Yesterday, I shared the first video for Opportunities.
Today. I’m sharing the second version. The second version was released after the song itself was remixed and re-recorded. This is the version that subsequently became a hit for the Pet Shop Boys. This is the version that is currently being unironically used by Allstate in their commercials.
(As much as I complain about this song being used by Allstate, it did lead to both Opportunities and West End Girls reentering the charts.)
The director of this video is the Polish artist and filmmaker, Zbigniew Rybczyński. Before directing this video, he won the 1982 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film for Tango.
First off, a big thank you to Lisa for covering the past few days!
“It’s a simple message isn’t it? ‘I’ve got the brains, you’ve got the looks, let’s make lots of money.’ A very insensitive thing that was meant to be a satire of Thatcherism. Actually, we’d written the Thatcherite anthem. But it’s very difficult to think, now, that there was a period before money culture. That was the changing moment. It wasn’t even an original thing to say because it was at the same time as Loadsamoney, Harry Enfield. It was that period where suddenly one’s sensitive left-wing soul was shocked by everything being about money. Now, of course, generations have grown that haven’t known anything else.”
— Neil Tennant
It’s amazing how things can get misinterpreted. I remember when I was a kid, Mercedes used Janis Joplin singing, “Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz” in their commercials. It used to drive my father crazy because the whole point of the song was that a Mercedes wasn’t a big deal and it was foolish to act like the car you drove had anything to do with your worth as a human being.
Right now, the song in today’s music video of the day is being used in an Allstate Commercial! Of course, in the commercial, all you hear is “Let’s make lots of money!” The commercial doesn’t include any of the lyrics that indicate that the singer is basically looking for someone who is dumb but good-looking so that he can be exploited.
There were two music videos for this song. This is the first one and it leaves no doubt what the point of the song actually is.
You run and you run and you run and where do you end up? You just end up still running. This video appeals to my existential side, which is probably why I like it so much. The whole grainy retro feel, combined with the run through the universe makes this entire video feel like sort of existential daydream. Keep running because who knows where you’ll eventually end up.
When I first saw this, I have to admit that I misread the title as being “You got in my way” and, since I suck at understanding lyrics, I assumed that this song was about a hit-and-run accident or something like that. Like maybe Ali was explaining that it was unfortunate that she ran you over but she was driving home at four in the morning and she was a little distracted and then you just happened to step off the curb. Seriously — what were you thinking!?
Actually, though, this is song is abut Ali singing about a boy who seems to be perfect but who still kind of cramps her style. She’s got the stability of a relationship but sometimes, that stability gets in the way of her just doing what she wants to do. Is she sacrificing her freedom? It’s a legitimate question and one to which I think any former or current wild child can relate.
Hi, everyone! I’m in charge of “music video of the day” for this week so let’s get things started with this trippy little video from Laurence-Anne.
Basically, you remember those big bulky computers that everyone used to have? Well, judging from this video, it’s a pretty good thing that we got rid of the because they’ll cause you to sucked into a maze and then melt away. Seriously, everyone …. melting is just not worth it. While I personally don’t know anyone who has melted, I imagine that it would be a pretty difficult thing to come back from. You melt and you can pretty much say goodbye to whatever future plans you may have had.
“Lou decided to get Godley and Creme to do the video for ‘Video Violence’ with these robots. Then the label decided to change single, but Lou didn’t want to waste the robots, so you had this great clever pop song with a video of this robot tearing its own face off… MTV debuted it, and then we got a call saying people were complaining that their video was making kids cry.”
— Lou Reed’s bassist Fernando Saunders on the music video for No Money Down
That pretty much says it all. How many young viewers were traumatized by the discovery that Lou Reed was a terminator? I can’t imagine that the man between Metal Machine Music minded too much.
Winner Takes It All was written for the classic Sylvester Stallone arm-wrestling film, Over The Top. It was originally recorded by the lead singer of Asia but the film’s producers felt that his version wasn’t tough enough for a Stallone film so they instead offered it to Hagar. Hagar’s version is the one that appeared on the soundtrack. Eddie Van Halen plays bass on the track.
Hagar has said that he didn’t care much for the song but he did enjoy getting to arm wrestle Sylvester Stallone while filming the music video. At the end of the shooting, Stallone and Hagar both signed the black cap that Stallone was wearing and the cap was later auctioned off for $10,000. All of the money went to charity.
What is Dumb Waiters about? The song mentions nothing about waiters, dumb or otherwise. Nor does it appear to be about the elevator that some restaurants and hotels use to transport food from one room to another. Check out the lyrics for yourself:
Give me all your paper ma Gimme all your jazz Give me something that I need Something I can have Mrs. London’s coming round She’s coming with her son Gimme all your paper ah So I can get a gun She has got it in for me Yeah I mean it honestly She’s so mean Give me all your paper ma So I can buy a train They just want to suck you in To being one of them Tell her that I’m not in here Tell her I’m a freak Tell her that I fall about Every time I speak She has got in for me Yeah I mean it honestly I just scream Give me all your paper ma So I can buy a train I don’t know how I got in here It’s making me insane Have another cigarette And have another cigarette In a room where lovers go Talking on the telephone They have go it in for me Yeah I mean it honestly They all dream
According to guitarist John Ashton, the lyrics were meant to be surreal. As he told Songfacts, “I think they tend to make people use their imaginations really. The way we never play a song the same. It never means quite the same. I guess people relate to it any way, make something out of it themselves.”
The song reached #59 on the UK chart while doing slightly better in the U.S., peaking at #25.
Through the Shattered Lens