Polyphonic guides you through a full history of music videos. I find the research, knowledge and editing to be so impressive.
Above you will find the series from the beginning and going to near the end of the MTV era. It is at that point - the early 2000s - where I personally lose interest. If you're interested in watching the full history/series, you can find that here.
Strange times. "Psycho Killer" was a song by the Talking Heads released in 1977. The official music video was just released today.
I'm a big Talking Heads fan and a big fan of "Psycho Killer." In the abstract, I'm not opposed to making a modern music video for it - I don't see the point, really, but not opposed. But I don't get this. The contrast in era between the music and video is too great, it's jarring. I think maybe it could be helped if you go for a 70s aesthetic, but I don't know. Certainly a better concept/story is called for, for such a classic song.
I don't have any real opinions on Jamiroquai one way or the other but it's a nice trip back to the late 90's.
Oh, I do have one opinion, actually. It's amazing to me how all the elements of this video came together perfectly. You don't just have the concept but the "slipperiness" of the floor is combined with a great dancer who can make it amazing. And they didn't just combine the concept and the dancing and say "we'll improvise" - this is meticulously planned and choreographed. And how are we going to hide the edits? It's just in time for early CGI. Everything just comes together perfectly to make a hit video.
There's a lot going on in the music video for Frank Sinatra's "L.A. is My Lady."
The song is yacht rock and the video resembles the Yacht Rock web-series.
It features Donna Summer(?), James Ingram, Quincy Jones; Latoya Jackson is drinking with Dean Martin. Michael McDonald puts an orange in a grocery bag, the orange travels and disappears. There is an implied Michael Jackson but they couldn't get the real one, so they show archival footage.
Psychological studies have indicated (or suggested) that you can change a memory merely by accessing it. It is possible that my current memory of being 6 years old, for instance, is not just my exeperience of that time but my experience plus my remembering it when I was 10, plus my remembering it when I was 20, 30, etc.
One of the best ways to become nostalgic for a place or time is to listen to the music that corresponds to it, but the above suggests that ironically you don't remember the 80s (for instance) best by the big 80s hits because you've been hearing those hits ever since. What you would ideally want is a great song that was everywhere at that time but that hasn't made it into constant hit rotation (by you, the radio, or anywhere else). It's a tall order. I can't think of any.
But failing that, the next best thing is a moderate hit or a song that was never a hit, that was very much of its time but you haven't heard even a single time since then.
The above music video is very enjoyable and I suppose it's because it somewhat fits the criteria. It's also just an earworm. On its face, it's a simple song, perhaps even a braindead simple song. But what I like about it is that it's very slyly constantly changing all the time - new elements are introduced, new instruments, additional melodies. Not that being braindead simple is necessarily a bad thing anyway, that's one of the distinguishing features of the 90s.
I expect the young people in Current Year, will react completely differently to the lyrics. Back when the song was released, a phone was just for phone calls.
Oh, and one more thing, if you're like me and you're wondering what happened to the "I miss the rising action... but it rocks" part, you're thinking of this. Very tricky.
MTV premiered August 1, 1981 - I missed the anniversary by 1 day - and you can now watch the first two hours ever broadcast on that channel, on youtube.
1981 is before my time and this is not my kind of music but it's still a quaint and interesting artifact, interesting enough for me to bother watching it.
A lot of people complain how MTV doesn't show music anymore - I was one of them. But I've finally reached the acceptance stage of grief and don't really care. I've reached the even more depressing conclusion that an MTV that showed music videos could never succeed today - everything is on-demand on the internet and no one has the patience to sit through any song that they don't like. In some ways this is progress, in some ways we're breaking down.
The Charismatic Voice reacts to "Interstate Love Song" by Stone Temple Pilots. I never knew the backstory to this song nor do I recall ever seeing that beginning to the music video.
Charlie Chaplin is not involved in any way.
If you're unfamiliar, TCV is a former Opera singer who now does these kind of youtube videos. She's done a series of Grunge songs and her fondness for the genre has been one of the pleasant surprises of the channel.
In 1984, Mr. T released his own album of songs called "Mr. T's Commandments." At 30 minutes in length, Wikipedia calls it technically an EP.
The tracklisting is as follows:
"Mr. T's Commandment"
"Don't Talk to Strangers"
"The Toughest Man in the World"
"Mr. T, Mr. T (He Was Made for Love)"
"The One and Only Mr. T"
"No Dope No Drugs"
"You Got to Go Through It"
This is mostly the mid-eighties rap/funk that you'd imagine. My favorite track is the unexpectedly sultry and sensual "Don't Talk to Strangers." If you're with your girl and you're looking for music to set the mood, you gotta go with "Don't Talk to Strangers."
Notable is the fact that the "rap direction" (whatever that is) for the album was done by none other than Ice-T. If you were in on the studio sessions and you said, "Hey T, what are we doing on this track?" I wonder what would've happened.
This song was big for me in 1994 and it recently started getting stuck in my head again, all these years later.
A few thoughts.
I never knew how popular any particular song (U Will Know by Black Men United) was and therefore never knew if this was a big hit or not. With 7 million plays on youtube it appears it wasn't very popular.
This is one of those "everyone gets together for charity" things that was so popular back then. Such a thing is mocked now but I think it holds up.
Tevin Campbell. Remember Tevin Campbell. Man, that takes me back. I wonder what he's doing these days.
I always took for granted that this was a Gospel song. Reading the lyrics now, it has nothing to do with it, it's basically just motivational speaking. They still have a certain strength, I think, probably due to the music.
I have one big problem with the video. At 1:24, when the lyrics say "boys to men" they cut to video of Boys II Men. I want to take the editor aside and say, "Come on, man. Too obvious."
As you can see in the video, this song was made for the movie "Jason's Lyric" which I don't think I've ever seen. I always get "Jason's Lyric" confused with "Poetic Justice". I might have to watch "Jason's Lyric" to settle the score.
The only problem with this clip is how old it makes me feel. You see, there used to be this thing called "MTV" and it used to have music videos... and they used to give out awards for the music videos... and there was a thing called the "Real World" and then the bands themselves.... aaaa-AAHHH...
All I know, all I know is love will save the day...
Things are slow on the comedy front. Thought I'd post a song.
The internet has solved so many problems in life but once in a while you'll run into a question that can't be searched - an ungoogleable problem. I ran into one recently. I had a song in my head, I knew it was from the 80s, I knew the melody and one of the synth sounds but I didn't know the artist, the title, a single lyric or what it was about.
After much searching, I've found it. It's "Steppin' Out" by Joe Jackson. It's great.
The Flight of the Conchords are tasked with creating a song for a children's charity. Awesomeness ensues.
I think "The kids that are sick can't do hip hop anymore" is my new favorite sentence. I want to begin every conversation that way. That, and I've started using the work "collusion" in everyday sentences. I can't stop watching.
In the world of college football there are many fight songs. But until now there have not been any 80's power ballads.... until now. Oh yeah, I already said that.
