Today’s music video of the day features Natalie Merchant and 10,000 Maniacs covering Patti Smith’s Because The Night on MTV Unplugged in 1993. This is a good example of what MTV used to be, before it sold its musical soul and became the Rob Dyrdek channel.
Milton Lage, the director of the video, was also the director of Unplugged. He’s also done music videos for James Taylor, 98 Degrees, Bonnie Raitt, and others.
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Don’t Look Down was the first single off of Out of the Cradle, Lindsey Buckingham’s first solo album after leaving Fleetwood Mac for the first time. Buckingham’s tour to support the release of Out of the Cradle was also his first tour as a solo artist.
The accompanying music video takes a documentary approach, with clips of Buckingham and his band on tour. The main theme of the video seems to be that Lindsey was much happier touring with his own band and doing his own thing than having to deal with another round of drama with the members of Fleetwood Mac. Who can blame him?
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We Care A Lot, written as a parody of benefit concerts like Live Aid, was the first Faith No More Song to have an accompanying music video and it is also the band’s second-most popular song, right after Epic. What the bands cares a lot about depends on which version of the song that you hear as We Care A Lot is frequently re-written to keep the lyrics updated and topical. Over the years, Faith No More has cared a lot about Madonna, Mr. T, the LAPD, the money that Live Aid made, Transformers, and the Garbage Pail Kids.
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Today’s music video of the day is typical of the type of video that used to dominate MTV, the movie tie-in where clips of the artist performing were mixed with scenes from the film. The video for Colors goes further than many other film-related music videos by not only showing scenes from the film but also by projecting them on the brick wall behind Ice-T. The movie was a hit and, on MTV, so was the video.
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In 1988, long before Frank Sinatra started teaming up with pop artists and Tony Bennett had his brief moment of MTV popularity, Tom Jones and Art of Noise teamed up to cover Prince’s Kiss. The song was an unexpected success in Europe and Asia, hitting number one in both New Zealand and Spain while entering the Top Ten in many other countries. In the U.S., it peaked at #14 on the Billboard Top 100.
Of the two co-directors, Stephen Lowe also did videos for Duran Duran and Lisa Stansfield. Martin Brierly has worked as cinematographer and a second unit director on several projects, including the third Alien film.
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Today’s music video of the day was written for Martin Scorsese’s The Color of Money. The video mixes clips of Clapton performing the song with scenes taken from the film. This use to be a very popular format on MTV, back when MTV played videos and every movie was advertised with a music video.
Director Oley Sassone is perhaps best-known for directing the never released 1996 Fantastic Four for Roger Corman.
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Michelle Pfeiffer not only starred in Dangerous Minds but she also appeared in the subsequent music video for Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise. It looks like she found an even worse school than the one from the movie. How many schools have people lifting weights in the middle of the hallways?
For a while, in 1995, this song was everywhere. It never recovered from being parodied as Amish Paradise. Director Antoine Fuqua has gone on to have a notable career as feature film director.
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Today’s music video of the day comes from the two less annoying members of U2, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen. Their re-interpretation of the Mission: Impossible theme was recorded for the first film in the series, bringing the franchise into the 90s. I am old enough that I can remember when the first Mission: Impossible film was released. I don’t think anyone expected the series to become what it currently is.
This video was directed by Kevin Godley, who has also worked with Fine Young Cannibals, Bryan Adams, Blur, and Hozier.
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Today, as Beck celebrates his 53rd birthday, we celebrate his video for Where It’s At. Directed by Steven Hanft, this video shows the many sides of Beck. He’s a rebel picking up trash for community service. He’s a country line dancer. He’s a robot that bears a resemblance to MST 3K’s Tom Servo. And finally, he’s William Shatner performing at the Saturn Awards.
Director Steve Hanft has also worked with the Cure, Primal Scream, and Delinquent Habits. Before this video, he directed the video for Loser, which introduced Beck to the world.
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Today, we we wish a happy birthday to everyone’s favorite Beatle, Ringo Starr.
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Through the Shattered Lens 