My friend Max (short for Maxima, though if it were short for Maximus that would also be cool in a GLADIATOR way) has introduced me to Macklemore.
He’s a Seattle rapper famous for the THRIFT STORE song and video, which is worth an entirely post by itself.
I’d heard Macklemore’s songs on the radio and such, but not the music videos, seeing how MTV doesn’t play vids anymore because, you know, wall-to-wall Jersey Shore nonsense and such. Snooki needs her screen time.
This video is long and courageous and well done.
I salute you, Macklemore, for having the range to do a hilarious romp like THRIFT STORE and the guts to do this quiet little beauty.
Now, the usual music video features (a) some kind of singer or rock band (b) singing and rocking, and possibly trying to (c) dance, though if they can’t dance, the can (d) look tough or (e) let their backup dancers go crazy while the singers and rockers look tough. The toughest part is whether to film in an empty warehouse or on top of a roof.
For pop singers and boy bands, it’s even simpler: they have to sing WHILE dancing, and it doesn’t really matter where.
Music videos that tell a story, like some kind of moving picture, with a script and such, are rare. Because that sort of thing is work, you see, and the rock bands who try usually shoot for “artsy” and merely slam hard into “the Wall of Pretentious.”
This isn’t quite art, and it doesn’t quite make sense, but it is interesting and different and ambitious. I salute the Shins for aiming high instead of setting up their drums and amps in the parking lot of a vacant K-mart, just to be ironic.
For you musical types, here are the lyrics for you to dissect and decipher:
Well, this is just a simple song,
To say what you done.
I told you ’bout all those fears,
And away they did run.
You sure must be strong,
And you feel like an ocean being warmed by the sun.
When I was just nine-years-old,
I swear that I dreamt,
Your face on a football field,
And a kiss that I kept,
Under my vest.
Apart from everything,
But the heart in my chest.
Chorus:
I know that things can really get rough,
When you go it alone,
Don’t go thinking you gotta be tough,
And play like a stone.
Could be there’s nothing else in our lives so critical,
As this little home.
My life in an upturned boat,
Marooned on a cliff.
You brought me a great big flood,
And you gave me a lift.
Girl, what a gift.
When you tell me with your tongue,
And your breath was in my lungs,
And we float up through the rift.
Chorus:
I know that things can really get rough,
When you go it alone.
Don’t go thinking you gotta be tough,
And play like a stone.
Could be there’s nothing else in our lives so critical,
As this little home.
Well, this would be a simple song,
To say what you done.
I told you ’bout all those fears,
And away they did run.
You sure must be strong,
When you feel like an ocean being warmed by the sun.
Remember walking a mile to your house,
Aglow in the dark?
I made a fumbling play for your heart,
And the act struck a spark.
You wore a charm on the chain that I stole,
Especial for you.
Love’s such a delicate thing that we do,
With nothing to prove,
Which I never knew.
If you are a child of the ’80s, or even alive and conscious during that decade, you remember some nutty TV shows that — at the time — we thought were cool.
THE A-TEAM is unwatchable today. Go fire it up on Netflix or whatever. The fourth time in a row that (a) Mr. T says “I pity the fool” as (b) bullets spray all over the place and (c) bad guy cars jump in the air and do that half-flip, you’ll do a facepalm, and right in the middle of that facepalm, Col. Hannibal will light up a cigar and say, “I love it when a plan comes together.”
Other things we watched and thought were cool: AIRWOLF and that show where some American guy thinks he’s a ninja because he has an old wise mentor and is constantly fighting some actual ninja who actually should be the hero, seeing how he was the only real ninja within 100 miles.
Anyway, the point is, they’re rebooting one of the nuttiest relics from the Glowing Tube back in the ’80s: MANIMAL.
This is great news for America, and for bored college kids looking for something watch and dissect, as a group, when they’ve had too much Pabst Blue Ribbon to write that term paper about dialectical materialism as it relates to Madonna’s early videos, the ones before she’d married Sean Penn.
Here’s the classic MANIMAL intro.
Watch the hero as he trasforms, and no, they didn’t get this idea when they hired the special effects guy who turned Michael Jackson into a werewolf.
Special bonus: SPACE SHERIFF triple transformation
Note that I have no idea what this show is, aside from a possible father of POWER RANGERS, but it is awesome.
There’s a funny little post on reddit that actually gives us (1) a nice laugh and (2) a great little lesson in writing.
Here’s the story:
At the grocery store he’s running around doing superhero moves with a fierce expression and making kind of a spectacle of himself. A lady says, “Hello, young man, what’s your name?”
In a little kids’ version of a growly voice, he says “I’m Batman.”
The lady laughs. “I mean, what’s your real name?”
Again: “I’m BATMAN!”
“No, what’s your actual real name?”
(long pause)
“Bruce Wayne.”
As a father and a fan of Batman, I love this.
As a writer, I see a story in 66 words. How many words could you kill without hurting the story? Not many.
Everything has a purpose.
If you read this silly blog, you know about setups and payoffs, which are essential tools for writers of all sorts, whether you’re a blogger, a journalist, a speechwriter or a novelist finishing a 242,000-word epic about elves with lightsabers riding dragons. (Sidenote: I keep waiting for somebody to actually write this Jedi elf saga as a parody, or send me a link to the actual books, because THEY MUST EXIST.)
This little story has multiple setups that all pay off with the last line. It’s beautifully done and the laugh comes not just from the surprise, but from all those careful setups.
Bonus Video: little kid instructs adult in proper Batman voice
Not the people watching movies, unless that movie happens to be TWILIGHT: BREAKING DAWN PART 5 or whatever, in which case yes, your LSAT scores will never be the same.
No, I’m talking about characters in movies.
Characters in books sometimes do stupid things, but not usually. Put that same character in a movie and they turn into absolute idiots.
This is true for romantic comedies (bumbling fools in love!), action movies (no henchman can shoot, and no heroine or sidekick can avoid getting kidnapped by the villain) and especially horror movies, which deserve a post all their own.
If a person with a functioning brain cell rattling around their skull wouldn’t go into the spooky abandoned house where people keep disappearing, you can bet the movie character will march right in. Does the hot young teenager know that a serial killer is chasing down and killing hot young teenagers? Well, she should definitely wear high heels and fall down six times while the psycho chases her.
There are websites dedicated to listing the stupid things that movie characters do.
However: I want to pick on THE WALKING DEAD, a zombie shebang that’s on the Glowing Tube.
As a fan of zombies, I am aware of this show, and though I haven’t watched every flipping episode, I kinda keep track of things by recaps and reviews and such. It’s a good show and not at all stupid.
So why did a smart show have their characters get so idiotic in the big series finale?
Here’s the setup: the non-zombie hero peoples are holed up at some farm, and the big finale is a battle that happens when the zombies show up, en masse.
What made me want to throw things at the YouTube clip is how the zombies happily marched across the fields and surrounded the farmhouse.
No, no, no.
If you or I are hanging around a farmhouse during the zombie apocalypse, the zombies won’t ever march up on us from every direction. Why? Because we’ll get busy, real quick, using all the tools and equipment that any decent farm has the second we arrive there and take inventory of the place.
First thing we do is fire up the tractor or backhoe and dig a long ditch around the farm.
Second thing we do shove the dirt we dug up into a berm, a rough wall. So they fall in the ditch, and if by some zombie magic one of the undead gets out of the ditch, he’s gotta climb a wall.
Third thing we do is put a barbed wire fence on top of that berm.
If there’s a working tractor, this sort of thing takes a day or two.
And it’s worth it, because now a single Farmer Joe type with a flipping .22 rifle can stand on top of that berm and pick off zombies all day while he sips moonshine. Because there’s no way a horde of zombies is magically getting past the ditch, the wall and the barbed wire. It’s not happening.
Zombies can’t climb.
Instead, the heroes of THE WALKING DEAD go on foot (to get nom-nom-nommed) and drive around in cars trying to blow away zombies. Which isn’t smart, either. Shooting from a moving vehicle may look cool, but you have a much better chance of hitting a moving target when you’re not bouncing around, too.
Bottom line: If you really want to survive a horror movie / zombie apocalypse, please use your noggin first and your trigger finger second.
OK, so it’s one thing to take (1) one of the most talented singers in the solar system and (2) a bunch of professional backup dancers, set designers, choreographers and film peoples to make (3) a great music video that probably cost more money to make than you or I will ever see, even as we tour a secret Federal Reserve money factory that creates Benjamins by the bucketful.
It is quite another thing for a whippersnapper student, with no monies, to shoot the same video on his iPhone or whatever and edit it on his computer — doing the EXACT SAME VIDEO, frame for frame, effect for effect.
This kid is such a flipping genius that his blue snuggie, just by osmosis, has earned two doctorates in Applied Awesomesauce.
For musical peoples, here are the lyrics to COUNTDOWN.
Boy!
Oh, killing me softly and I’m still falling
Still the one I need, I will always be with you
Oh, you got me all gone, don’t ever let me go
Say it real loud if you fly
If you leave me you’re out of your mind
My baby is a 10
We dressing to the 9
He pick me up we 8,
Make me feel so lucky 7
He kiss me in his 6
We be making love at 5
Still the one I do this 4
I’m tryna make us 3
From that 2
He’s still the 1
There’s ups and downs in this love
Got a lot to learn in this love
Through the good and the bad, still got love
Dedicated to the one I love, hey
Still love the way he talk, still love the way I sing
Still love the way he rock them black diamonds in that chain
Still all up on each other, ain’t a damn thing changed
My girls can’t tell me nothing, I’m gone in the brain
I’m all up under him like it’s cold, winter time
All up in the kitchen in my heels, dinner time
Do whatever that it takes, he got a winner’s mind
Give it all to him, meet him at the finish line
Me and my boo and my boo boo riding
All up in that black with his chick right beside him
Ladies, if you love your man show him you the flyest
Grind up on it, girl, show him how you ride it
Me and my boo and my boo boo riding
All up in that black with his chick right beside him
Ladies, if you love your man show him you the fliest
Grind up on it, girl, show him how you ride it
Oh, killing me softly and I’m still fallin’
Still the one I need, I will always be with you
Oh, you got me all gone, don’t ever let me go
Say it real loud if you fly
If you leave me you out of your mind
My baby is a 10
We dressing to the 9
He pick me up we 8,
Make me feel so lucky 7
He kiss me in his 6
We be making love at 5
Still the one I do this 4
I’m tryna make us 3
From that 2
He still the 1
Yup, I put it on him, it ain’t nothing that I can’t do
Yup, I buy my own, if he deserve it, buy his shit too
All up in the store, shorty, tricking if I want to
All up in the store, shorty, fly as we want to
Ooh ooh ooh ooh
Damn I think I love that boy
Do anything for that boy
Boy!
Now I’ll never be the same
You and me until the end
Me and my boo and my boo boo riding
All up in that black with his chick right beside him
Ladies, if you love your man show you the flyest
Grind up on it, girl, show him how you ride it
Me and my boo and my boo lip locking
All up in the back because the chicks keep flocking
All that gossip in 10 years stop it
London speed it up, Houston rock it
Oh, killing softly and I’m still falling
Still the one I need, I will always be with you
Oh, you got me all gone, don’t ever let me go
Say it real loud if you fly,
If you leave me you’re out of your mind
My baby is a 10
We dressing to the 9
He pick me up we 8,
Make me feel so lucky 7
He kiss me in his 6
We be making love at 5
Still the one I do this 4
I’m tryna make us 3
From that 2
He still the 1
Yes, I know that there are rumors that MTV still plays some music videos between the hours of 3 a.m. and 9 a.m., when it’s not doing Jersey Shore marathons or finding the next Heidi Pratt or whatever. MTV used to play videos 24 hours a day. Now all you can watch are country videos on some nearby channel. Do I need country videos about somebody’s dog dying and the transmission on his Chevy going out and his wife leaving with his best friend, and him sure missing his best friend? No. I need a channel that just plays music videos. VH1 doesn’t count.
This video by Fall Out Boy is a rocking tune with lyrics that nobody understands.
Listen closely. Tell me if you figure out (a) what the lead singer is saying, especially around the chorus and (b) if you can divine any meaning to those words.
Also: there is a parody video that tries to explain the lyrics. Quite funny and well done, though a smidge NSFW. If you fire up the YouTubes, you can probably find it.
If you were alive, and breathing, you remember watching this on what we used to call MTV, which played these things called “music videos” instead of endless reality shows starring people from New Jersey who tan a lot.
Sidenote: Sir Tans a Lot would be a funny name for a rapper who made fun of The Situation.
Three things: (1) the hair makes me laugh, (2) the effects seems cheap now and (3) the storytelling in the video is much better than the lyrics of the song.
Check out the lyrics below. I’ve read them twice. Saw the video a zillion times. The video sort of makes sense. The lyrics, not so much.
We’re talking away
I don’t know what
I’m to say I’ll say it anyway
Today’s another day to find you
Shying away
I’ll be coming for your love, OK?
Take on me, take me on
I’ll be gone
In a day or two
So needless to say
I’m odds and ends
But that’s me stumbling away
Slowly learning that life is OK.
Say after me
It’s no better to be safe than sorry
Take on me, take me on
I’ll be gone
In a day or two
Oh the things that you say
Is it life or
Just a play my worries away
You’re all the things I’ve got to
remember
You’re shying away
I’ll be coming for you anyway
Take on me, take me on
I’ll be gone
In a day or two
After watching so many horrible music videos — ten pounds of fail packed into five-pound bags — it is a pleasure to see something new and different and wonderful.
This is Delta Heavy’s “Get By” and I like it all: the music, the lyrics and the stop-motion creativity. They use Rubik’s cubes, Battleship, Hungry Hippos, you name it.
Wonderful. Well done, well done — and give us more.
The Red Pen of Doom 