky chair and some alterations of the audio to give it an amateur echoed sound

Did you fall for it? I did!

CAST (in alphabetical order):
BROCK BAKER: Jack Black, Kermit the Frog, Smeagol / Gollum, Peter Griffin, Adam Sandler, Patrick Warburton, Jon Lovitz
GILBERT GAUTHIER: Frank Sinatra
AMANDA GARI: Cher, Flipper
REAGAN JAMES: Gwen Stefani
BORA KARACA: Whistle
ANDREW LAURICH: Christopher Walken
ANDY McCLOUD: Bono
PIOTR MICHAEL: Christopher Lloyd, Steve Buscemi, Gilbert Gottfried, Ray Romano, Ian McKellan, Jeff Goldblum, Bob Dylan
MISSY MODELL: Shakira
MARK SIPKA: Randy Newman, Louis Armstrong, Willie Nelson, Billie Holiday
GABE STEINER: Trumpet
MELISSA VILLASEÑOR: Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Bjork