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Music Video Thread


Slick Rick - "Teenage Love"

This is another one that mixes styles: black and white, color, stock footage. A lot of music videos were probably made by frustrated filmmakers, hoping to try things they would prefer doing in movies. I know David Fincher did a Paula Abdul video, before getting into films.

I love the cinema verité feel in the black and white scenes. And they look elegant. The color scenes are exciting in how they make theater out of poverty. That's part of the fun of older rap music. Poor, black artists made a lot of white kids want to live in places nobody would choose to live in. Like Compton. These artists did for the projects what Brian Wilson did for Southern California.
 

U2 - "With or Without You"

Another performance video, but changing the frame rate makes it stand out. This probably works more than trying to represent the lyrics in images. It feels very intimate without telling you anything. They are remote, but at the same time you feel connected. They could be anyone, though. It's a good piece of propaganda, like the best videos are.

Pop music is very much about fashion, lifestyle, and making trends. So music videos must connect, somehow, with an audience, and create a (false) sense of unity. They are speaking to you :) No one really cares about identifying with a jazz or classical musician, but in pop music this connection is everything.
 
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XTC - "Dear God"

The lip-synching really sucks, but visually this is so effective. People stuck in a tree is a great visual metaphor, showing how we get stranded in theological questions. It says a lot with very little.
 
The first time I saw this I thought it was original and creative, it's so simple but at the same time very deep, beautiful and sad.

 

The Dandy Warhols - "Not if You were the Last Junkie on Earth"

Directed by David LaChapelle, a photographer. He also did this great promo for the show Lost, which played on English TV:

 
This is still one of the best music videos ever made. The Walken kickin' it old school. :D I'm a huge Walken fan so this melted my brain the first time I saw it. How did they come up with this idea.

 

Current favorite music video, the song is about the end of all things, including the end of nothing signified by the birth visuals.
I'll leave it up to the moderators whether this one is okay to post because it's a grey area in my opinion, I'd never call it offensive, it's too beautiful.
 

I know this thread is about 80s/90s vids but one artist I really like has some fun videos that also go with that era. This song makes me miss the 90s more...
 
LadyS said:

I know this thread is about 80s/90s vids but one artist I really like has some fun videos that also go with that era. This song makes me miss the 90s more...
Click to expand...

This thread is about any video you think is well-made. I just think the 80/90s were the peak of their popularity and when they were most ambitious, generally.

Thank you for posting :)
 
The quality is not so great, but this thread would be incomplete without One Minute Movies by The Residents:


This was used to promote The Commercial Album, in 1980. This LP was 40 songs, each one minute long. So they made videos for four songs, and showed them as one short film. I'm guessing this was made in the warehouse where they lived and made their records (Sycamore Street, in San Francisco?). The film has been shown at The Museum of Modern Art in New York.
 
This is a fun video, something about it reminds me of 80s music videoes. And it makes you wonder what is going on and what will happen next from start to finish.

 
^^ Also, their promo film for The Third Reich 'n' Roll (1976):


This LP was two medleys of 60s songs, each taking up a side of the record. The tracks were "Swastikas on Parade" and "Hitler Was a Vegetarian." Songs covered include hits by The Rolling Stones, Beatles, Doors, The Seeds, ? and the Mysterions, James Brown, and more. The video is just a few minutes of highlights.

This was a concept album pretending to assert pop music was a form of fascist brainwashing. The cover features Dick Clark dressed as a Nazi.

One of their friends hoarded newspapers and left a bunch when he moved back from California to Louisiana, their home state. So they used them to make the set and costumes you see.
 
Another artsy Swedish video that makes you wonder what is going on. You're not sure where it's going and it keeps you wondering. Very well made.

 
These guys always make good videos, this one has that special Danish feel to it. Dancing outside in the summer and garden parties and just the right amount of strange and artsy. It's like something from a dream. Well made video, a personal favorite. It's special.

 
Knower of nothing said:

Current favorite music video, the song is about the end of all things, including the end of nothing signified by the birth visuals.
I'll leave it up to the moderators whether this one is okay to post because it's a grey area in my opinion, I'd never call it offensive, it's too beautiful.
Click to expand...

This is incredible! And it reminds me of Stereolab, who I love.

Edit: I see Fred Frith plays on this. I love Henry Cow, too.
 
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