Author Archives: Jedadiah Leland

Congratulations To The Super Bowl Champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers!

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

The Super Bowl just ended and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have won their 2nd Super Bowl!  Tom Brady has won his seventh.  Though the Chiefs scored first with a field goal, there was never really any doubt as to who was going to win the Lombardi Trophy.  As soon as I saw Tom Brady’s face after the Chiefs got those three points, I knew he was going to be unstoppable.

The final score was 31 to 9.  Though the Chiefs may have fallen short, Patrick Mahomes showed that he is the quarterback of the future.  He’s scary good.  He may not have won tonight but he’ll definitely get another chance to win his second super bowl.

For now, though, the Buccaneers are your Super Bowl champions and Tom Brady has added another chapter to an already amazing career.  Congratulations, Tampa Bay!

My Super Bowl Predictions

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Since the game is just a few hours away, I guess I should make my prediction as to who is going to win the Super Bowl.

This is exactly the type of Super Bowl that I’ve always wanted to see.  Tom Brady is the best quarterback of his generation and probably the best quarterback of all time.  Patrick Mahomes is the best quarterback of the next generation.  This season, Brady proved that he can lead more than one team to the Super Bowl.  Mahomes seems like he has the same type of talent.  This is the best vs. the best.

I think the Buccaneers are going to win.  I think the Chiefs are going to give them a good game.  It’s not going to be easy for either team.  But I think Tampa Bay is going to win in the end.  The Buccaneers are playing at home, which is going to be a huge advantage.  And I just have an unquestioning faith in the ability of Tom Brady to win Super Bowls.  I know that’s not a very scientific analysis but Tom Brady has a talent that sometimes seems to defy everything that we’ve been led to assume about football.  Tom Brady went from being nearly undrafted to winning 6 Super Bowls.  At an age when most football players have already retired, Brady is still playing like a man in his early 30s.  The rest of the team is going to have to do their part but I still see Tom Brady and the Buccaneers winning this game.

Final prediction:

Buccaneers — 24

Chiefs — 21

The game will be won by a last minute field goal that Tom Brady will probably volunteer to kick himself.  Having won his 7th Super Bowl and led two separate teams to victory, Tom Brady will then win a Nobel Peace Prize and write a memoir that will be turned into an Oscar-winning film.  Brady will then be elected governor of whatever state he decides to run in.  Eventually, President Tom Brady will bring about world peace along with ending climate change and personally overseeing the first manned mission to Mars.  After you win seven Super Bowls, there’s nothing you can’t do.

If the Buccaneers somehow lose, it will mean the winter is coming.

Enjoy the game!

Music Video of the Day: Hold The Line by Toto (1978, directed by Michael Collins)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

I used to think that this song was called Borderline.  I thought the chorus was “Borderline!  Love isn’t always unkind!”  Of course, the song actually goes, “Hold the line!  Love isn’t always on time!,” which makes more sense.

When this song was recorded, “Hold the line” meant to stay in place.  In this case, the lyrics were directed at a girl who was waiting for the lead singer to commit.  Back in the days of landline phones, it was also something that you said to someone before putting them on hold so you could take another call.  This song became Toto’s first hits and remains one of the band’s signature songs.  When guitarist Steve Lukather finally disbanded Toto in 2009, he said it was because he no longer felt that he could continue to sing Hold the Line with a straight face.

Even before MTV actually became a thing, Toto was doing music videos.  Their video for Hold the Line is a simple performance piece.  It may not have cost much money but it still helped to bring the song to an audience that might have otherwise missed it.

Enjoy!

Music Video of the Day: Can’t Get Enuff by Winger (1991, directed by Michael Bay)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Winger’s the worst but this video for Can’t Get Enuff is interesting just because it was directed by Michael Bay, before he started his feature film career.

Everything about this video identifies it as being a Michael Bay production.  It takes place on a hot day and it features a lot of sexy people finding ways to deal with the heat.  The camera lingers on the sun, the bodies, and the city.  It looks great even if it’s hard to imagine that any of the people in the video would actually be listening to Winger.  The video was so popular that, even though Winger’s style of music was being overshadowed by newcomers like Nirvana, Can’t Get Enuff was still a hit for the band.  Of course, just two years later, Beavis and Butthead premiered on MTV and viewers met Stewart, the loser wearing a Winger t-shirt.  Whatever chance Winger had ever being considered cool in even a retro fashion pretty much ended as soon as Stewart said, “Hey, guys.”

Enjoy!

Music Video of the Day: Guilty of Love by Whitesnake (1983, directed by Lindsey Clennell)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

David Coverdale is guilty of love!  I’m not sure how you can be guilty of something that isn’t a crime or even a bad thing but I’m sure David Coverdale could find a way.

Sorry, Tawny Kitaen is not in this video.  Instead, it’s just clips taken from a series of different Whitesnake shows.  A good deal of this video was filmed during a Monsters of Rock show.

This song was the first single to be released off of their sixth studio album, Slide It In.  One thing that no one will ever accuse Whitesnake of being is subtle.

It’s rocking song, though.

Enjoy!

Music Video Of the Day: Gone Daddy Gone by Violent Femmes (1983, directed by Doug Martin and Steve Martin)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

I will be the first to admit that I was hoping that it would turn out that this video was directed by that Steve Martin.  But no, the directors of this video were twin brothers Douglas Brian Martin and Steven M. Martin.  Along with a few acting appearances (they played “angry twins” in Fast Times At Ridgemont High), Steve Martin is credited with directed the documentary Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey in 1993.

According to the imdb, Doug Martin ” (d)irected the following music videos: “Murder, Mystery & Mayhem (1981)” for Peter Ivers “No Smoking (1982)” for John Waters “Shock Value (1982)” for John Waters “I Predict (1982)” for Sparks “Get Up And Go (1982)” for The Go-Go’s “Gone Daddy Gone (1983)” for Violent Femmes “Barefoot Rock (1983)” for The Blasters “One Red Rose (1983)” for The Blasters “The Cutting Edge (1983)” for MTV “Christian Girls Problems (1983)” for The Gleaming Spires “Head Over Heels (1983)” for The Go-Go’s “Sound Of The Rain (1984)” for Rank & File “Livin’ A Little, Laughin’ A Little (1985)” for John Hiatt/Elvis Costello “When Angels Kiss (1985)” for Gary Myrick “Stick Around (1985)” for Julian Lennon “Lips To Find You (1986)” for Teena Marie “Situation #9 (1986)” for Club Nouveau.”

This song features not one but two xylophone solos.

Enjoy!

Music Video of the Day: Guns for Hire by AC/DC (1983, directed by Paul Becher)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

One thing that you could always count on with AC/DC is that their music videos would be direct and to the point.  While other bands tried to come up with elaborate storylines or gimmicks for their videos, AC/DC was content to just rock.

Guns For Hire was the first single and video to be released off of their 1983 album, Flick of the Switch.  While the band was touring to support the album, Guns for Hire was the song that they opened with.  It’s also a song that they apparently stopped playing after the tour ended.  Though Flick of the Switch has its fans (and has been the subject of much positive reappraisal in recent years), it was a commercial disappointment when it was first released.  It was also during the recording of Flick of the Switch that drummer Phil Rudd left the band for the first time.  Malcolm Young later described the album as being a disappointment, saying that it was “thrown together real quick.”  Personally, I think Guns for Hire is a perfectly good AC/DC song but it’s understandable why the band may not have wanted to revisited the turmoil that was going on when it was recorded.

Because Phil Rudd either left the band or was fired during the recording of Flick of the Switch (it depends on who you ask), Guns For Hire was the first AC/DC music video to feature Simon Wright on drums.  Wright stayed with the band until 1989, when he left to join Dio.  He was replaced by Chris Slade, who was subsequently replaced in 1993 by …. Phil Rudd.  Time is a flat circle.

This video was directed by Paul Becher, who directed two other videos for AC/DC and one for Prince.

Enjoy!

 

Music Video of the Day: Celebrate Youth by Rick Springfield (1985, directed by David Fincher)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

When I first read the blandly generic title and I saw that it was performed by Rick Springfield (who I don’t think has ever ben anyone’s idea of a cutting edge musical artist), I assumed that Celebrate Youth was going to be another cheesy, feel good anthem from the 80s.  Then I discovered that this song rocks!

As you could probably guess just by its visual style, this was one of the many music videos that David Fincher directed before moving onto feature films.  The black-and-white cinematography with the only splash of color coming from that red scarf clearly identifies this as one of Fincher’s videos.  The interesting thing about Fincher’s music videos is that they show that, even before he directed his first film, Fincher already had a clear and unique artistic vision.  Just as you would never mistake any of Fincher’s films for the work of another director, the same is true of his music videos.

Enjoy!

Music Video of the Day: Rock the Night by Europe (1987, directed by Nick Morris)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

If you were a member of the band Europe in 1987, you were all about rocking the night!

And what better way to rock the night than by going to the Hard Rock Cafe and watching one of your own music videos on television?

There were actually two videos filmed for this song.  The first one was a simple performance clip, featuring Europe rocking and the audience rolling.  The second and more popular video features Europe going to a Hard Rock Café and discovering that the first video is playing on TV!  This, of course, leads to the band rocking and rolling in the restaurant.  In the 80s, a hair band rocking a chain restaurant was as common a sight as a flapper doing the Lindy Hop in the 20s.

This video was filmed at an actual Hard Rock Café in Stockholm.  The first Hard Rock Café was opened in London in 1971 and the company really didn’t start to expand worldwide until 1982, five years before this video was filmed.  At the time of the video, the Hard Rock Cafe brand was still very cool and a pretty big deal.  (Yes, those shirts used to really stand for something.)  When the Stockholm Hard Rock Café first opened in 1985, it was only the chain’s seventh location.  (Today, by comparison, there are 180 operating Hard Rock Cafes.)  The Stockholm restaurant is currently still open but I don’t know if Europe still hangs out there.

This video was directed by Nick Morris, who also did the videos for both The Final Countdown and Carrie.

Enjoy!

 

Music Video of the Day: Come Sail Away by Styx (1977, directed by ????)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Leave it to Styx to take a seemingly straight-forward song about sailing away from life’s trouble and suddenly end it with an alien visitation.  Actually, I’ve read multiple interpretations of the film’s final verses.  Some see it as the subject of the song being abducted by aliens.  Others think that it means that he’s been taken into Heaven.  Because it’s a Styx song, the lyrics are open to many readings as long as you accept that it’s either angels or aliens.

Considering all of the debate that’s been inspired by this song, the music video is a pretty simple affair.  Like the majority of the videos that were released in the days before MTV, it’s a simple performance clip.  If you were hoping to see either aliens or angels in this video, you’ll be disappointed.  It’s good song, though.  It’s impossible not to get that chorus stuck in your head.

Enjoy!