Videodrone #25: Letter from an Occupant

Videodrone is a weekly(ish) feature looking at music videos from the last half century. 

Letter from an Occupant (2000)

What happens when you write a perfect pop song and nobody hears it? Did it actually happen? Well, in the case of "Letter from an Occupant" by the New Pornographers, yes, it did happen and we are all better for it.

Of course, I'm being hyperbolic to say nobody heard it. The song was on the band's debut album, Mass Romantic, which was released on Mint Records in Canada in November 2000. The album got good notices (indeed, the NPs won a Juno for Alternative Album of the Year for it), but it didn't chart and "Letter from Occupant," which was released as a single in April 2002, didn't make much of a splash on radio or MTV. (Although I just discovered it was included on the soundtrack to the movie Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back in 2001.)

But dammit, it sure deserved to. The group was referred to as a Canadian indie rock supergroup, more as a joke than anything else since none of its members had any real success prior to joining. Head songwriter Carl Newman was previously in Zumpano, Dan Bejar was in Destroyer, John Collins was in the Evaporators, Kurt Dahle came from Limblifter and Blaine Thurier later became a filmmaker. Honorary Canuck Neko Case was already an alt-country solo artist, but her career didn't take off until later.

Case sang lead on "Letter from an Occupant," which was an upbeat power pop gem that was very different from Case's usual repertoire. There was a lot going on in the song, Newman told Pitchfork: "I remember 'Letter from an Occupant' was a pretty belabored song. It ended up being almost minimal, but I remember there's so much shit we put on it. There's a psychedelic 12-string guitar solo, a backwards guitar, there's a really cool synth that's in there but buried. At some point, you have to choose. That was the hardest part about mixing the thing: just making that judgment call. I only feel at peace with the record now because people seem to like it."

Newman's lyrics are also excellent. "The time that your enemy gives you/Good times are not the ones you want/I've cried five rivers on the way here/Which one will you skate away on?/The tune you'll be humming forever/All the words are replaced and wrong/With a shower of 'yeahs' and 'whatevers'/You traded me away long gone."

The video was directed by Michael Dowse, who went on to direct feature films including the beloved cult comedy FUBAR, the hockey comedy Goon, and several others. The video features the NPs performing the song in different locations with a screen in the background that jumps to the next scene. It likely got plenty of play on MuchMusic in Canada; if it got any MTV airplay, it was on 120 Minutes. I certainly never saw the video until YouTube came along years later.

I never heard the NPs on the radio, but rather discovered the band the way I learned about a lot of music in the early 2000s, through MP3 blogs. It was around 2003 when the band's second album, Electric Version, came out, that some of the blogs I followed started hyping the New Pornographers. I went back and discovered the greatness of Mass Romantic. 

The early '00s was a great time for Canadian indie rock: The New Pornographers, Broken Social Scene, Metric, Wolf Parade, Stars, Arcade Fire, Death from Above 1979, The Dears, Joel Plaskett Emergency, Hot Hot Heat, Black Mountain, Land of Talk and on and on. 

The NPs just released their 10th album earlier this year. Newman remains the band's leader and Case continues to work with the group, even though her solo career has really blossomed. The rest of the lineup has fluctuated over the years, but the band's output remains strong. Still, Mass Romantic and "Letter from an Occupant" was a hell of a launching-off point.

Videodrone #23: Space Lord

Videodrone is a weekly(ish) feature looking at music videos from the last half century. 

Space Lord (1998)

The music world was changing in 1998. The alt-rock revolution of the early to mid-'90s was fizzling out, replaced by one-hit wonders (Semisonic, New Radicals, Harvey Danger, etc.), teen pop (Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys, N*SYNC), and pop country (Garth Brooks, Shania Twain). Hip hop was also faring well, especially on MTV with flashy videos directed by the likes of Hype Williams showcasing the glamorous life of rappers with plenty of cash, dancers and bling.

For a guy like Dave Wyndorf, frontman of the New Jersey space metal act Monster Magnet, things were getting a little lean. Heavily influenced by Black Sabbath, Hawkwind and Marvel Comics, Monster Magnet was formed in 1989 and signed with A&M Records in 1992 (they opened for Soundgarden and Swervedriver at Avalon in Boston in April 1992, but I got to the show too late to see them). They had a minor hit with "Negasonic Teenage Warhead" in 1995, getting some radio and video play, but like the band's previous album, it didn't sell well. 

So Wyndorf holed up in a hotel room off the Las Vegas strip and wrote a song a day for 21 days, mostly around the Vegas themes of desperation and despair. One of those songs was "Space Lord," about a Thanos-esque supervillain. The label had encouraged him to write simpler songs in the hopes of scoring an actual hit of the complex and often long epics the band was known for. 

For the video, Wyndorf asked director Joseph Kahn (who has directed videos for Taylor Swift, George Michael, Eminem, Snoop Dogg and many others) to make it look like a rap video, since rappers were becoming the real rock stars by this point. Kahn obliged and filmed scenes at many of the same Vegas strip locations used in Mase's "Feel So Good" video (see below). 

The video starts off with a slow-building intro that mimics Metallica's "Enter Sandman" clip, haunting and shadowy, before exploding into the bright colors, pyrotechnics and fisheye lens angles utilized by Williams in the Mase video and many others. Wyndorf is wearing a shiny blue suit in some scenes, a white suit emblazoned with light bulbs in others. The song is an all-out rocker and the video jumps off the screen, with Wyndorf and a group of dancers gyrating in front of a Vegas hotel while fireworks go off all around them.

For some reason, Wyndorf went with a sanitized version of the song's refrain "Space lord, motherfucker," changing it to "Space lord, mother mother" instead. It still works. The song ended up reaching #3 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart and #29 on the U.S. Alternative Airplay chart. The album Powertrip hit #97 on the Billboard 200 and was certified gold.

Monster Magnet's video was so similar to "Feel So Good" that once Wyndorf realized it, he was concerned that Mase would be upset but Mase was amused by the homage.

As it turned out, "Space Lord" was the first video ever aired on MTV's Total Request Live, which was an extremely popular show for several years.

Monster Magnet is still together, although they would never again reach the heights they did with "Space Lord." Still, Wyndorf's Vegas stay certainly stands the test of time, even if Monster Magnet was never able to top it.

Videodrone #22: Unreal is Here

Videodrone is a weekly(ish) feature looking at music videos from the last half century. 

Unreal is Here (1997)

In the mid- to late-80s glory days of MTV, hard rock acts found success with the power ballad: A slower song that builds into a powerful climax. These songs helped heavy bands like Motley Crue and Scorpions reach a wider audience (i.e., women) and usually translated into huge album sales. At the same time, the videos for these songs were usually what propelled them to popularity, featuring live footage, dramatic-seeming shots of the band backstage, and wistful shots of the group traveling on buses and planes. See "Home Sweet Home" by the Crue, "Wanted Dead or Alive" by Bon Jovi and "Every Rose Has Its Thorn" by Poison for three examples.

Fast forward to 1997. Bon Jovi managed to transcend its hard rock roots and remained successful throughout the 

90s and beyond, but many of the metal and hard rock acts that ruled the '80s saw their popularity diminish after 1991 thanks to the rise of alternative rock. One act that remained under the radar even in those giddy times for indie rock was Chavez, an NYC-based band formed in 1993 by guitarist-singer Matt Sweeney (previously of the bands Skunk and Wider), guitarist Clay Tarver (formerly of Boston's Bullet Lavolta), bassist Scott Marshall (son of director Garry Marshall) and drummer James Lo (who also played in Wider).

Signed to legendary indie label Matador, Chavez played an angular math-rock style and released its first album Gone Glimmering in 1995. Their video for "Break Up Your Band" was featured on Beavis and Butt-Head and they toured with Guided By Voices and Bardo Pond. The group released Ride the Fader in late 1996 and in 1997, unveiled the video for "Unreal is Here," directed by Tarver and Marshall (who both went on to become TV and film directors).

The video opens with the band's name in lights before a show at the Hollywood Bowl as fans wait in the packed venue and the group disembarks from a helicopter in rock star style. Chavez plays "Unreal is Here" at soundcheck and it indeed starts off slow like a power ballad. Cut to shots of the group presenting a big check to its "CHAVEZ KIDS" charity and receiving platinum and gold records from its label while adoring throngs of fans surround them. There are scenes of backstage antics, long bus rides, interviews and photo ops. 

What's so funny about all that? The joke is that as great as Chavez was--and they were great--they never achieved a fraction of the success that those big-name hair metal bands scored in the '80s. And that's okay. Especially since Chavez was in on the joke.

Ride the Fader was their last album. The band never officially split, but they didn't release any new material or play shows from 1999 to 2006, when Matador released the comp Better Days Will Haunt You. It featured a new song and Chavez played a few shows in support of it. In 2017, the band released the EP Cockfighters.

Sweeney ended up becoming a notable session guitarist and featured player. In 2001, he joined Billy Corgan and Slint's David Pajo to form Zwan, he's worked with Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Iggy Pop, Guided By Voices, Probot, Johnny Cash, El-P, Andrew W.K. and Run the Jewels, among others. He also formed The Hard Quartet with Stephen Malkmus, has produced albums for numerous artists and hosts the web series Guitar Moves.

Marshall has directed three movies and worked as second unit director on several of his father's films. Tarver has also worked as a writer and director, including serving as the co-showrunner and executive producer of HBO's Silicon Valley.

Chavez is probably known to about 2% of current music fans, but at least those of us who appreciate them have a glimpse of what might have been with the video for "Unreal is Here."

Videodrone #19: Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe

Videodrone is a weekly feature looking at music videos from the last half century. 

Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe (1994)

In 1994, alternative rock ruled the roost. Even though it was dampened somewhat in April '94 by Kurt Cobain's suicide, the grungesplosion was in full effect. The major labels were scouring rock scenes in various cities looking for the next big thing. There was a lot of great music out from the likes of Beastie Boys, Sloan, Helmet, Frank Black, Pavement, Weezer, Beck, Jeff Buckley, Mazzy Star, Liz Phair. And there was a weirdo anthem out of Sweden that captured the attention of the world thanks to its crazy video.

In Stockholm, record producer Gordon Cyrus and radio host Henrik Schyffert were working on a TV ad when they decided to write some music together as a joke. They recruited Schyffert's girlfriend Cia Berg, who sang with the '80s new wave act Ubangi, to sing. The song they came up with, "Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe," was a combination of Chili Peppers-esque funk metal, quirky Bjork-styled vocals and trip-hop beats. Berg sings about a well-off woman who sleeps with homeless people for kicks, while Schyffert and Cyrus chime in with shouted gang backing vocals. It's all quite insanely catchy.

The lyrics were actually a cultural mix-up by Schyffert. "It was a misunderstanding from me," he told Melody Maker when asked what a "slobo babe" was. "I heard 'Slobo' was a nickname for Chelsea girls. Hobo Humpin' Sloane Babe would have been right."

Calling themselves Whale, the trio decided to make a video for the song on the cheap and somehow were able to get director Mark Pellington, who was already well known for directing Pearl Jam's "Jeremy," R.E.M.'s "Drive" and U2's "One." He was agreeable and told Schyffert he was directing a commercial on a Thursday and Friday, but they could use the gear over the weekend to film the video before he had to return it.

It's a gloriously bizarre affair, with Berg singing the song while inspecting a group of shirtless men and boys. She's got braces and is licking a lollipop. Meanwhile, Cyrus and Schyffert are jumping around with guitars chanting the chorus: "You hobo humpin' slobo babe/Get it off, get off, get off of me!" Cyrus is just wearing shorts while Schyffert is wearing a flowery dress and the whole thing is supremely silly and fun.

The video became an instant hit on MTV Europe, so much so that it won Best Video at the first MTV Europe Music Awards in November 1994, beating out instant classics like the Beasties' "Sabotage." Over on this side of the pond, the song wasn't as big of a hit but it was played on MTV's 120 Minutes regularly and on stations like KROQ in Los Angeles. But the real mark of success for the video was getting the Beavis and Butt-head stamp of approval (see below). That's where I first saw the video and it made an immediate impression on me. That impression, of course, was "WTF?"

"Hobo" reached #24 on the Billboard Alternative Airplay chart and #102 on the Singles chart in the U.S., faring better on the European charts. It was re-released in 1995 when Whale's debut album We Care came out and hit #15 on the U.K. Singles chart. Trip-hop icon Tricky co-produced a few of the songs, but the album didn't fare well. A follow-up, All Disco Dance Must End in Broken Bones, came and went in 1998 and the band split up the next year. 

But 32 years later, "Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe" remains a memorable one-hit wonder. 

Videodrone #18: I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)

Videodrone is a weekly feature looking at music videos from the last half century. 

I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That) (1993)

By the time the 1993 rolled around, there was a lot going on. Grunge was omnipresent (you could get the whole look at K-mart for short money), alt-rock was on the charts, hip hop and new jack swing was all over MTV. It hardly seemed like the right time for a comeback from a sweaty, theatrical 300-pound singer who peaked 16 years earlier, but that's exactly what happened.

Meat Loaf (aka Marvin Lee Aday) started performing in the late '60s with his first band Meat Loaf Soul, opening for Them and Question Mark and the Mysterians and later (under the band name Floating Circus) opening for the Who, the Stooges, MC5 and the Grateful Dead. He joined the Los Angeles production of Hair, did some recording for Motown and also acted in plays, including the original cast of The Rocky Horror Show. 

In 1972, he started working with songwriter Jim Steinman on an album called Bat Out of Hell, but they didn't get serious about it until a few years later when Meat Loaf decided to focus on music exclusively. They struggled to find a record label, but talked Todd Rundgren into producing and playing guitar on the album, which was adapted from a rock musical based on Peter Pan that Steinman had written. They were finally signed by Cleveland International Records, a subsidiary of Epic, and was released in October 1977. 

The initial response to Bat Out of Hell was indifference. It was full of long, bombastic, wordy songs that didn't connect with label execs, but got a good response from radio programmers. A Toronto rock station, CHUM-FM, started playing songs from the album in January 1978 and listeners were enthusiastic. Similarly, videos made for some of the songs generated interest in the U.K. and Australia. Eventually, the U.S. caught on and "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" became a huge hit. I remember hearing it on the radio all the time in sixth grade, complete with the Phil Rizzuto baseball play-by-play and the sexual innuendo. 

Eventually, Bat Out of Hell sold over 43 million copies worldwide, certified 14x platinum in the U.S. alone. It's one of the biggest selling albums of all time. But Meat Loaf struggled to follow it up. He lost his voice after constant touring and drug use, so he turned to acting and cleaned up before recording 1981's Dead Ringer. The album was also written by Steinman, but it struggled in the U.S. (although it did hit #1 in the U.K.). Loaf had a falling out with Steinman and put together the next album without him, but it did even worse, failing to chart at all in the U.S. Adding to this, Meat Loaf had money struggles and faced 45 lawsuits totaling $80 million, which led to him filing for personal bankruptcy. 

After a few more album duds, Meat Loaf and Steinman made up and started working on Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell, which was released in September 1993. They went back to worked on the first album, releasing operatic and over-the-top rock as exemplified by the first single, "I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)." Like "Paradise by the Dashboard Light," the new single featured Meat Loaf duetting with a female singer. And like that song, the singer from the recording did not appear in the video; on "Paradise," original singer Ellen Foley was replaced in the video by Karla DeVito. 

With "I'd Do Anything," the female vocals were done on the album by Lorraine Crosby, who was credited as "Mrs. Loud" in the liner notes. But in the video, the female protagonist was played by model Dana Patrick, who lip-synched Crosby's vocals. 

On the album, "I'd Do Anything" is 12 minutes long, but it's cut down for the video to a concise 7:48. Directed by Michael Bay, who replaced original director David Fincher after the latter's proposed $1.7 million budget was rejected, the video was filmed for $750,000. Apparently, Bay and Fincher had feuded in their music video directing days before becoming big-name movie directors; Fincher later worked with Meat Loaf in 1999's Fight Club.

The video was based on Beauty and the Beast and The Phantom of the Opera, with Meat Loaf made up to look like a hulking deformed beast who is on the run from police and hiding out in a castle. He comes across a beautiful woman in the woods and drama ensues; meanwhile, the police are on his trail. And then (spoiler alert), they embrace and Meat Loaf transforms back into a human and they ride off into the distance on his motorcycle. 

The song never really specifies the one thing he wouldn't do for love, leaving that up to the listener's imagination.

It's not an exaggeration to say the video was in constant rotation on MTV at the time. Power ballads were big business, as Aerosmith and countless hard rock bands had discovered over the previous decade or so. The song was getting played to death on top 40 radio as well, becoming Meat Loaf's first and only #1 single on the Billboard Hot 100. It also topped the U.K. Singles Chart and was the best-selling single of 1993 in the U.K.; indeed, it went #1 in 28 countries. Meat Loaf won a Grammy award for the song as well. 

Bat Out of Hell II sold over 14 million copies worldwide and this time, Meat Loaf was able to sustain his success a little better. His 1995 release Welcome to the Neighborhood went platinum in the U.S. and had some top 40 singles. He continued to release new albums and tour over the next few decades, including Bat Out of Hell III in 2006. His last album was released in 2016. He died in 2022 at age 74.

If nothing else, Meat Loaf's career proved that doing your own thing comes back into style every 15 years or so. 

Videodrone #17: Everything's Ruined

Videodrone is a weekly feature looking at music videos from the last half century. 

Everything's Ruined (1992)

Last week, I wrote about one of the most expensive (and ridiculous) music videos ever made, MC Hammer's 14-minute magnum dopus, "2 Legit 2 Quit." But what happens when you don't have much of a budget to make a video?

In 1992, Faith No More was at an interesting spot. The Bay Area band had been around since 1983 (under that name; previously the group was called Sharp Young Men and Faith No Man). They scored a rock radio hit in 1987 with "We Care a Lot," but things blew up for FNM after the addition of new singer Mike Patton and the release of their 1989 album The Real Thing. Specifically, it was the single "Epic," a Chili Peppers-esque hybrid of funk and metal that took off, especially thanks to the video getting popular on MTV. 

The band rode that album for nearly two years, touring extensively, playing Saturday Night Live and the MTV Video Music Awards, and maintaining popularity in both the alternative and metal scenes. For their follow-up, Patton was more involved in the writing process and the results were unexpected, as the band completely moved away from the funk-metal sound of the previous albums and into weird and wonderful territory. Released in June 1992, Angel Dust sold well, but fans of The Real Thing weren't quite sure what to make of it.

The first two singles, "Midlife Crisis" and "A Small Victory," received expensive, high concept video treatments, and by the time the band wanted to release "Everything's Ruined" as the third single, their video budget from Warner Bros. didn't have much left. So FNM and director Kevin Kerslake, decided to make the cheapest video possible.

The song itself is pretty straightforward by Angel Dust standards, a catchy ripper of a song. But the video is something else. It features the band (and some kids) performing in front of random B-roll footage of a couple getting married, wildlife, explosions and some graphic surgery. The extras in the video were found through a competition on MTV's Most Wanted, an MTV Europe show. In one scene, the band pretends to run away from footage of a giant tortoise. It's simultaneously ridiculous and awesome.

"It was our idea to take this further and make a video as cheap as humanly possible, in one of those video booths like they had at county fairs, where you sing and dance in front of a blue screen," keyboardist Billy Gould wrote in response to a question on the FNM blog. "We didn't quite get to do that, but we got it as close as possible."

I never saw "Everything's Ruined" on MTV back when it came out, as it likely got played infrequently and late at night. But thanks to YouTube, you can now watch it for yourself and see how, like one commenter noted, it's both the worst and greatest rock video ever.

Unsung: Seen Your Video

Unsung is a feature in which I take a look at a pop culture phenomenon (be it music, TV, literary, whatever) that has been forgotten or underappreciated. In this installment, I look at V66, the short-lived Boston-based music video channel from the mid-1980s.

In this age of on-demand streaming of pretty much anything you want, it's interesting to look back on how different things were for entertainment options when I was a kid. You were pretty much at the whim of radio and TV programmers in terms of when and what you could see; if you missed the episode of Happy Days that featured Robin Williams as Mork from Ork (which originally aired in February 1978), you had to wait for summer reruns to see it again. There were no DVRs or on-demand options, or even VCRs (at least nobody I knew had one then) to record the episode.

Artists had been making music videos since the 1960s, but I didn't really become aware of them until 1979, when a Toronto station called CITY-TV began airing a show called The New Music. In addition to running interviews with the hottest musicians of the day and concert footage, the show would air music videos. I remember seeing "Ashes to Ashes" by David Bowie, "Don't Stand So Close to Me" by the Police, "Once in a Lifetime" by Talking Heads and "One Step Beyond" by Madness, among many others. This coincided with the beginning of my lifelong obsession with music, so seeing videos was a cool new way to enjoy it.

I remember hearing about the launch of MTV in the U.S. in August 1981; a few months later, we would move to Richland, Washington, where my dad had taken a job. The cable system there, like many in the country, hadn't picked up MTV yet, so it was just a concept at that point. But there were other ways to see videos: USA Network's Night Flight was a four-hour show that featured full-length and short films, concerts and rock videos, and HBO had a show called Video Jukebox. 

A few years later, we moved to Kingston, New Hampshire, where the cable system again didn't have MTV available. NBC launched Friday Night Videos at 12:30 a.m. Saturday morning (right after Late Night with David Letterman); I would try and stay up and watch it up but would often fall asleep part way through because it was so late. One time, I was fading in and out while watching Men Without Hats' "The Safety Dance," which led to some really strange dreams. And the Boston CBS affiliate had a show called Hot Hit Video that would air in the afternoons after school. Sometimes I would go with my friend Jeremy to his girlfriend's house in a neighboring town where they got MTV and watch videos for hours.

During my senior year of high school (1984-85), I discovered a new video channel called V66. It wasn't on our cable system, but you could pick it up with an antenna on the UHF band (if you cut the cord from cable now, you can still pick up UHF stations with a digital antenna). We had one TV that wasn't on cable and one day I was watching and flipping stations and came across channel 66, which was playing "How Soon is Now?" by the Smiths; I was blown away by the song, but also the fact that this station existed.

WVJV-TV (aka V66) went on the air almost exactly 40 years ago, on February 12. Launched by Boston-area radio veterans John Garabedian and Arnie "Woo Woo" Ginsburg, V66 followed the same format as MTV, with video jockeys introducing music videos and concerts and hosting events in the Boston area. The station played a wide variety of music, from rock to pop to hip hop, mixing in local unknown acts with major artists. Local artists featured included Til Tuesday, Del Fuegos, Extreme and the Fools. With the New England Patriots getting ready to take on the Chicago Bears in the 1986 Super Bowl, V66 even produced an answer video to the Bears' popular "Super Bowl Shuffle" called "New England, the Patriots and We." It's as hilariously cringy as it sounds (see below), and the Pats ended up getting demolished by the Bears.

In July 1985, V66 aired the big Live Aid benefit concerts (in addition to ABC). Eventually in an attempt to increase ratings, the station added news shows, sports highlights, comedies and syndicated programs. Ratings were measured by 30- and 60-minute blocks; it was difficult to maintain steady ratings when a viewer might change the channel if they didn't like a particular song that was airing. (Interestingly enough, MTV came to the same realization a few years later and began airing non-music-based programming like the game show Remote Control and later reality shows like The Real World and Road Rules. MTV still exists, but you won't find music videos anymore, just endless viewings of tedious "reality" shows.)

I didn't watch V66 a whole lot because the signal was so fuzzy; I lived in the boonies so V66 would kind of come and go. I would check in every so often and watch it for a while before it got too staticky. When I went to college in the fall of 1985, I didn't have a TV in my room anymore (we just had a bit TV in the dorm lounge; it was a different time, kids), so I wasn't able to watch V66 anymore. And then when I came home for the holidays that December, the local cable system had finally added MTV, so I watched that whenever I could.

V66 didn't stick around for very long. Garabedian was hoping it would become a national network, but by the summer of 1986, the station was sold to the Home Shopping Network; it went off the air on my 19th birthday, September 21, 1986. The station now broadcasts the Spanish-language network Univision to the Boston area.

Although it wasn't around very long, V66 made a strong impression on music fans in the Boston area. Local filmmaker Eric Green watched the channel as a young child and in 2008, began working on a documentary about V66, interviewing former staff and viewers. The documentary, Life on the V: The Story of V66, came out in 2014. It's been out on DVD since 2015 and is screening at the Somerville Theatre on February 27 as part of the theatre's February offerings. It's a fun look at an interesting blip in the Boston media landscape. I interviewed Green about Life on the V for my podcast in 2012 while he was making the film (listen to parts 1 and 2) and again in 2015 after it was released (listen here). 

Fast forward 40 years and music videos are still made, but they're nowhere near as influential as they were in the '80s and '90s. You can find them on YouTube whenever you want, but you're hard-pressed to find then on TV anymore. Certainly not on MTV. But for a short time in the mid-80s in Boston, you could get your video fix on V66. And that wasn't a bad thing at all. 

Day After Day #254: New Moon on Monday

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

New Moon on Monday (1983)

It's truly amazing how different the music industry was in the early '80s. Unlike today, artists were able to succeed because of radio and video, thanks to MTV's meteoric rise. One of the bands who took full advantage of the newfound popularity of music videos was Duran Duran, an English pop-rock act that happened to be extremely photogenic in addition to talented.

The group was formed in Birmingham, England in 1978 by singer Stephen Duffy, keyboardist Nick Rhodes and guitarist/bassist John Taylor. There were some lineup shuffles before the group settled in 1980 on Rhodes, Taylor, singer Simon Le Bon, guitarist Andy Taylor and drummer Roger Taylor (none of the Taylors are related). The group's 1981 self-titled debut featured the single "Planet Earth," which went to #12 on the U.K. singles chart. The third single, "Girls on Film," had a video with topless women mud wrestling that stirred up plenty of controversy, as the band had hoped. A heavily edited version aired on MTV but it got the band noticed in the U.S.

Duran Duran's second album, Rio, came out in the spring of 1982 and was an immediate hit in the U.K. It took a while longer in the U.S., where the group's label was promoting them as a New Romantic band. After a shift in promotion to work the album as dance music, the videos for "Hungry Like the Wolf" and "Rio" hit MTV and blew up, as did the ballad "Save a Prayer." The album hit #6 on the Billboard 200 and stayed on the chart for 129 weeks.

As 1983 began, Duran Duran re-released their first album in the U.S. along with the single "Is There Something I Should Know?" and soon the band was being mobbed at in-store appearances by hysterical fans. The group's third album, Seven and the Ragged Tiger, came out in November 1983 and really leaned into synth pop and expensive videos: "Union of the Snake," "New Moon on Monday" and a remix of "The Reflex." 

Duran mania was everywhere. I, for one, was firmly in my metalhead phase but still hearing Duran songs constantly on the radio and TV (we didn't have MTV yet but I watched shows like Friday Night Videos regularly). The songs were damn catchy but I couldn't be caught dead admitting I liked them to anyone. No, it was Iron Maiden and Judas Priest for me, but I could appreciate synth-pop acts like Duran, ABC and the Thompson Twins. 

I only know the singles because I've never purchased a Duran album, but I know them well. "New Moon on Monday" was always a favorite, even the band hated the video for the song. It was filmed in a French village with the band as members of an underground resistance movement called La Luna organizing a revolt against a military regime. There's a 17-minute version that has a long introduction before the song begins, a shorter one that has a spoken French intro, and then an even shorter one. 

But the song itself is pretty fun, sort of echoing latter-day Roxy Music.

"Shake up the picture/The lizard mixture/With your dance on the eventide/You got me coming up with answers/All of which I deny/I said it again/Could I please rephrase it?/Maybe I can catch a ride/I couldn't really put it much plainer/But I'll wait til you decide/Send me your warning siren/As if I could ever hide/Last time la luna/I light my torch/And wave it for the new moon on Monday/And a fire dance through the night/I stayed the cold day/With a lonely satellite."

The song got up to #10 in the U.S. and #9 in the U.K. Pretty decent, but then the remix of "The Reflex" went to #1 in both countries. The band began playing stadiums, appeared on magazine covers and won Grammys for short- and long-form videos. After 1984, the group took a break and worked on solo projects. John and Andy Taylor teamed up with Robert Palmer and Chic drummer Tony Thompson to form the Power Station, a rock-funk act that had a couple of top 10 hits in '85. Le Bon, Roger Taylor and Rhodes formed Arcadia, a synth pop act. The group got back together to record the title theme to the James Bond film A View to a Kill, which went to #1 in the U.S. Duran also played at the Philadelphia Live Aid concert in July 1985; it would be that lineup's last performance for 18 years.

In 1986, Roger Taylor left the band, citing exhaustion, and Andy Taylor signed a solo deal; he played on a few songs on the band's next album before leaving. Le Bon, Rhodes and John Taylor moved ahead, hiring former Missing Persons and Frank Zappa guitarist Warren Cuccurullo and drummer Steve Ferrone (later replaced by Sterling Campbell). They had a few hits, but as the decade ended, Duran Duran were definitely on the downswing. 

In January 1989, I saw them play the Worcester Centrum, but I actually wasn't there to see them. My friend Arthur, who was Arts editor at the UNH school newspaper where I was a reporter, scored a couple of passes to the show so he could interview Moe Berg of The Pursuit of Happiness, the Canadian alt-rock act that was opening the concert. I was a big fan of TPOH's debut album Love Junk and was excited to see them and they didn't disappoint in their opening set. It was kind of an odd pairing because TPOH combined snarky lyrics, big riffs and girl group backing vocals, a sound that was very different from Duran Duran's. DD played a decent set but the arena was half full and it was striking how just four years earlier, they were packing stadiums.

The band kept going through the '90s with mixed results and in '97, John Taylor left. But in 2001, Le Bon and Rhodes reunited with the three Taylors and played to sold-out arenas. They've continued recording new music and touring in the 20+ years since. Andy Taylor left in 2006, but the other four are still members of the band and going strong. Duran Duran have definitely had their ups and downs over the last four decades, but they always seem to bounce back.

A Lil' Ain't Enough

Sit back, kiddies. I'm going to tell you the tale of a music video that is simultaneously the greatest and worst thing I've ever seen. It's the story of a once-great star on the cusp of a serious career decline. And it's a case of horrendous timing.

It was January 1991. It was a strange time. The U.S. had just entered the first Gulf War, launching airstrikes on Iraq. The Berlin Wall was coming down. The Soviet Union was breaking apart. And David Lee Roth was about to embark on a quarter-century career dip before he finally rejoined his old band.

Roth was not yet six years removed from his first stint with the mighty Van Halen, which was the one of the biggest bands in the world before he parted ways with Eddie, Alex and Michael Anthony. DLR's first solo effort was impressive: 1986's Eat 'Em and Smile, featuring a killer band comprised of virtuoso players Steve Vai and Billy Sheehan. It was a lean, mean hard rock beast that contrasted well with VH's first Sammy Hagar album, 5150, which had its share of rockers but also continued Eddie Van Halen's fascination with keyboards. I saw both bands in the summer of 1986 at the Portland Civic Center in Maine and DLR was better by far.

His follow-up, 1988's Skyscraper, went in a different direction altogether, as Roth became interested in danceable pop and lightened the hard rock edge with tons of synths. It sold well, about 2 million copies in the U.S., but Vai and Sheehan were not pleased with the change in sound and left the band (Sheehan after the album release, Vai after the tour). DLR went back to a hard rock sound on his next album, A Little Ain't Enough, which was released in January 1991. He brought in 19-year-old guitar wunderkind Jason Becker and producer Bob Rock and things were looking up. Or so he thought. Before the tour began, Becker was diagnosed with ALS and was unable to continue.

Which brings us to the video in question, for the "title track" (quotes used because it's not spelled the same), "A Lil' Ain't Enough." I remember seeing the video premiere on MTV; as it turned out, the clip only aired a few more times before MTV decided to ban it because of the scantily clad women throughout. I bought the CD when it came out, but I only listened to it a few times before moving on; eventually I sold it to a used CD store.

I hadn't given the video much thought since it came out until I was bored and started watching old videos on YouTube and stumbled across this one. It's got all the earmarks of a DLR video of the time: Dave jumping around doing high kicks, doing his hammy "wocka wocka" schtick (which I love, BTW); hot chicks all over the place, wearing not a whole lot (but really not much different than his "California Girls" video from 1985); the familiar synth-drenched hard rock sound he'd been trafficking in; and the slapstick antics he liked to include in his videos.

But the repeat viewing also reveals the following:

• Recession. I didn't notice it at the time, but Dave's hairline here is clearly racing upward. He was still wearing it long, but it wasn't what it was even a few years earlier. Fast-forward to 1994 and Dave actually had cut his hair shorter. But the mighty DLR mane declined to the point where he recently decided to shave his head for an appearance with the Foo Fighters in January.
• A massive pink jeep that DLR drives throughout the video. Absolutely ridiculous looking, but fitting with Dave's Big Rock ethos.
• Little people in blackface. You read that right. At the 1:58 mark of the video, there's a Busby Berkeley-esque sequence featuring DLR standing in the middle of a circle of little people wearing blackface and Afro wigs. Honestly, I don't know how I forgot I about that. I don't think it's racist so much as...ill-advised. Still, wow.
• Gym babes. Dave sings while surrounded by bikini babes working out on Nautilus equipment because, you know, boobs.
• Football stadium. Dave's dancing around a bunch of cheerleaders in a stadium, then strutting past a line of women holding guitars in front of a zillion amps. Then back to the little people, this time doing pelvic thrusts. This video is truly insane.
• 50-foot-long boom box. The sight gags continue. Get it? A little ain't enough, so everything's big (except for the little people, I guess).
• Old and fat. In the last section of the video, Roth presciently fast forwards to Oct. 10, 2021 to "Diamond Dave: THE ABSOLUTE FINAL TOUR" at a sold-out Anaheim Stadium. At the time it was 30 years away; now it's only six. DLR's back in a fat suit, like he did in the "Goin' Crazy" video from 1986, doing goofy dance moves. He's still in pretty good shape, so it's doubtful he'll be gigantic in six years, but he was also wrong about the hair: It was long in the video but as we know, it's all gone now.

I have no idea what DLR spent on this video, but it couldn't have been cheap. Had to be at least $1 million. For maybe four airings on MTV. There were other videos and singles from this album, but they didn't fare much better. The album went gold, but it was quickly forgotten and by the end of the year, Roth's brand of spandexed hard rock was pretty much extinct. Bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains soon dominated the sales, MTV and the radio.

As for DLR, in the decades that followed, he periodically released albums that sold less and less, had an infamous and short-lived reunion with Van Halen at the 1996 VMAs, appeared on The Sopranos, had a brief stint as Howard Stern's morning radio replacement, became an EMT, was busted for buying weed, wrote an autobiography, played with the Boston Pops and performed on an album of bluegrass covers of Van Halen. Hey, he kept himself busy. And then in 2007, he reunited with Van Halen again for an initial tour and a 2012 album/tour. It's looking doubtful that another VH album will happen anytime soon, if at all. They announced a live album release from the last tour.

So even if there's no more new Van Halen material or tours, things seem to have turned around for good ol' DLR. But it was one ill-timed and ridiculously awesome video that led to a prolonged dry stretch for Diamond Dave.

Completely Conspicuous 232: Rock Box

Part 2 of my conversation with filmmaker Eric Green as we discuss his documentary about V66, the short-lived Boston music video channel. Listen to the episode below or download it directly (right click and "save as").

Show notes:
- Recorded in Cambridge, Mass.
- Eric's documentary is called Life on the V
- V66 was on the air from 2/85 to 9/86
- Response to the topic has been great
- Doc is almost finished
- Music docs are in vogue
- Rumors that MTV was keeping an eye on V66
- Eric resisted the classic Behind the Music structure
- V66 was based in Worcester, Mass.; bands would visit before concerts there
- 9-year-old Eric got on the air with a phoned-in joke
- Cable TV was much different in the '80s; still hadn't made it to many rural areas

- Memories of USA Network's Night Flight video show
- Music docs: Stop Making Sense vs. The Last Waltz
- When V66 played Dire Straits' "Money for Nothing" video, they took MTV logo out
- Eric received a lot of fan submissions of V66 videos taped on VHS
- Bonehead of the Week

Music:
Mission of Burma - Second Television
David Byrne and St. Vincent - Who
Metric - Artificial Nocturne
Ceremony - I Don't Wanna Be Learned/I Don't Wanna Be Tamed

Completely Conspicuous is available through the iTunes podcast directory. Subscribe and write a review!

The Mission of Burma song is from the forthcoming album Unsound on Fire Records. Download the song for free at Rolling Stone.
The David Byrne and St. Vincent song is from the forthcoming album Love This Giant on 4AD. Download the song for free (in exchange for your email address) at Stereogum.
The Metric song is on the album Synthetica on Mom and Pop Records. Download the song for free at Epitonic.
The Ceremony song is an unreleased track available for free download at Noisey.


The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Find out more about Senor Breitling at his fine music blog Clicky Clicky. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian; check out his site PodGeek.

Moving Pictures

It's an oft-repeated, and not incorrect, refrain among older music fans these days that MTV doesn't play videos anymore.

Those of us who were young music fans in the '80s spent countless hours watching artists mouth the words to their biggest hits in rock videos. Then MTV hit on the idea of original programming: Game shows, talk shows and eventually reality shows like "The Real World" and "Road Rules" gradually took over the airwaves on MTV and its sister station VH1. Starting in the 2000s, you had to tune in overnight or during odd hours to catch a video.

For artists, it was no longer imperative to make videos. Much like radio airplay, unless you're an established and popular artist, your videos would never get played. Then something funny happened: high-speed Internet access made it possible to watch videos on demand whenever you wanted and on a phone, laptop or tablet. Thanks to YouTube, you can watch just about any video ever made as well as live clips of your favorite band on their current tour.

Enter indie rock acts like Stephen Malkmus, Ted Leo and the New Pornographers, who are revered among their small niche of hipster fans but relatively unknown to the pop world at large. Radio airplay even on so-called alternative stations is scarce, so these acts are getting more creative to get the word out about new releases: Using social media platforms to build up buzz, but also teaming up with folks from the alternative comedy world to make videos. The latest example is Malkmus' new video "Senator," directed by Scott Jacobson of The Daily Show and starring Jack Black as a coke-snorting, cattle prod-wielding senator and Gary Cole as his hype man:



Malkmus and his band the Jicks are featured briefly, but the attention is on the antics of Black and his cohorts. The clip mainly goes for laughs but features a fairly shocking last scene.

Malkmus' Matador Records labelmate Ted Leo and the Pharmacists had a similarly funny effort produced for Leo's "Bottled In Cork," directed by WFMU's Tom Sharpling and featuring comic Paul F. Tompkins as a Broadway producer who talks Leo into writing a Broadway musical. A clear parody of Green Day's "American Idiot" show, the video also features John Hodgman as a theater critic:



Sharpling has become a go-to director for funny indie rock videos. He also directed this clip of The New Pornographers' "Moves" that starred The Daily Show's Hodgman and Wyatt Cenac, Paul Rudd, Bill Hader of SNL, Horatio Sanz and Donald Glover, among others:



And he directed Titus Andronicus' "No Future Part Three: Escape from No Future":



Sharpling's latest videos include a clip for The Ettes' "Excuse," starring Patton Oswalt, and The Stepkids' "Legend in My Own Mind" with Cenac.

As much as I've always enjoyed straightahead performance videos, these funny mini-movies are a lot of fun. And they bring back fond memories of DaveTV: