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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 22, 2009 20:27:23 GMT -5
88. Robert Palmer—“Addicted To Love” www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0U5JfGYx4cAlbum: Riptide Label: Island Records Director: Terence Donovan I’ve always been puzzled to see "Addicted to Love" consistently included on Greatest Videos of All-Time lists. Yet, here I am including it and wondering why. It’s just Palmer singing his song with a backing band of pale skinned, heavy make-uped, dark haired and seductively looking models who all resemble the women in Patrick Nagel paintings. The video itself contains slightly more motion than a still picture: the sexless "sexy" mannequins scissor their legs and bop in place slightly, Palmer looks like he's thinking about a latte or his doctor's appointment, and the camera "work" consists of focusing in on small details of the non-event. Occasionally, the girls will look like they actually are playing their instruments: "Hey, look her fingers are really touching those bass strings." Yes, now if only the thing were plugged into the amp. Hell, all it’s pretty much good for is being parodied: Beyoncé's 2007 video for "Green Light" shares many of the same elements. Shania Twain's 1999 video for "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!" Palmer's women are substituted for men dancing in the same way. "Weird Al" Yankovic parodied the song with "Addicted to Spuds" in 1986 and "UHF" in 1989. It was also used in Mr Blobby's 1993 music video for "Mr Blobby". Further parodies include Tone Lōc's 1988 "Wild Thing", Bowling for Soup's video for "1985" released in 2004, a dream sequence of Dr. Joel Fleischman the 1990 TV series Northern Exposure, and film parodies including the 1990 comedy "horror" film Repossessed with Leslie Nielsen's character Father Jebedaiah Mayii and the 2003 romantic comedy Love Actually with Bill Nighy's character, Billy Mack. Not only that but in 1985, people found it offensive. Today it's just vapid and lacking in any kind of eroticism. But, therein lies its greatness. It’s iconic, fully representing the decade it came from. Well, mostly the negative aspects. Any time someone feels like indulging in character-destroying nostalgia for the era, all he or she needs to do is see this video to quickly remember everything awful about the 80's. Consider it medication for 1980’s addiction. Though, much like prescription pills, it can be just as addictive. Here's a fun fact that might shed some light. Robert Palmer and the chicks never met. Palmer was performing in front of a blue screen the whole time! ![](http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m85/hulk6785/Confused/big-lebowski.jpg)
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Post by Shovelman on Jul 22, 2009 20:59:36 GMT -5
So are you indifferent or did I blow your mind? The Dude is being hard to read right now.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 22, 2009 21:35:48 GMT -5
So are you indifferent or did I blow your mind? The Dude is being hard to read right now. I'm confused. Where did you hear that "fact"?
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Post by Shovelman on Jul 22, 2009 22:07:56 GMT -5
So are you indifferent or did I blow your mind? The Dude is being hard to read right now. I'm confused. Where did you hear that "fact"? I forgot where...I think it was some countdown or something like that.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 23, 2009 17:16:38 GMT -5
It's countdown time once again. Here's number 85:
85. Bonnie Tyler—“Total Eclipse Of The Heart”
Album: Faster Than The Speed Of Night Label: Columbia Records Director: Russell Mulcahy
Before “Highlander,” Russell Mulcahy helped launch a network as director of the first music video to play on MTV, "Video Killed The Radio Star" by The Buggles. His profile rose as he directed a number Duran Duran’s memorable videos, like “Rio” and “Hungry Like The Wolf.” More threatening than the canons-cum-cocks of Cher's "If I Could Turn Back Time," Mulcahy's cinematic clip for Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse Of The Heart" reimagined Wolf Rilla's horror classic The Village of the Damned as gay fantasia. The witchy headmistress played by Tyler must defy the pink curtains and unexplained doves that shoot out at her from the vaginal hallways of her all-boys school. Tortured by her pent-up sexual energy, she discovers release in fantasy, imagining her pupils as dancing ninjas, greasers, football players, and scantily clad Tarzans. Morning call seemingly restores her faith in prudence though a child's bright eyes portend yet another vaginal flow. Though the openly gay Mulcahy would channel some of the leftover homoeroticism into the first three episodes of the Brit version of "Queer as Folk," the video's stateside legacy is a sad one. In the 90s, the video was updated for two other Jim Steinman produced tracks: Meatloaf's "I Would Do Anything For Love" and Celine Dion's "It's All Coming Back To Me Now." But, this one still stands out as superior to those two, mainly because its cheesy grandeur isn’t as cheesy as the other two.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 23, 2009 17:43:24 GMT -5
84. Toni Basil—“Mickey” Album: Word Of Mouth Label: Chrysalis Director: Toni Basil This is another one I was afraid to put on the list due to the song’s catchiness. However, much like that song playing in your head forever, this video can’t be ignored. It was one of the most popular early MTV videos, which isn’t that hard to figure out. In the video, Basil wore the head cheerleader uniform of Las Vegas High School, from which she graduated (The year on the uniform, 1981, was two decades after her actual graduation, and her actual uniform from that period was not as elaborate as the uniform she wore in the video.) and dances around with some other cheerleaders. That’s all it is: a white room with cheerleaders. Yes, it’s for purely hedonistic reasons. Practically every single male in the world has a thing for cheerleaders. But, there is a little more to it than that. Directed and expertly choreographed by Toni Basil herself, "Mickey" was a supreme "f*** you" to the Mickey of her dreams. (By the way, that “Mickey” is Monkee Micky Dolenz; Basil's crush on the actor during her work as a choreographer/dancer on the set of the Monkees 1968 movie “Head” prompted her to change the lyrics of the song, which was originally called “Kitty” to "Mickey" to better suit her real-life experience, and the gender from female to male.) Basil's cheerleader is a far cry from the typical airhead who'll shed a tear or two when the captain of the football team forsakes her for another girl. For whom the cheerleader cheers; she cheers for herself. And, she’s still cheering. Basil subsequently developed a special fondness for the song and its enduring popularity and has said on more than one occasion that, if she was asked to, she would gladly resume the cheerleader uniform she wore in the video. And, she could pull it off. Seriously, the woman has barely aged since that video. I mean just look at this photo: ![](http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m85/hulk6785/toni.jpg) It’s like she’s been frozen in ice since 1981!
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 23, 2009 18:05:44 GMT -5
83. Red Hot Chili Peppers—“Give It Away”
Album: Blood Sugar Sex Magik Label: Warner Bros. Records Director: Stéphane Sednaoui
When it came time to make a video for the lead single off of the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ album Blood Sugar Sex Magik, lead singer Anthony Kiedis wanted the video to be visually distinct and readily identifiable but disliked much of the material Warner Bros. sent for him to choose from: "I started viewing reels and reels and reels of video directors but nothing looked good to me. Everything was the same, boring, homogenized, contrived s***." Upon finding French fashion photographer and director Stéphane Sednaoui's reel, however, Kiedis noticed it was "like nothing else. It was slower and poetic, shot in black and white. It seemed like authentic art, not something shot for MTV." He and Flea met with Sednaoui to talk about the video, for which the director proposed a "very desolated [and] very graphic landscape," while heavily focusing on the band members with little to no outside influence. It was decided that the video would be filmed in black and white while Sednaoui took the idea of painting the band members with silver acrylic from previous photo shoots he had done. Sednaoui recalls that he was "amazed by what [the band] gave me because they went far, far, far beyond what I was expecting and I think that's one of my best experiences in that regard". The band’s look in the video wasn’t the only thing that made it stand out. There was also John Frusciante waving an large aluminum ribbon in reverse, a wide-angle shot of Flea in a desert setting wearing pants with several gold colored horns protruding from each leg and standing in a meditative stance and brings his arms together above his head when the music begins to play and later getting dowsed in water, the four band members standing with their eyes closed; the band dancing around in a dimly lit setting, a ground view of Frusciante playing a reflective silver Fender Stratocaster in between his legs while wearing pants made up entire of small pieces of mirror, the band members dancing frenziedly with full makeup on; Kiedis began to move his tongue flamboyantly to dramatically accentuate the lyrics, and Kiedis' crotch-hugging shorts. After seeing the finished product, Warner Bros. executives were worried that the content would be "too weird" or "too artsy" for the general public and favored a more traditional premise in contrast to the experimental approach Sednaoui took. Luckily, the video was ultimately released without being edited by the record label. Since then it has been widely credited as being a considerable factor in the Red Hot Chili Peppers' success and greatly increased their international popularity, and it still stands out today.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 23, 2009 18:23:23 GMT -5
82. Human League—“Don’t You Want Me?” www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPudE8nDog0Album: Dare Label: Virgin Records Director: Steve Barron A brunette being pursued by a gun-toting thug rides a sleek automobile along a twisty highway and ends up inside a hillside mansion. This isn't “Mulholland Drive” but rather Steve Barron's film-within-a-film-within-a-video for Human League's "Don't You Want Me," the band's classic ode to love gone bad. We watch a detective film being made, the behind the scenes romantic tensions of the leads, and the obsessive editing that will lead to a finished product. It was an archetypal New Pop move, simultaneously strong narrative pop and a fictionalizing of how the Human League got the girls in to sing and thus became popular. Superior to No Doubt's similarly themed "Don't Speak," this heady video explores the band's sticky on-set romances and pent-up hostilities with nary a hint of self-indulgence. Barron's camera constantly unravels a new layer beneath the collection of stone-faced glances and suggests that nothing can ever be taken at face value. Nothing is spelt out, the emotion happens in hidden stares and unmet glances. Shots are repeated and rewound and replayed; it’s easier for the characters to watch each other on a screen than to face each other in real life. The viewer is the only person to be looked in the eye. It ends, of course, with the camera dollying away from the set and filming itself in the bright lights of a dressing room mirror. This is Jean-Luc Godard’s “Le Mépris” with a dash of “A Star Is Born” thrown in and made for Saturday morning TV kids.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 23, 2009 20:29:04 GMT -5
81. U2—“Where The Streets Have No Name” www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpvdaIJ1TuQAlbum: The Joshua Tree Label: Island Records Director: Meiert Avis On March 27, 1987, U2, director Meiert Avis, and a film crew went to the rooftop of the Republic Liquor Store at East 7th Street and South Main Street in Los Angeles to film the video for their song “Where The Streets Have No Name.” Unfortunately, radio stations around the city leaked out that they were going to be shooting a video and the location. A large group of fans showed up to see it, so many that the LAPD were concerned they would congest traffic. So, they shut the shoot down. However, U2 played the song anyway! Or so it seemed. I hate to burst people’s bubbles, but this video ain’t 100% kosher. The scenes including the police shutting the video down due to traffic concerns are real. However, the video was edited and heavily overdubbed to make it appear the band defied the police and kept on filming the video. In reality, they stopped performing upon being ordered to do so, and the song was performed to playback. I know it hurts to have this perception of reality shattered. Hell, I thought it was all real too until I did the research for this entry. But, that shouldn’t take away from the video’s greatness. For one, they did a good job of making it seem like the whole video was real. Plus, the video captures the song’s theme of searching for a feeling of belonging, with the band and film crew wanting to film the video paralleling that feeling. But, the main reason is that it fully captures U2’s cooler that everything presence they had been gaining in the late 1980s. Around the time this video came out and afterwards, they were pretty much the biggest act in the world; and this video shows some of that aura that surrounded them. At the time, they had just released The Joshua Tree, an album that saw the band diving deep into the roots of American rock. The wild beauty, cultural richness, spiritual vacancy, and ferocious violence of America were explored to compelling effect in virtually every aspect of The Joshua Tree, yet they were able to keep a worldly appeal mainly because of the lyrics of the songs. In 1987, U2 had the world in the palm of their hands, and you can see why in this video.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 23, 2009 20:33:00 GMT -5
Okay, that's all for tonight. Here's a recap of the past 20 videos we've gone through:
100. Beastie Boys—“Fight For Your Right (To Party)” 99. ZZ Top—“Legs” 98. Daft Punk—“Around The World” 97. Godley And Creme—“Cry” 96. Lenny Kravitz—“Are You Gonna Go My Way” 95. OutKast—“Hey Ya” 94. Wyclef Jean—“Gone Till November” 93. Janet Jackson—“Rhythm Nation” 92. Fatboy Slim—“Praise You” 91. Guns N’ Roses—“November Rain” 90. Yeah Yeah Yeahs—“Maps” 89. New Order—“True Faith” 88. Robert Palmer—“Addicted To Love” 87. Peter Gabriel—“Shock The Monkey” 86. The Killers—“All These Things That I’ve Done” 85. Bonnie Tyler—“Total Eclipse Of The Heart” 84. Toni Basil—“Mickey” 83. Red Hot Chili Peppers—“Give It Away” 82. Human League—“Don’t You Want Me?” 81. U2—“Where The Streets Have No Name”
Tomorrow, numbers 80-76. Here are the hints:
That first video that appeared on a network that use to play music, an optimistic man, an atheist's magnus opus, feeling the weight of something heavy, and a single moment in life.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 24, 2009 15:40:00 GMT -5
Countdown time, Shirley. Here's number 80: 80. The Buggles—“Video Killed The Radio Star” www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKJHRisppCoAlbum: The Age Of Plastic Label: Island Records Director: Russell Mulcahy On August 1, 1981, MTV began broadcasting. This was the first video to air on the network. That little answer to a trivia question alone would be enough to put it on this list, but there are other reasons. For one, the surreal look of it made it stand out from the typical “band playing their song” videos of its day. But what really gets it on the list is its prophetic song. Group member Trevor Horn has said that his lyrics were inspired by the J.G. Ballard short story “The Sound-Sweep,” in which the title character, a mute boy vacuuming up stray music in a world without it, comes upon an opera singer hiding in a sewer. He also felt "an era was about to pass." The theme of the song is thus nostalgia, which is also echoed in the tone of the music. The lyrics refer to a period of technological change in the 1960s, the desire to remember the past and the disappointment that children of the current generation would not appreciate the past. In the 1950s and early 1960s, radio was an important medium for many, through which "stars" were created. Then came the 1980s and MTV. Soon, the music video became the thing that made “stars.” Think about it. Michael Jackson and Madonna had some good albums, but most remember them more for their videos. And, the look became a little more important than the music. Stylish videos with good looking artists get lots of play on the music channels. Hell, today you don’t even need the music. A lot of people have become famous from stupid YouTube videos. It was fitting that this video was the first one to air on MTV; it’s like they knew that things were going to change once they started broadcasting.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 24, 2009 15:56:51 GMT -5
79. The Killers—“Mr. Brightside” www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnwLf88t_WcAlbum: Hot Fuss Label: Island Records Director: Sophie Mueller Like I said earlier, videos can make stars, and this one pretty much did that for The Killers. Now, there are two versions of this video. One is just the band playing the song, shot in black and white. After that monochromatic, bare, and ultimately charmless video, director Sophie Mueller took that as the starting point of how not to shoot "Mr. Brightside." Enter huge sets, huge costumes, and a swarm of chicks baring their asses for a bunch of aristocrats. Along the way, Brandon Flowers resurrects the idea of the badass pop-crooner and throws the whiny kid of the earlier video to the wayside. Although "Mr. Brightside"'s love-triangle with the lead singer is a staple for music videos, it's the excess and the sprinkles of camp that makes this video taste so sweet: Flowers hamming it up for the camera and romping through checkers boards while his porcelain-doll muse interprets the song through an acrobatic dance. Plus, you can’t go wrong with Eric Roberts.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 24, 2009 16:24:29 GMT -5
78. Faith No More—“Epic”
Album: The Real Thing Label: Splash Records, Reprise Records Director: Unknown (I couldn’t find out who did it)
At a time when hair metal and glossy dance pop dominated MTV, Faith No More's "Epic" stood out in 1990 for its adventurous musical and visual sense. The song itself was a classic single that pioneered a hybrid of rap, punk, and metal that unintentionally inspired some of the s***tiest bands known to man later in the decade, but the video for it became a little more memorable than the song. Inspired by the work of painter Salvador Dali, it featured surreal images, like an exploding piano and a hand with an eyeball in the middle of it and lightning shooting out from it, combined with performance footage of the band soaked by an artificial rainstorm on a sound stage. But, one image is best remembered than all the others: the slow-motion footage of a flopping fish laid over the song's pretty, piano-tinkling coda. That disturbing image of the dying fish was subject to controversy because of the perceived treatment of the fish. However, even though the fish is out of water and dying on camera, it was in fact slow motion footage; and the fish was returned to its tank alive in a matter of seconds. Nevertheless, that damn fish became just as famous as the band, so much so that the band began joking about it in interviews. During one interview, the band joked that the fish belonged to Icelandic singer Björk, whom they claimed to have stolen from her at a party. There are also stories of Björk giving the fish to the keyboardist Roddy Bottum after a poetry reading in San Francisco. Nevertheless, like the song, the fish has no meaning beyond its visceral effect, which is both oddly beautiful and incredibly creepy. As for animal-rights concerns, well, at least the fish was immortalized in a way his breaded and fried brethren never were.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 24, 2009 16:40:17 GMT -5
77. Queen And David Bowie—“Under Pressure”
Album: Hot Space Label: EMI, Elektra Directors: David Mallet and Andy Morahan
When directors Mallet and Morahan were given the job of making the video for Queen and David Bowie's now-classic anthem "Under Pressure," they were told two things: they had to make a video but Queen and Bowie weren’t going to be available to film it. So, they pieced one together entirely from silent film and documentary stock footage. Amazingly, the video doesn’t looked half-assed. The directors actually put some thought into it and used their creativity to create a memorable video. A symphony of images cued to the Queen and Bowie duet, this socially conscious slideshow was edited in such a way that the images add to beautiful tone of the song. Stinging yet hopeful, the clip celebrates the pressure-cooker mentality of a culture willing to wage war against political machines. This is propaganda worthy of Sergei Eisenstein, the unofficial father of the music video and whose "Battleship Potemkin" is a main source of inspiration here.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 24, 2009 17:07:31 GMT -5
76. Talking Heads—“Once In A Lifetime” www.dailymotion.com/video/x12spb_talking-heads-once-in-a-lifetime_musicAlbum: Remain In Light Label: Sire Records Directors: David Byrne and Toni Basil When the Talking Heads first hit the music scene, they didn’t sound any other band that was out there. So naturally, when they started making music videos, they didn’t look anything like any other music video that was out there. Case in point, “Once In A Lifetime.” When it comes to music video performance, David Byrne is something of a nerdy Robert DeNiro, and “Once in a Lifetime” is his “Raging Bull.” He huffs, he puffs, and he generally freaks people the f*** out, looking about four times as ragged as Dustin Hoffman in “Marathon Man” (meaning he probably stayed up the last four nights straight before the shoot). Byrne is Jake LaMotta without an opponent, mentally and physically kicking his own ass as if the stress of the modern world had actually made him lose sense of his motor functions. And then comes the chorus, where Byrne surrenders completely, floating on a sea of blue screen and looking unsure as to whether he’s reached heaven or is merely stuck in limbo. Though, Byrne doesn’t deserve all the credit; half of it should go to Toni Basil. She’s the one who choreographed the erratic dances Byrne does in the video, and she also showed Byrne footage of epilepsy patients as inspiration. Plus, the video shows her range. The dancing is a complete 180 from her “Mickey” video, but it’s just a memorable. She was Byrne’s Martin Scorsese, deftly guiding him through his “boxing match.” Together, they came up with a clip good enough to be shown in the New York Museum Of Modern Art. Music video acting may have existed before “Once in a Lifetime,” but Byrne (with Basil’s help) that made it Lee Strasberg worthy.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 24, 2009 17:10:55 GMT -5
Tomorrow, numbers 75-71. Here are the hints:
Automobiles having a thought, a famous work out video, the competition you like the best, loitering, and plants that don't need to be watered.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 25, 2009 13:56:40 GMT -5
What time is it? Well, I have 1:54. It's also countdown time.
75. The Cars—“You Might Think”
Album: Heartbeat City Label: Elektra Director: Jeff Stein.
They just don't make 'em like they used to. Much like Herbie Hancock's "Rockit" and Dire Straits' "Money For Nothing," "You Might Think" is one of several 80s relics that have truly stood the test of time. This colorful clip is a melange of corny yet innocent visual puns, goofy sight gags, and cutout digital effects, with plenty of shots of that cute model (who, by the way, is Susan Gallagher, not Ocasek's future wife, Paulina Porizkova; most people mistake Susan for Paulina because there is a little resemblance and Porizkova appeared in the band’s video for "Drive."). In just over three minutes, director Jeff Stein brings to mind both Michael Snow and Andy Warhol's negotiated personal conflict via a postmodern reality. Because of its underlying romantic spirit, "You Might Think" is more liberating than Snow's Wavelength (not to mention *corpus callosum) and less preening than anything Warhol ever produced. In the name of love, Ric Ocasek repeatedly presents and repackages himself as a desperate romantic figure. And, it was that romantic repackaging and the special effects that helps “You Might Think” to win the first MTV Video Music Award for Video of the Year.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 25, 2009 14:29:39 GMT -5
74. Olivia Newton John—“Physical” www.youtube.com/watch?v=spaw8bCZMHcAlbum: Physical Label: MCA Director: Brian Grant And, here’s another one of those relics from the 1980s that has stood the test of time. Before Madonna, Olivia Newton-John made a ripple or two when her "Let's Get Physical" special aired on network television in the winter of 1982. This hour-long spectacle created by Newton-John and director Brian Grant was inspired by the artist's 1981 album Physical, which spawned the number one hit of the same name. The music video for the song features Newton-John in full double-entendre mode. The singer casts herself as a horny aerobics instructor dressed in a tight leotard supervising a group of overweight men trying to shed some of their excess fat. By video's end, the porkers have turned into sweaty Adonises straight out of a Wakefield Poole porn. No doubt wanting to get in on the action, Newton-John is stunned to discover that her class prefers each other's company. (That means they’re gay.) Amazingly, as tame as it seems today, the sight of men walking hand-in-hand into a gym shower sparked some controversy. MTV frequently cut the ending when it aired the video, and the sometimes sensuous nature of the video also led to it being banned outright by some broadcasters in Canada and the United Kingdom. And, Newton-John's influential fashion trends caused a few schools to adjust their dress policies. Nevertheless, “Physical” still stands up despite it’s sign of the times look. Sure, the video has a cheesy charm with the gags at the fat guys and with the slightly hilarious attempts of Newton-John to shed the good girl image she had at the time; but that twist at the end has elevated it a little. It’s funny and unexpected, and it has a nice message: it doesn’t matter who you’re getting physical with, just as long as your happy. This message is reinforced a little with Newton-John walking off with one of the fat guys at the end.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 25, 2009 15:23:19 GMT -5
73. The Cardigans—“My Favorite Game”
Album: Gran Turismo Label: Stockholm, Polydor Director: Jonas Åkerlund
Most people know The Cardigans for their song “Lovefool,” a bubblegum popish love song that appeared in the film “William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet.” It was a huge hit for the band, but it completely misrepresented the band’s work as a whole. They were branded as saccharine soft-pop group on the basis of "Lovefool." However, they had an edge to them; and most likely due to this branding, the band went darker with their next album Gran Turismo. The video for "My Favorite Game" is a good example of it. The video perfectly embodied the pre-millennium tension of the late 90s. "My Favorite Game" follows leading Cardigan Nina Persson driving her red beater convertible recklessly through the desert on a crash course to self-annihilation. She seemingly takes control by putting her life (and the lives of others) in her own hands but, alas, her fate is eventually determined by a completely random act. So random that they filmed four endings for it: In ending one, Persson's body goes flying into the air and over the van roof where she is then depicted as being dead on the road. In ending two, she also flies over the van roof, except she tries to pick herself off the ground but is knocked out by the rock that was used to keep the car pedal down. In ending three, Persson is depicted being decapitated by the top of her car windscreen and a mannequin head, is seen in the next shot, rolling along the road. In ending four, she also flies over the van roof except she manages to pick herself up from the ground and walks away from the accident. The music video caused much controversy when it was first released. Many European channels, including MTV UK, only played an edited version of the video where all of the car crashes and reckless driving depictions where taken out despite director Jonas Åkerlund's attempts to meet the censorship standards by making six differently edited cuts of the video with varying degrees of violence and blood. The reason MTV UK rejected the video was because of fears that the video could encourage joyriding and cause car accidents amongst teenage drivers. But, in the U.S., the music channels were noticeably less restrictive as many of them either played the completely uncensored version of the video or a slightly censored version with only a few of the car crashes removed. Sure enough, this video did a good job of shedding that saccharine soft-pop label. Though, sadly they haven’t been as popular as they were with “Lovefool,” at least in the United States. But, that shouldn’t really matter. Popularity is overrated anyway.
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Post by Kermit The Hulk on Jul 25, 2009 15:46:50 GMT -5
72. The Cranberries—“Linger” www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPLXJAWUnwIAlbum: Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We? Label: Island Records Director: Melodie McDaniel In 1993 and 1994, photographer and commercial director Melodie McDaniel hit pay dirt with the release of two black-and-white gems. One was for The Cranberries breakout single "Linger" (the other was for Madonna's "Secret."). McDaniel's images are less body-horrific than those of Cindy Sherman's, yet they're every bit as consumed with the way femininity is represented in modern art. McDaniel channeled the spirit of Sherman and John Cassavettes for "Linger," an abstract video diary that follows Dolores O'Riordan through a seedy hotel with two lookalikes by her side and a mysterious private investigator following them. O'Riordan codifies and displaces her "self" via her doubles, no doubt as a reaction to the way the males in the video choose to consume her. The starkly haunting yet beautiful video is just mesmerizing, so much so that it couldn’t be ignored. MTV soon put in into heavy rotation, and The Cranberries became a sensation almost overnight.
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