diff --git a/Lib/distutils/log.py b/Lib/distutils/log.py
index cf3ee136e0a..95d4c1c5a21 100644
--- a/Lib/distutils/log.py
+++ b/Lib/distutils/log.py
@@ -20,7 +20,12 @@ def __init__(self, threshold=WARN):
 
     def _log(self, level, msg, args):
         if level >= self.threshold:
-            print msg % args
+            if not args:
+                # msg may contain a '%'. If args is empty,
+                # don't even try to string-format
+                print msg
+            else:
+                print msg % args
             sys.stdout.flush()
 
     def log(self, level, msg, *args):