For anyone interested in reading the whole thing all the way through, here's links to the 4 parts...
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part One)
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part Two)
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part Three)
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part Four)
Showing posts with label 20 best promo videos ever. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 20 best promo videos ever. Show all posts
Sunday, October 18, 2009
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part Four)
I'm really drunk and it's 1AM on a Saturday night, so honestly, what better time could there possibly be to post the top 5 music videos ever made? Fuck it. I'm down if you are.
#5 Aphex Twin “Windowlicker” (Chris Cunningham, 1999)
It’s got the narcissism, the bling, the women being objectified, the limousine (38 windows in length), and in its highly quotable 4-minute intro, it’s got 127 uses of profanity (including 44 uses of “fuck”). And of course, it’s got The Face: the eerie Cheshire grin of Richard D James. By the time the song starts, it’s clear that the two windowlickers from the intro have been in The Twin’s world all along, and never stood a chance against its demonic master.
Six months earlier, Monster Magnet’s “Space Lord” was partially the same concept: The most extravagent rock-n-roll videos of the time were hiphop videos. Chris Cunningham essentially took that idea and transported it via spaceship approximately ten million galaxies parallel to wherever Ma$e’s “Feels So Good” was shot, gathered together grotesque masks and digital art, and discovered a world where Aphex Twin has become the greatest rock star who ever lived.
P.S. That one shot with the slow motion champagne bottle is A-fucking-plus.
#4 Sigur Ros “Vidrar Vel Til Loftarasa” (Celebrator, 2001)
Sigur Ros and slow motion shots are kind of like peanut butter and jelly at this point - such a classic combination. I always figured the clothes and attitudes of this video were of present day Iceland, but it turns out the setting is in the 1950’s, a time when hope of a love such as theirs (the pair of 12-year-old dudes who star in the video) was never something society would even consider, let alone accept. There are so many stand-out images included here: The porcelain dolls, representing hope; the Holy Bible, tragically symbolizing denial; a bottle with the alien-fetus image from Ágætis Byrjun printed on it, which doesn’t really represent anything other than a subtle and awesome way to incorporate Sigur Ros into the story. (All four band members also make individual brief appearances.) Although this 11-minute song has been shortened to 7 minutes for the video, the final 45-seconds are here intact, probably the best part of the song, when Sigur Ros decides to increase the tape speed by a milli-fragment, creating this aura of sudden devastating cruelty, compared to how otherworldly the previous 10 minutes had progressed. Celebrator’s images oblige in this video’s heartbreaking conclusion.
NOTE: Oh my bad.. the last section of the song does not fully appear in the video version. It still rules though.
#3 Radiohead “Paranoid Android” (Magnus Carlsson, 1997)
Robin’s bizarre adventures are normally accompanied by his own calming soliloquy and some quiet triphop music (one favorite being his trip to the grocery store). However, his most famous adventure took place after Magnus Carlsson was commissioned to send Robin on yet another undertaking, this time with only Radiohead’s upcoming single as the soundtrack. Parlophone were hoping for “another video like ‘Street Spirit,’” but Radiohead were adament on going with a cartoon. Luckily for them, Robin was more than willing. And luckily for Robin, “Paranoid Android” just happened to be a brilliantly unorthodox mindfuck of a single with a whole range of darkness and creepiness to accompany his discovery.
#2 Guns N’ Roses “Don’t Cry” (Andy Morahan, 1991)
After 5 years of releasing primarily performance videos and ones with significantly lower costs by today’s standards, Guns N’ Roses kicked off their two-and-a-half year album-promotion cycle for Use Your Illusion with the mysterious and extravagent clip for “Don’t Cry.”
The following summer, this video became largely overshadowed after the premiere of the enormously popular “November Rain” video, which had an easier narrative to follow and included several equally iconic and gorgeous shots, such as Slash’s guitar solo outside of the church. At the end of 1993, the third part of this apparent trilogy concluded with “Estranged,” the 12th (that’s correct.. TWELFTH) and final video released to promote Use Your Illusion, and the least popular video from this trilogy, now regarded as a bloated triumph after its inclusion in several of those MTV “Most Expensive Video” specials.
While the original lineup were infinitely badass in their earlier videos, and gloriously coroding throughout Use Your Illusion, “Don’t Cry” marks the only time these two eras properly intersect, creating the quintessential Guns N’ Roses clip. Confusion, death, chaos, drugs, revenge, anger management, Los Angeles, the downfall of hair metal... So many themes, so many brilliant sequences... Axl drunkenly stumbles through a cemetary with a gun in the middle of a blizzard. Slash drives a car off a cliff with his girlfriend inside of it and plays a guitar solo above the wreckage. Axl and Shannon Hoon run around on top of a skyscraper, and someone holds a sign that says “Where’s Izzy?” (He had left the band weeks earlier.) The band’s model girlfriends get into a bar fight, smashing glasses. Axl’s triple-personality disorder is physically shown on screen. And finally, he becomes reborn again. 5-minute video clips are rarely this dense, a huge part of why “Don’t Cry” still demands repeated viewings. In terms of 80’s metal excess, it doesn’t get more rock n’ roll than this.
#1 Jay-Z “99 Problems” (Mark Romanek, 2004)
With the exception of Coldplay’s “Speed Of Sound,” “99 Problems” stands as the last music video Mark Romanek has directed so far, capping off perhaps the most stunning videography of any modern video director. His resume includes Michael & Janet’s “Scream” clip, Fiona Apple’s "Criminal," Johnny Cash’s “Hurt,” and NIN’s “Closer” & “The Perfect Drug.” Romanek’s videos are like watching an out-of-order slideshow, except the pictures all happen to be brilliant and speak a thousand words each... And the rushed photographer only has 5 minutes to show 3 carousels worth of these brilliant slides, so that by the time it’s over you’ve been given such a sensory overload that many of the images are permanently burned into your brain. The afformentioned videos are all examples of this, Romanek’s signature style. However, “99 Problems” is the grittiest of all of these.
“99 Problems” was also intended to be Jay-Z’s final single from his last album before retiring from hiphop. Had he never returned from retirement only 2 years later, the video’s conclusion may have gone down as possibly the the most explosive swansong of alltime, a graphic slow-motion sequence in which the rapper himself is shot multiple times by off-camera assailants and presumably murdered.
Jay-Z originally wanted direction from Scorsese or Tarrantino, but Rick Rubin convinced Jay to call upon Romanek. Jay’s only real input was that he wanted “powerful images” of Brooklyn, a phrase that actually downplays the immense weight of these shots, shockingly surpassing that found within Public Enemy’s “Fight The Power” video from 15 years earlier, and sort of revamping the same concept for post-9/11 New York.
#5 Aphex Twin “Windowlicker” (Chris Cunningham, 1999)
It’s got the narcissism, the bling, the women being objectified, the limousine (38 windows in length), and in its highly quotable 4-minute intro, it’s got 127 uses of profanity (including 44 uses of “fuck”). And of course, it’s got The Face: the eerie Cheshire grin of Richard D James. By the time the song starts, it’s clear that the two windowlickers from the intro have been in The Twin’s world all along, and never stood a chance against its demonic master.
Six months earlier, Monster Magnet’s “Space Lord” was partially the same concept: The most extravagent rock-n-roll videos of the time were hiphop videos. Chris Cunningham essentially took that idea and transported it via spaceship approximately ten million galaxies parallel to wherever Ma$e’s “Feels So Good” was shot, gathered together grotesque masks and digital art, and discovered a world where Aphex Twin has become the greatest rock star who ever lived.
P.S. That one shot with the slow motion champagne bottle is A-fucking-plus.
#4 Sigur Ros “Vidrar Vel Til Loftarasa” (Celebrator, 2001)
Sigur Ros and slow motion shots are kind of like peanut butter and jelly at this point - such a classic combination. I always figured the clothes and attitudes of this video were of present day Iceland, but it turns out the setting is in the 1950’s, a time when hope of a love such as theirs (the pair of 12-year-old dudes who star in the video) was never something society would even consider, let alone accept. There are so many stand-out images included here: The porcelain dolls, representing hope; the Holy Bible, tragically symbolizing denial; a bottle with the alien-fetus image from Ágætis Byrjun printed on it, which doesn’t really represent anything other than a subtle and awesome way to incorporate Sigur Ros into the story. (All four band members also make individual brief appearances.) Although this 11-minute song has been shortened to 7 minutes for the video, the final 45-seconds are here intact, probably the best part of the song, when Sigur Ros decides to increase the tape speed by a milli-fragment, creating this aura of sudden devastating cruelty, compared to how otherworldly the previous 10 minutes had progressed. Celebrator’s images oblige in this video’s heartbreaking conclusion.
NOTE: Oh my bad.. the last section of the song does not fully appear in the video version. It still rules though.
#3 Radiohead “Paranoid Android” (Magnus Carlsson, 1997)
Robin’s bizarre adventures are normally accompanied by his own calming soliloquy and some quiet triphop music (one favorite being his trip to the grocery store). However, his most famous adventure took place after Magnus Carlsson was commissioned to send Robin on yet another undertaking, this time with only Radiohead’s upcoming single as the soundtrack. Parlophone were hoping for “another video like ‘Street Spirit,’” but Radiohead were adament on going with a cartoon. Luckily for them, Robin was more than willing. And luckily for Robin, “Paranoid Android” just happened to be a brilliantly unorthodox mindfuck of a single with a whole range of darkness and creepiness to accompany his discovery.
#2 Guns N’ Roses “Don’t Cry” (Andy Morahan, 1991)
After 5 years of releasing primarily performance videos and ones with significantly lower costs by today’s standards, Guns N’ Roses kicked off their two-and-a-half year album-promotion cycle for Use Your Illusion with the mysterious and extravagent clip for “Don’t Cry.”
The following summer, this video became largely overshadowed after the premiere of the enormously popular “November Rain” video, which had an easier narrative to follow and included several equally iconic and gorgeous shots, such as Slash’s guitar solo outside of the church. At the end of 1993, the third part of this apparent trilogy concluded with “Estranged,” the 12th (that’s correct.. TWELFTH) and final video released to promote Use Your Illusion, and the least popular video from this trilogy, now regarded as a bloated triumph after its inclusion in several of those MTV “Most Expensive Video” specials.
While the original lineup were infinitely badass in their earlier videos, and gloriously coroding throughout Use Your Illusion, “Don’t Cry” marks the only time these two eras properly intersect, creating the quintessential Guns N’ Roses clip. Confusion, death, chaos, drugs, revenge, anger management, Los Angeles, the downfall of hair metal... So many themes, so many brilliant sequences... Axl drunkenly stumbles through a cemetary with a gun in the middle of a blizzard. Slash drives a car off a cliff with his girlfriend inside of it and plays a guitar solo above the wreckage. Axl and Shannon Hoon run around on top of a skyscraper, and someone holds a sign that says “Where’s Izzy?” (He had left the band weeks earlier.) The band’s model girlfriends get into a bar fight, smashing glasses. Axl’s triple-personality disorder is physically shown on screen. And finally, he becomes reborn again. 5-minute video clips are rarely this dense, a huge part of why “Don’t Cry” still demands repeated viewings. In terms of 80’s metal excess, it doesn’t get more rock n’ roll than this.
#1 Jay-Z “99 Problems” (Mark Romanek, 2004)
With the exception of Coldplay’s “Speed Of Sound,” “99 Problems” stands as the last music video Mark Romanek has directed so far, capping off perhaps the most stunning videography of any modern video director. His resume includes Michael & Janet’s “Scream” clip, Fiona Apple’s "Criminal," Johnny Cash’s “Hurt,” and NIN’s “Closer” & “The Perfect Drug.” Romanek’s videos are like watching an out-of-order slideshow, except the pictures all happen to be brilliant and speak a thousand words each... And the rushed photographer only has 5 minutes to show 3 carousels worth of these brilliant slides, so that by the time it’s over you’ve been given such a sensory overload that many of the images are permanently burned into your brain. The afformentioned videos are all examples of this, Romanek’s signature style. However, “99 Problems” is the grittiest of all of these.
“99 Problems” was also intended to be Jay-Z’s final single from his last album before retiring from hiphop. Had he never returned from retirement only 2 years later, the video’s conclusion may have gone down as possibly the the most explosive swansong of alltime, a graphic slow-motion sequence in which the rapper himself is shot multiple times by off-camera assailants and presumably murdered.
Jay-Z originally wanted direction from Scorsese or Tarrantino, but Rick Rubin convinced Jay to call upon Romanek. Jay’s only real input was that he wanted “powerful images” of Brooklyn, a phrase that actually downplays the immense weight of these shots, shockingly surpassing that found within Public Enemy’s “Fight The Power” video from 15 years earlier, and sort of revamping the same concept for post-9/11 New York.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part Three)
The tabloids have been pestering us for weeks about what lies between #10 and #6 on the 20 greatest videos list. And now they have their answer.
#10 Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Y Control" (Spike Jonze, 2004)
"Maps" was the third single from Yeah Yeah Yeahs breakthrough 2003 LP Fever To Tell. It ultimately turned into one of those slow-burning classics that stayed in K-Rock's light rotation for nearly a year straight. However, the "we've arrived" moment was signified by its video, in which Karen O gives a heartfelt performance, shedding genuine tears, conjuring memories of Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U." Somebody at their label did something correctly, because the video actually received daytime MTV airplay (not just MTV2.. yeah, the actual MTV.. the one that never plays videos anymore). It was a quite a triumph for indie bands who actually had a shot of receiving Top 40 airplay. (Over the next year, Modest Mouse, The Killers and Franz Ferdinand would all crash the Top 40 party briefly, but were too cool to stick around for longer than a year.)
The thing about "Maps," however, was that it almost set the bar too high, and sadly overshadowed its follow-up single, "Y Control," which never really got farther than MTV2's late-night show Subterranean and received no commercial radio airplay. One can tell right from the start that YYY's wanted to be noticed and create something huge, so they wisely called upon Spike Jonze to direct one of his few rock-video masterpieces from the 2000's. Apparently influenced by Michael Jackson's "Beat It" and "Thriller" videos, it includes shots of children engaging in acts of dismemberment and bludgeoning chaos, in an manner that takes violence no further than cheesy 80's horror movies. Its explosive nature somehow alluded Pitchfork, who preferred the "Maps" video for their "best of the decade" special, most likely because people actually saw it. Regardless of popularity, "Y Control" slays every time.
#9 Beastie Boys "Sabotage" (Spike Jonze, 1994)
"Sabotage" influenced the opening sequence of Trainspotting. Almost immediately beloved by MTV viewers, it's become one of the most revered and acclaimed videos ever, to the extent that I can't think of anything new to say about it.
And so on that note, let's hear what Beavis has to say...
#8 Nirvana "In Bloom" (Kevin Kerslake, 1992)
Everyone always seems to forget that Nirvana were jokes n jokes n jokes... In other words, they were funny as shit. It's probably their most underrated quality, period. Look no further than the opening sequence of Live! Tonight! Sold Out! or their various antics in 1991: The Year Punk Broke, or other various weirdness such as the Michael Jackson impersonator accepting their "Best Alternative" award at the '92 VMA's.
If you've seen "In Bloom" anytime recently, their sense of humor should be obvious anyway. This "second version" is best of them all, which combines two videos into one. The first version, simply their deadpan faux-Ed Sullivan performance by itself, enters a whole new level of mindfuck during the video's second half, after shots were included from an unused edit, with the stage destruction in dresses. Thankfully, this is the version that made it to MTV.
#7 Pulp "This Is Hardcore" (Doug Nichol, 1998)
Pulp claimed nearly every director who were presenting concepts for this video were all relating "Hardcore" to its more obvious sexual overtones. Doug Nichol was the exception, who accompanied the song's darkness to fake outtakes from a fake movie from the 1950's, starring Pulp themselves along with a cast of hundreds. It's unsure whether this portrayal is of a film that was plagued by disaster, possibly a film that was never finished. A fight sequence starting around 3:40 accompanied by one cast member having a fake-real heart attack darkens this mystique even further, as well as the closing shots of the "cast members" staring into the camera, waiting for a possibly angry and fed-up director to make another decision.
#6 Sonic Youth "Sunday" (Harmony Korine, 1998)
So much to say of such a simple video.. Upon this video's unveiling midway through a summer 1998 episode of 120 Minutes, Macaulay Culkin had not acted for a film camera since 1994's Richie Rich. And suddenly there he was, staring through a mirror at late night MTV viewers. Harmony Korine's slow motion film effect was one he had also used to perfection in 1997's Gummo, particularly in one shot of Chloë Sevigny staring into the camera in a very similar manner... They're similar in that Gummo and "Sunday" seem to blur the lines between what might be reality and what might be scripted or planned. Elsewhere in the video are both slow motion and fast motion shots of a ballet class, Macaulay jamming out with Thurston Moore, and Macaulay once again with then-wife Rachel Miner in a real-life moment of marital bonding. "Sunday" conveys simplicity, innocence and freedom, in a manner rarely portrayed with such darkness and discomfort.
#10 Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Y Control" (Spike Jonze, 2004)
"Maps" was the third single from Yeah Yeah Yeahs breakthrough 2003 LP Fever To Tell. It ultimately turned into one of those slow-burning classics that stayed in K-Rock's light rotation for nearly a year straight. However, the "we've arrived" moment was signified by its video, in which Karen O gives a heartfelt performance, shedding genuine tears, conjuring memories of Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U." Somebody at their label did something correctly, because the video actually received daytime MTV airplay (not just MTV2.. yeah, the actual MTV.. the one that never plays videos anymore). It was a quite a triumph for indie bands who actually had a shot of receiving Top 40 airplay. (Over the next year, Modest Mouse, The Killers and Franz Ferdinand would all crash the Top 40 party briefly, but were too cool to stick around for longer than a year.)
The thing about "Maps," however, was that it almost set the bar too high, and sadly overshadowed its follow-up single, "Y Control," which never really got farther than MTV2's late-night show Subterranean and received no commercial radio airplay. One can tell right from the start that YYY's wanted to be noticed and create something huge, so they wisely called upon Spike Jonze to direct one of his few rock-video masterpieces from the 2000's. Apparently influenced by Michael Jackson's "Beat It" and "Thriller" videos, it includes shots of children engaging in acts of dismemberment and bludgeoning chaos, in an manner that takes violence no further than cheesy 80's horror movies. Its explosive nature somehow alluded Pitchfork, who preferred the "Maps" video for their "best of the decade" special, most likely because people actually saw it. Regardless of popularity, "Y Control" slays every time.
#9 Beastie Boys "Sabotage" (Spike Jonze, 1994)
"Sabotage" influenced the opening sequence of Trainspotting. Almost immediately beloved by MTV viewers, it's become one of the most revered and acclaimed videos ever, to the extent that I can't think of anything new to say about it.
And so on that note, let's hear what Beavis has to say...
#8 Nirvana "In Bloom" (Kevin Kerslake, 1992)
Everyone always seems to forget that Nirvana were jokes n jokes n jokes... In other words, they were funny as shit. It's probably their most underrated quality, period. Look no further than the opening sequence of Live! Tonight! Sold Out! or their various antics in 1991: The Year Punk Broke, or other various weirdness such as the Michael Jackson impersonator accepting their "Best Alternative" award at the '92 VMA's.
If you've seen "In Bloom" anytime recently, their sense of humor should be obvious anyway. This "second version" is best of them all, which combines two videos into one. The first version, simply their deadpan faux-Ed Sullivan performance by itself, enters a whole new level of mindfuck during the video's second half, after shots were included from an unused edit, with the stage destruction in dresses. Thankfully, this is the version that made it to MTV.
#7 Pulp "This Is Hardcore" (Doug Nichol, 1998)
Pulp claimed nearly every director who were presenting concepts for this video were all relating "Hardcore" to its more obvious sexual overtones. Doug Nichol was the exception, who accompanied the song's darkness to fake outtakes from a fake movie from the 1950's, starring Pulp themselves along with a cast of hundreds. It's unsure whether this portrayal is of a film that was plagued by disaster, possibly a film that was never finished. A fight sequence starting around 3:40 accompanied by one cast member having a fake-real heart attack darkens this mystique even further, as well as the closing shots of the "cast members" staring into the camera, waiting for a possibly angry and fed-up director to make another decision.
#6 Sonic Youth "Sunday" (Harmony Korine, 1998)
So much to say of such a simple video.. Upon this video's unveiling midway through a summer 1998 episode of 120 Minutes, Macaulay Culkin had not acted for a film camera since 1994's Richie Rich. And suddenly there he was, staring through a mirror at late night MTV viewers. Harmony Korine's slow motion film effect was one he had also used to perfection in 1997's Gummo, particularly in one shot of Chloë Sevigny staring into the camera in a very similar manner... They're similar in that Gummo and "Sunday" seem to blur the lines between what might be reality and what might be scripted or planned. Elsewhere in the video are both slow motion and fast motion shots of a ballet class, Macaulay jamming out with Thurston Moore, and Macaulay once again with then-wife Rachel Miner in a real-life moment of marital bonding. "Sunday" conveys simplicity, innocence and freedom, in a manner rarely portrayed with such darkness and discomfort.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part Two)
Back again for another round..
#15 Metallica "One" (Bill Pope & Michael Solomon, 1988)
After their frantic thrash debut Kill 'Em All, Metallica spent the remainder of the decade releasing one of rock's classic album trilogies, highlighted by their career-centerpiece Master Of Puppets. The third part of this trilogy was 1988's ...And Justice For All, which had no choice but to be considered a let down after Master Of Puppets raised the bar so high.
This isn't to suggest Justice is anything but outstanding.. It was their last truly definitive moment, and the last time they truly mattered to metal. But it was also Metallica's first big let down to their fans, partially because of their shift towards slightly more mainstream verse-chorus rock. But it was also because before Cliff Burton died, they stated that they would never make a music video. It's hard to say if fans were more pissed off with the actual shooting of the video than they were with the hypocrisy. Either way, the band hadn't gone to shit just yet, and "One" currently stands as the single official promotional video that represents this band's most classic era. They should also be given credit for their first video pushing the 8 minute mark and still receiving heavy MTV airplay alongside Madonna and New Kids On The Block.
There's a version of this video that only includes the band's black & white performance, but right from the start, MTV always played the version with the clips from Johnny Got His Gun, even though many probably considered this version slightly more tedious. However, "One," complete with movie clips, is a far better visual representation of the book than its film adaptation. (And yes, I've read the book, which is good, and seen the movie, which is kinda awful..)
(Just fyi, this is NOT the version of "One" that used to air on MTV.. I guess there were more than 2 edits of this, but unfortunately the one posted here is not nearly as effective as the original.. and it seems this version is nowhere to be found on the world wide web. Sad.)
#14 Aphex Twin "Come To Daddy" (Chris Cunningham, 1997)
One truly amazing aspect of "Come To Daddy" is that both Richard D. James and Chris Cunningham were shooting more for silliness and jokes than the terrifying doomfest it ultimately became. Two things Cunningham pointed out on his DVD that I love about "Come To Daddy": #1 It makes no sense why a little old lady would have such a "monsterous, aggressive, horse-sized dog." And #2 Some of the kids are midgets with masks, which is hilarious because if you look closely they're "little hairy-armed kids" with an Aphex Twin face. Maybe there's more jokes here than I realized..
#13 Wax "California" (Spike Jonze, 1995)
One of the most definitive images of 90's MTV, and one of Beavis's favorite videos.. A simple tale of a man flagging down a bus, and the little girl bored out of her mind watching the whole thing. Wikipedia claims that Tim and Lars from Rancid are somewhere in this video...
#12 The Pharcyde "Drop" (Spike Jonze, 1996)
Spike Jonze has a knack for choosing very distinct images that always seem to perfectly accompany the music.. The backwards effect in this video was actually perfected by Michel Gondry's clip for Cibo Matto's "Sugar Water." However, the final minute of "Drop" is a climax that blows it back into stratospheric territory.
#11 UNKLE feat Thom Yorke "Rabbit In Your Headlights" (Jonathan Glazer, 1998)
This video has already been analyzed to death.. I can't think of a single original thought about it, so instead I'll get all lame and nostalgic.. There aren't many videos that can take me back like this one, right to the first time I saw it on 120 Minutes around 1AM sometime in December 1998 in my mom's basement.. I had never seen anything like it.. I wasn't really paying attention initially, and then that first car strike was so unexpected I couldn't look away until the end.. one of the first cases I can remember of truly being wow'd by a video.. In fact, I'm pretty sure I whispered "wow" to myself. But that's the thing.. If you know what to expect it may not blow you away the first time, so I've already said too much...
"Embedding disabled by request." :(
Part 3 coming soon...
#15 Metallica "One" (Bill Pope & Michael Solomon, 1988)
After their frantic thrash debut Kill 'Em All, Metallica spent the remainder of the decade releasing one of rock's classic album trilogies, highlighted by their career-centerpiece Master Of Puppets. The third part of this trilogy was 1988's ...And Justice For All, which had no choice but to be considered a let down after Master Of Puppets raised the bar so high.
This isn't to suggest Justice is anything but outstanding.. It was their last truly definitive moment, and the last time they truly mattered to metal. But it was also Metallica's first big let down to their fans, partially because of their shift towards slightly more mainstream verse-chorus rock. But it was also because before Cliff Burton died, they stated that they would never make a music video. It's hard to say if fans were more pissed off with the actual shooting of the video than they were with the hypocrisy. Either way, the band hadn't gone to shit just yet, and "One" currently stands as the single official promotional video that represents this band's most classic era. They should also be given credit for their first video pushing the 8 minute mark and still receiving heavy MTV airplay alongside Madonna and New Kids On The Block.
There's a version of this video that only includes the band's black & white performance, but right from the start, MTV always played the version with the clips from Johnny Got His Gun, even though many probably considered this version slightly more tedious. However, "One," complete with movie clips, is a far better visual representation of the book than its film adaptation. (And yes, I've read the book, which is good, and seen the movie, which is kinda awful..)
(Just fyi, this is NOT the version of "One" that used to air on MTV.. I guess there were more than 2 edits of this, but unfortunately the one posted here is not nearly as effective as the original.. and it seems this version is nowhere to be found on the world wide web. Sad.)
#14 Aphex Twin "Come To Daddy" (Chris Cunningham, 1997)
One truly amazing aspect of "Come To Daddy" is that both Richard D. James and Chris Cunningham were shooting more for silliness and jokes than the terrifying doomfest it ultimately became. Two things Cunningham pointed out on his DVD that I love about "Come To Daddy": #1 It makes no sense why a little old lady would have such a "monsterous, aggressive, horse-sized dog." And #2 Some of the kids are midgets with masks, which is hilarious because if you look closely they're "little hairy-armed kids" with an Aphex Twin face. Maybe there's more jokes here than I realized..
#13 Wax "California" (Spike Jonze, 1995)
One of the most definitive images of 90's MTV, and one of Beavis's favorite videos.. A simple tale of a man flagging down a bus, and the little girl bored out of her mind watching the whole thing. Wikipedia claims that Tim and Lars from Rancid are somewhere in this video...
#12 The Pharcyde "Drop" (Spike Jonze, 1996)
Spike Jonze has a knack for choosing very distinct images that always seem to perfectly accompany the music.. The backwards effect in this video was actually perfected by Michel Gondry's clip for Cibo Matto's "Sugar Water." However, the final minute of "Drop" is a climax that blows it back into stratospheric territory.
#11 UNKLE feat Thom Yorke "Rabbit In Your Headlights" (Jonathan Glazer, 1998)
This video has already been analyzed to death.. I can't think of a single original thought about it, so instead I'll get all lame and nostalgic.. There aren't many videos that can take me back like this one, right to the first time I saw it on 120 Minutes around 1AM sometime in December 1998 in my mom's basement.. I had never seen anything like it.. I wasn't really paying attention initially, and then that first car strike was so unexpected I couldn't look away until the end.. one of the first cases I can remember of truly being wow'd by a video.. In fact, I'm pretty sure I whispered "wow" to myself. But that's the thing.. If you know what to expect it may not blow you away the first time, so I've already said too much...
"Embedding disabled by request." :(
Part 3 coming soon...
20 Best Promo Videos Ever (Part One)
I found a good list to post, but it requires lots of youtube links so I decided to break it into four parts, 5 videos at a time. "Keeping 'em wanting more" is good showmanship. I'm also a fan of "show, don't tell."
Just so anyone reading this can know for the future, you cannot fuck with this list. These are the best videos ever shown on MTV. Everything on this list was released between the 80's and 2005, which is when MTV actually would have been airing music.
Promo videos since 2005, including those which received the most praise, have pretty much all been shallow and cliched, with meaningless CGI effects, vapid celebrity cameos, tired computer animation, and every other imaginable cliche that's being used for the millionth fucking time. The small handful of exceptions from the past 5 years that I can recall would include the following:
"Rubber Johnny" (Aphex Twin) |Youtube|
"The Denial Twist" and "My Doorbell" (The White Stripes) |Youtube (Denial)| |Youtube (Doorbell)|
"Keine Lust" (Rammstein) |Youtube|
"Prime Time Of Your Life" (Daft Punk) |Youtube|
"Over And Over (Hot Chip) |Youtube|
"Sensual Seduction" (Snoop Dogg) |Youtube|
"Kids" (MGMT) |Youtube|
Besides these few, the best videos since 2005 are no longer those paid for by record label advances or funded by record sales. Youtube has allowed both bands and fans to launch a kind of DIY-era of promo clips. We personally enjoyed Radiohead's performance videos from around the release of In Rainbows such as their cover of New Order's "Ceremony", or Tobacco from Black Moth Super Rainbow who released an entire DVD of random VHS weirdness to accompany the Fucked Up Friends LP.
This list also unintentionally excludes videos released before the launch of MTV, for no other reason than simply they're not very interesting compared to what followed. Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues" and The Beatles "I Am The Walrus" were among the first that seemed to explore beyond mere musical performance or compiling images of bands lipsynching while strolling around various landscapes. Much later, David Bowie's "Ashes To Ashes" and Sex Pistols' "My Way" continued pushing forward, soon before MTV's official launch.
The videos that currently receive the most praise from MTV's first 5 years are "Thriller," "Sledgehammer" and of course A-ha's "Take On Me," which will probably end up in every major publication's "top 10 videos ever" for the rest of eternity. However, it won't be in this one because we no longer consider it exciting in compared to what followed. And honestly, it confused me as a 6-year-old MTV fan. It reminds me of confusion.
Enough malarkey. Let's get to this so I can sleep.
#20 Mr. Oizo "Flat Beat" (Quentin Dupieux, 1999)
This video stars Flat Eric. I don't know a lot about his history, but the clip suggests his professional life is quite successful and that he works very hard to keep his company strong. "Flat Beat" taught me the virtues of perseverance. This video may be the apex of meaningless non-Henson puppetry. In fact, puppetry and minimalism are so rarely used together, and they're such an effective combination.
#19 My Chemical Romance "I’m Not Okay (I Promise)" (Marc Webb, 2004)
This was an obvious fluke since it inspired a turd-pile of videos that followed in its path, all of which included one, some, or all of the elements from this video. The turd-pile I'm referring to includes every other MCR video and all the others from every band that got radio spins as a result of MCR's success. (i.e. "Dance Dance," "I Write Sins Not Tragedies," etc.)
This video was different, since it's the only case in which these elements congealed correctly. Yes, the song and video are both trying way too hard to be anthemic, but in this one specific case it made perfect sense.
"I'm Not Okay" is essentially the exact opposite of The Strokes' brilliantly simple "Last Night" video, which was also a "first of its kind" earlier in the decade. Both videos were thrown in heavy MTV rotation in hopes of creating a "new Nirvana" type of buzz, attempting to launch a new subgenre to take over alt-rock stations. And in a weird way, The Strokes did become the Nirvana of neo-garage in the same way My Chemical Romance became the Nirvana of "whiny post-post-emo with huge pop hooks."
The video was also a fluke for Marc Webb, who later went on to direct no more good videos and an overhyped recently released movie called (500) Days Of Summer, one of those fake-indie movies that's not actually distributed by an independent film company while catering to Garden State/Juno fans and probably has a soundtrack with 75% boring indie-rock and 25% new wave from the 80's (and wouldn't you know it - dead fucking right on target as usual. I swear I didn't look before that prediction.) Moving on.
Whatever, no apologies. Take it or leave it, this is what a great video looks like:
(Youtube did not allow the original edit of the video to be posted, but somehow it made it onto Spike TV's official website.
#18 Nirvana "Heart Shaped Box" (Anton Corbjin, 1993)
Wayne & Garth summed it up nicely:
#17 Yo La Tengo "Sugarcube" (Phil Morrison, 1997)
"Sugarcube" is a favorite among music nerds and Mr. Show fans, although its appeal is actually way more universal than that, since I knew nothing about Mr. Show when I was 17, and I was a fairly pathetic excuse for a "music nerd" in comparison to people I've met since then. And yet despite my ignorance, this was still one of my most cherished discoveries after I became addicted to 120 Minutes in that crazy summer of '97.
#16 Blur "Coffee + TV" (Hammer & Tongs, 1999)
Poor little Milky. This video is so cute, and yet so dark. Some really scary shit blocks Milk's path from reaching Graham Coxon. I'm still somewhat scared by the last 45 seconds, in which Hammer & Tongs decided to also create a visual of the 2 angel-milks flying to the sound of the interlude heard between "Coffee + TV" and "Swamp Song" on Blur's 13 LP. It still gives me some chills. but I mean, it's so cute. How could anyone with a soul dislike this video?
(P.S. According to the wikipedia entry on Blur's 13 the character is actually named "Milky." I was just guessing before. I had no idea!)
Part 2 coming soon!
Just so anyone reading this can know for the future, you cannot fuck with this list. These are the best videos ever shown on MTV. Everything on this list was released between the 80's and 2005, which is when MTV actually would have been airing music.
Promo videos since 2005, including those which received the most praise, have pretty much all been shallow and cliched, with meaningless CGI effects, vapid celebrity cameos, tired computer animation, and every other imaginable cliche that's being used for the millionth fucking time. The small handful of exceptions from the past 5 years that I can recall would include the following:
"Rubber Johnny" (Aphex Twin) |Youtube|
"The Denial Twist" and "My Doorbell" (The White Stripes) |Youtube (Denial)| |Youtube (Doorbell)|
"Keine Lust" (Rammstein) |Youtube|
"Prime Time Of Your Life" (Daft Punk) |Youtube|
"Over And Over (Hot Chip) |Youtube|
"Sensual Seduction" (Snoop Dogg) |Youtube|
"Kids" (MGMT) |Youtube|
Besides these few, the best videos since 2005 are no longer those paid for by record label advances or funded by record sales. Youtube has allowed both bands and fans to launch a kind of DIY-era of promo clips. We personally enjoyed Radiohead's performance videos from around the release of In Rainbows such as their cover of New Order's "Ceremony", or Tobacco from Black Moth Super Rainbow who released an entire DVD of random VHS weirdness to accompany the Fucked Up Friends LP.
This list also unintentionally excludes videos released before the launch of MTV, for no other reason than simply they're not very interesting compared to what followed. Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues" and The Beatles "I Am The Walrus" were among the first that seemed to explore beyond mere musical performance or compiling images of bands lipsynching while strolling around various landscapes. Much later, David Bowie's "Ashes To Ashes" and Sex Pistols' "My Way" continued pushing forward, soon before MTV's official launch.
The videos that currently receive the most praise from MTV's first 5 years are "Thriller," "Sledgehammer" and of course A-ha's "Take On Me," which will probably end up in every major publication's "top 10 videos ever" for the rest of eternity. However, it won't be in this one because we no longer consider it exciting in compared to what followed. And honestly, it confused me as a 6-year-old MTV fan. It reminds me of confusion.
Enough malarkey. Let's get to this so I can sleep.
#20 Mr. Oizo "Flat Beat" (Quentin Dupieux, 1999)
This video stars Flat Eric. I don't know a lot about his history, but the clip suggests his professional life is quite successful and that he works very hard to keep his company strong. "Flat Beat" taught me the virtues of perseverance. This video may be the apex of meaningless non-Henson puppetry. In fact, puppetry and minimalism are so rarely used together, and they're such an effective combination.
#19 My Chemical Romance "I’m Not Okay (I Promise)" (Marc Webb, 2004)
This was an obvious fluke since it inspired a turd-pile of videos that followed in its path, all of which included one, some, or all of the elements from this video. The turd-pile I'm referring to includes every other MCR video and all the others from every band that got radio spins as a result of MCR's success. (i.e. "Dance Dance," "I Write Sins Not Tragedies," etc.)
This video was different, since it's the only case in which these elements congealed correctly. Yes, the song and video are both trying way too hard to be anthemic, but in this one specific case it made perfect sense.
"I'm Not Okay" is essentially the exact opposite of The Strokes' brilliantly simple "Last Night" video, which was also a "first of its kind" earlier in the decade. Both videos were thrown in heavy MTV rotation in hopes of creating a "new Nirvana" type of buzz, attempting to launch a new subgenre to take over alt-rock stations. And in a weird way, The Strokes did become the Nirvana of neo-garage in the same way My Chemical Romance became the Nirvana of "whiny post-post-emo with huge pop hooks."
The video was also a fluke for Marc Webb, who later went on to direct no more good videos and an overhyped recently released movie called (500) Days Of Summer, one of those fake-indie movies that's not actually distributed by an independent film company while catering to Garden State/Juno fans and probably has a soundtrack with 75% boring indie-rock and 25% new wave from the 80's (and wouldn't you know it - dead fucking right on target as usual. I swear I didn't look before that prediction.) Moving on.
Whatever, no apologies. Take it or leave it, this is what a great video looks like:
(Youtube did not allow the original edit of the video to be posted, but somehow it made it onto Spike TV's official website.
#18 Nirvana "Heart Shaped Box" (Anton Corbjin, 1993)
Wayne & Garth summed it up nicely:
#17 Yo La Tengo "Sugarcube" (Phil Morrison, 1997)
"Sugarcube" is a favorite among music nerds and Mr. Show fans, although its appeal is actually way more universal than that, since I knew nothing about Mr. Show when I was 17, and I was a fairly pathetic excuse for a "music nerd" in comparison to people I've met since then. And yet despite my ignorance, this was still one of my most cherished discoveries after I became addicted to 120 Minutes in that crazy summer of '97.
#16 Blur "Coffee + TV" (Hammer & Tongs, 1999)
Poor little Milky. This video is so cute, and yet so dark. Some really scary shit blocks Milk's path from reaching Graham Coxon. I'm still somewhat scared by the last 45 seconds, in which Hammer & Tongs decided to also create a visual of the 2 angel-milks flying to the sound of the interlude heard between "Coffee + TV" and "Swamp Song" on Blur's 13 LP. It still gives me some chills. but I mean, it's so cute. How could anyone with a soul dislike this video?
(P.S. According to the wikipedia entry on Blur's 13 the character is actually named "Milky." I was just guessing before. I had no idea!)
Part 2 coming soon!
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