I am not going to pretend I know much about Liz Phair. She’s one of those 90s artists that largely flew under my radar. I remember hearing briefly about Exile In Guyville and how it was a response to The Rolling Stones’ album Exile On Main Street, but I’m pretty sure I never picked up any of her stuff till the early-to-mid-2000s. If I had to describe her, then I would say to imagine Sheryl Crow if she were more indie and had more punch to her lyrics. A good example of this, that I actually own, is the song Polyester Bride. By the time this song came around she was moving more towards a soft-rock sound that you would get from Crow. In fact, Phair provided background vocals on Crow’s Soak Up The Sun, which is when I lost interest in Sheryl Crow.

People didn’t take kindly to this trend in Phair’s music because of course they didn’t. She was hardly the only one to go down this path in the 90s. Goo Goo Dolls used to be a band inspired by Hüsker Dü before becoming one of the most pop-friendly bands of the late-90s after the success of the song Name. I remember stories about Dave Matthews Band early-on letting their fans plug recording devices directly into the soundboard at their concerts. Barenaked Ladies also changed with times. The list goes on and on. Phair isn’t special in this area.

Why did I pick out this particular Liz Phair music video? I wanted to feature a Liz Phair music video and it was the first one that popped up when I did a search on YouTube. That’s really it. Luckily, it turned out to be an interesting one. It’s like Limp Bizkit’s My Way and Taylor Swift’s Shake It Off. It plays with cliches. In this case, it mainly sticks to album covers, but it also has one of my favorite music video cliches: The White Dimension. This has been a thing in music videos since at least the mid-70s. You can see it in Waterloo by ABBA back in 1974 to Guerilla Radio by Rage Against The Machine in 1999. System Of A Down did it 2002 with Toxicity. The Mighty Mighty Bosstones did it back in 1997 for The Impression That I Get. Even Taylor Swift’s Shake It Off from 2014 did it.

I know why it started. Early promo videos often stuck a simple backdrop behind the group and had them perform in front of it. ABBA did this several times in the 1970s. I assume it is something a director does when they want to clear the screen of any other distractions except the artist. It seemed to be a popular thing around the time of this video.

I could be reading more into it then there is, but the jukebox at the start does appear to pick out the number 67, which would coincide with Phair’s birthdate in 1967. That would also match the album being self-titled in much the same way as Sheryl Crow did with her second debut album. This is probably one of the reasons she received extra backlash on this song since she seemed to be indicating it was a reboot of her career, yet it was produced by the same people (The Matrix) who did songs for Avril Lavigne, Britney Spears, and Hilary Duff. It’s not exactly the adult material people were used to getting from Phair.

While Phair herself directed some of her early music videos, they went with veteran music video director Phil Harder for Why Can’t I? He is still working today with around 150+ music videos to his name.

Veteran music video cinematographer Thomas (Tom) Marvel, who appears to be about 10 music videos from hitting 100, shot it. If there isn’t a society for prolific cinematographers you have never heard of because they mostly shoot music videos, then Daniel Pearl and Thomas Marvel need to found one. If The Sons of Lee Marvin society exists, then certainly this can be a thing.

JoLynn Garnes was the editor. Her credits are a bit more spotty, but she has dabbled in several areas of music video production. She sticks mainly to editing. She appears to be still working as an editor today.

Enjoy!