My Top Ten Videos

My top ten music videos

This is one of those lists where everyone can make their own. There are some videos out there that the whole world enjoyed, just because of their movie like quality, Think Thriller or November Rain. And then there are those other videos that people just think are so cool because they are obscure and have a very arthouse feeling to them. Think any video Bjork ever made.

So outside of that this is my list these are the videos that got me into crazy music or made me love certain bands. Or maybe some of them are just those videos that I waited to see when I was watching music videos for hours on end. Either way this is my list. And, honestly this time I hope you make your own list, because we can’t always agree so here it is my top ten

10. Here It Goes Again by OK Go

So it seems like everyone has something to say about this video, and the whole world has seen it, at least by now I hope you have.  I don’t want to sound like a snob, but I was already into OK Go before this video came out.  (They had a song called Get Over It that also had a really kick ass video)

But this video is the one that made everyone fall in love with them, and rightfully so. The video if you haven’t seen it yet is one of the most beautifully choreographed videos that I have ever seen.

Plus they don’t just dance!

 No- No that would be too easy and they had done that before, this time they do the whole damn thing on a treadmill.

 They won a Grammy for it and millions of fans. The video has been viewed almost 70 million times on YouTube! That’s a lot of times. That is the equivalency of One fourth the population of the United States of America. So literally 1 in 4 people have seen this video, I don’t know of too many videos that can say that.

 But I digress; the video is great so here, just watch it

9. Black or White by Michael Jackson

Do you remember this video?

Oh man it was an event when it came out seriously it debuted during primetime on the Fox Network, it was seriously an experience. I remember seriously waiting for this video. I loved Michel Jackson and I forced my whole family to watch this, because we only had one tv at the time. The original video had Macaulay Culkin in it. And Norm from Cheers. And at the end Bart Simpson was in it. It was incredible.

There was controversy and my mom got mad because in the second half of the video The King of Pop went berserk did some killer dance moves and smashed a car and blew up a building. Oh and he grabbed his crotch what seemed like a million times. (This was a problem because in my house I was always imitating his dance moves and my dad hated when I grabbed my crotch)  MJ would later apologize for this and most video networks only aired the first half.

The video had so many cool elements to it, starting with Culkin’s Looney Tunes-esque amp settings. Then, Michael is seen dancing all over the world and each scene sort of blends into each other until he starts walking through fire, then Macaulay is rapping on what looks like the Huxtable family’s front steps.(I always waited for Rudy to pop out and dance with Buuud). Then back to MJ on the Statue of liberty then the cool morphing face thing. Everything was great. I just loved it

So below you will find 2 videos, the main video and then the extended ending. Check them both out and try to feel how I felt when it aired in one piece straight and I was just a Nine year old so enthralled.

8. Money for Nothing -  Dire Straits

This video was incredible, at least for me it was. I usually play this song on the jukebox when I am drinking, and no one seems to get mad, even when the song says the word faggot. Of course the video doesn’t include the second verse, but most people have heard it by now.  Personally I don’t want to get into that conversation right now, so whatever

But the video was pure cool as hell as far as I was concerned.  And Mtv thought so too, even though the video questions what it takes to be a rock star, Sting chanting “I want my MTV” was enough for those folks to call this the Video of the year in 1986. 

But let’s be honest, it deserved the award.

It had this cool 3d looking cartoon that nobody had really seen before, who cares if they were square and rectangle shaped people, it was cool. So those cartoon guys are watching MTV and on their TV Dire Straits are performing live with cool neon instruments and colors plus some weird lingerie video is in there.  

Supposedly that is how the song came about too. Mark Knopfler was at an appliance store and MTV was on and the workers were complaining and saying some of the song’s lyrics.  

That’s perfect. Plus after hearing the song MTV begged him to make the video and that is awesome too.

Later, Weird Al copied the video and song for his Beverly Hillbillies song,  for the movie UHF, but Knopfler even plays guitar for that song, so I say that is pretty cool in of itself. So the song is great, the video is cool check it out.

7. Virtual Insanity -  Jamiroquai

Bleeding couches, cockroaches and an ominous crow flying around, what more do you need to have a hit video right?

Oh the floor moves too? 

And sometimes the furniture?

That’s crazy, crazy cool as hell.

This video was crazy and it was made completely in the opposite way that you might think. But either way it was one of the coolest videos that I had ever seen.  This was another MTV best video winner, and actually is the band’s most popular song. Unless you count Canned Heat which Napoleon Dynamite dances to in the movie to get Pedro a winning vote.

To be honest I never really cared much for the song.  But I always thought the video was cool as hell. I always tried to act like my hallway was moving and dance in it while being dragged away. Of course I didn’t have a fuzzy giant hat so I didn’t look as cool as Jay Kay, but I tried.

6. Short Skirt/Long Jacket -  Cake

Ok, so this video is not really a video. I mean that in that it has no production value. The first time I saw it I was confused as hell.  I mean I already liked Cake so it wasn’t like it was a new band to me or anything.  But the video was out there.

 Hell you may call this lazy, but just watch the video I don’t want to give anything away.

Ok, am I right? It’s a good song and the video is hilarious, and shit you don’t know exactly whats going on. Admit you liked it.

5. Faith -  George Michael

I apologize to the woman of the house and my father, but that ass is incredible. And, yes I am talking about the close up’s of George’s ass.  I have already talked about this album on my blog, it was the first tape I ever bought and this video is why. I wanted to be George Michael when I was six. Hell I still do.

This video was so iconic and it is such a great representation of the late Eighties.  It was really a simple video with George wearing a leather jacket and tight jeans singing and shaking his ass in front of a jukebox, with a chick standing next to it. Plus at the beginning you get to hear his other song I Want Your Sex, plus an organ plays Freedom. IT didn’t have fancy editing other than the color, but that was easy.  It was enough to help make the song number 1 and the top selling single of 1988.

Well you are entitled to your own opinion of course, and George Michael had his, -and he resented to being a sex symbol and idolized so in his video for Freedom! ’90 he burns the jacket and pants and blows up the guitar and jukebox. That video kind of made me sad. But hey what can you do. 

4. Touch of Grey – Grateful Dead

I would love to tell you that I was into the dead forever, and realistically I was 5 when I first  saw this video, but I never looked into their back catalogue until I got older. But hey this apparently was their first video and their biggest commercial song of all time.  It was this song that would keep me going back for more.

Let me quickly state that if you have not given the Grateful Dead a proper listen I suggest you do. I don’t want to veer off subject here, but the band is the greatest Jam band of all time. (We can have this argument some time if you like)  It’s not even about the jamming, but the instrumentation that they use, the organs that just grind in your ears, Not one drummer but two. Playing drums percussion and making great noises, the deep bass that sometimes seems to be thumping at its own beat and the guitars, they go back and forth loud quiet melodic harmonizing. Oh and you want to talk about harmonizing check out their vocals. The group comes together for some of the greatest vocal harmonization that a group of white boys has ever done. (Fuck You ‘N Sync)

OK, back to Touch of Grey.

The video was so cool, it was in a concert setting; and frankly can you present the Dead in any other way? The video begins with the band being represented by marionettes, but these aren’t just any marionettes, these are skeletons. Halfway through a dog runs off with a leg. Then all of a sudden they become humans, in the end we find out that the humans are marionettes as well being controlled by skeletons.

I tell you what, this isn’t a video that many people refer to as one of the best, but this was one of the ones that I waited for on Saturday mornings.(while other kids watched cartoons I watched music videos, until my brother would wake up, beat me up and steal the remote). Something about this video was cool to me, maybe it was because my dad absolutely hated the Grateful Dead, and I just wanted to rebel, I don’t know, but I always loved it. Just check it man.

3. Take on Me -   A-ha

If you haven’t seen this video by now, then where the hell have you been? This video, actually lost Video of the year honors in 1986 to the previously mentioned Money for Nothing. But who are we kidding, MTV played this one more, and more people know this song in my opinion.

The video looks awesome; I don’t care if A-ha never amounted to anything.

Ok, so this chick reads a comic while at a diner, when the guy in the comic pulls her into it. Then the waitress at the diner thinks the girl has dined and ditched so she crumples the comic and throws it away. But the comic character is being chased by a man so he rips a hole in the book so the girl can escape and suddenly she is in the diner, so she grabs the comic out of the garbage and runs home, and actually does then dine and ditch.  

So now she is at home and the comic book character starts banging on the pages then suddenly he is in her hallway flailing back and forth until he becomes a human then all is well with the world.

It sounds crazy when you read it, but the video does look superb, maybe the song is garbage, I don’t know nor do I care because I love the song and the video is one of my favorites.

2. Once in a Lifetime - Talking Heads

I wasn’t even born when this video came out, but the first time I saw it, it was the coolest and craziest thing that I had ever seen.

If you haven’t listened to Talking Heads you really should. They were a great New Wave band and had tons of hits, plus if you ever heard one of those stupid Billy the Bass things, then you already know the song Take Me to the River (yes I know Al Green and a bunch of other people  did it first, but their version was the most popular)  They also had hits with And She Was and Burning Down the House.

But this video is crazy ok, David Byrne, who was their singer is the only member of the band in the video, and he is just singing and doing a crazy dance, sometimes in front of a weird screen and  whilst  a group of 4 clones dance behind him. Meanwhile Byrne just gets crazier and crazier and he starts sweating profusely.  I am almost positive that at some point during the video he has a seizure. Every now and then he is in a weird blue pool of sperm like stuff. At one point something squeezes his head. Then at the end there are just nice shots of him singing.

Makes less sense than A-ha’s video doesn’t it? But that is why I loved it, it was crazy and had no story and the dancing and mannerisms were so easy to imitate.

It’s crazy but every now and then I think that somehow my son Rivers has seen this video because it is exactly how he dances, but I am pretty sure I never made him watch the video, I think I will now though.

This video was hard to find on the internet and it may be gone by the time you read this. 

Talking Heads - Once In A Lifetime by hushhush112

1. Buddy Holly- Weezer

OK, I mentioned it yesterday and I mention them all the time, I know that it is very controversial and totally biased to put this video at number One, but that is why I had the long preface at the beginning to make sure you understood, that I determined the order of this list. For what it’s worth this video actually appears on a lot of great video lists.

This video was actually nominated for MTV’s video of the year in 1995 and won as Best Alternative Video , Best Direction, and a few more.  I feel like I am arguing a case for it, when really I shouldn’t have to, but I just want you to understand it was a great and highly respected video

I won’t get into what the video did for me, because I gush enough about weezer on this blog every other day.  So, how about a little info on the video instead?

This was directed by Spike Jonze who directed so many great videos back in the day.

  The band is shown at Arnold’s on the set of Happy Days and after Al introduces them they play their song. All of the Happy Days cast is there, hanging out and watching. Hell Fonzie does one hell of a dance. Richie likes it, and Joanie has a crush on Pat(the drummer). Chachi isn’t there so he didn’t mind. Pat also points at Fonzie and it’s cool as hell  Rivers makes eyes at Richie’s girl and that pisses him off so he runs to the bathroom, but comes back and enjoys it later  At one point Potsie clearly sings along, and later he and Ralph are obviously devastated that weezer is so damn good.  Then Fonzie leaves with the chicks, Al talks to the band and Matt(bassist) tells him the fish isn’t good.

Did I leave anything out?

Ok so, it really was an awesome video and the editing was impressive. Every now and then I see an episode of happy days and recognize a brief second and know that it’s from the video. Once I even saw the episode where Fonzie dances.  So really just check it out it was a beautiful video that changed my life.

So those are the videos that meant something to me. That’s my top ten. I know that my opinion totally goes against the grain of the world. Usually you would have seen Thriller and Sledgehammer and other 80’s videos that people gush over. But those were the ones that did it for me.  Thanks for reading.