Now, you may think that I’m making up a holiday but I’m not. National Freedom Day has been observed annually on February 1st ever since 1949. That’s because February 1st is also the anniversary of the day, in 1865, that Abraham Lincoln signed the joint Senate and House resolution calling for a 13th amendment, one that would abolish slavery. Lincoln did not live to see that amendment ratified on December 6th and officially adopted to the Constitution on December 18th of the same year.
So, in honor of National Freedom Day, here’s Ray Charles singing America The Beautiful on a 1972 episode of the Dick Cavett Show. Enjoy!
When I think back to 2005, it sometimes seems as if every single song released that year was about how difficult it was to be a rich former Disney star. I know that, technically, that’s just a trick of my memory and there was a wide variety of songs released that year. But, if you mention 2005 to me, my automatic reaction is going to be to start singing, “People talking …. talking about me …. they think they know me …. they don’t know me….” Again, that’s not from any specific song. It just seems that 2005 was the year when everyone was singing about people talking about them.
Then again, I might just be thinking about Hilary Duff’s Wake Up. Wake Up was promoted as showcasing a totally new sound for the former Lizzie McGuire. Of course, it really didn’t but I still like the song. It’s almost a guilty pleasure, to be honest. I know it’s not exactly a great song but it certainly gets stuck in your head and the lyrics are shallow enough that it’s easy to relate to them.
The video features Hilary going to parties around the world and having a good time. Basically, the video is shouting, “She’s not just Lizzie McGuire anymore!” The video was directed by Marc Webb, who later went on to direct the two Spider-Man films that nobody remembers. He also directed Gifted, which is a film that left me cold but which is loved by a lot of other people.
One fun thing to do with this video is to turn down Hilary’s vocals and replace them with Rebecca Black singing Friday. Seriously, it works!
When it starts you think it’s just going to be another suburban sprawl video, with the ennui-stricken kids and the empty swimming pools and the workaholic father and the pill-popping moms. And I’ve got nothing against existential dread but, when the video started, I wasn’t expecting this to be anything that I hadn’t seen before.
And then Ned showed up.
Ned is the little alien thing who is watching Tyler and Josh while they’re cleaning the pool. It’s really impossible not to love Ned. I mean, Ned is adorable! And the way that Ned comes out of hiding and then quickly ducks back into hiding reminds me of the way Doc acts whenever he’s playing with me or Erin. Of course, Doc doesn’t like water so he probably wouldn’t be near a pool. Doc’s thing is to get underneath the couch and then try to grab you whenever you walk by. I cannot begin to tell you how many times I’ve fallen asleep on the floor, just to wake up with Doc trying to pull my hair out of my head.
Anyway, Ned is obviously pretty picky about what type of water it’ll dive into and that’s probably a good thing. A friend of mine once swam in a pool that hadn’t been properly cleaned and her eyes were so bloodshot afterward that I basically had to stop being her friend until they cleared up. They were like seriously freaking me out.
I love the closing shot of this video. Ned and Tyler, hanging out in the swimming pool.
This is another of those videos that I like specifically because it’s totally surreal and how you interpret it will probably depend on what type of mood you’re in when you view it.
Is this video about being trapped?
Is this video about breaking free?
Is this video about the sad face starting at you from the wall?
Is it about longing or is it about being owned?
That’s up to you to decide. I just like the idea of everyone being stuck in a mentally-projected maze. Whenever I see a video that featured an overhead shot of a maze, I’m reminded of one of my favorite scenes from The Shining, the one where Jack stares down at a model of the Overlook’s famous hedge maze while Danny and Wendy wander through the real maze. Briefly, it appears as if Wendy and Danny are actually in the model. Who knows, maybe they are?
Mazes are a great metaphor for …. well, just about everything! There’s very little in life that can’t be represented by a maze. Of course, in The Shining, the maze represented not only Jack’s twisted mind but also the way that time inside the Overlook twists back in on itself.
By this point, everyone should know that I have a weakness for surreal music videos, especially when they’re in black-and-white and they involve an overhead shot of a maze. So, my selection of this video for music video of the day should come as a shock to no one.
I like this one. The eyes remind of Salvador Dali’s famed work on Hitchcock’s Spellbound. For that matter, they also remind me of Argento’s Four Flies on Grey Velvet. One of the plot points of Four Flies is that the identity of the killer has been preserved on the victim’s retina.
(Though that’s scientifically impossible, you might be surprised to learn that there’s quite a few people who believe that can actually happen. In fact, I was recently reading about a police interrogation in which the cops got a guy to confess by telling him that they had found his image preserved in his victim’s eyes.)
Of course, you really can’t talk about eyes in cinema without mentioning Lucio Fulci. One of Fulci’s trademarks was that almost every film featured either an eye getting popped out of a head or otherwise split in half. I have to admit that, after seeing Zombi 2, I am now incredibly protective of my eyes.
Today’s music video of the day is one of those video’s that I think works best if you imagine that everyone in it is dead and that the video itself is taking place in Purgatory.
It’s seriously not that outlandish an idea. There has to be some sort of entertainment in Purgatory and the bartender certainly appears to have seen his share of singers and drinkers.
Another possible option is that this video is taking place at the Overlook Hotel. Again, the ghostly atmosphere would seem to suggest that we’re in another world, one that probably running parallel to ours. It’s very easy to imagine Jack Torrance sitting at the bar, watching the singers and wondering why Grady keeps denying having been the caretaker.
And, of course, there’s always the chance that we’re visiting a section of the Black Lodge. Or maybe we’re at the Roadhouse again….
Well, regardless of where this atmospheric video is taking place, enjoy!
We’ve seen the future and wow, there’s a lot of trash.
Seriously, that’s the main thing that I’ve noticed about movies set in the future. No one ever picks up after themselves. You would think that we’d have robots cleaning and polishing every inch of the Earth but apparently, WALL-E was a lie.
Even with that in mind, though, I still cry every time that I watch WALL-E. Damn, that’s a good movie. It totally should have been nominated for Best Picture. Between that and not nominating Three Identical Strangersfor Best Documentary, I don’t know what’s wrong with the Academy….
Anyway, this song appears on the soundtrack of a movie and no, it’s not WALL-E. Instead, it’s from Alita: Battle Angel, which was written and produced by James Cameron and directed by Robert Rodriguez. The movie’s coming out this February and maybe it will replace the Valentine-shaped hole that’s been in our soul ever since the Fifty Shades trilogy came to an end.
Or maybe not. I just hope it’s good!
Anyway, the video is a party in a futuristic rubbish heap. I don’t suggest trying this in your own neighborhood landfill. Party clean, everyone.
This may not be one of Gwen’s more popular videos but I like it because, like her in this video, I’m usually up at 4 in the morning.
Of course, in the video, Gwen’s up at four in the morning and looking totally put together because she’s waiting for her lover to return. They’ve had a fight. He’s left her. And now, she can’t sleep. Not even going for a drive through the early morning darkness helps.
Myself, when I’m up at 4 in the morning, it’s mostly because I got wrapped up either reading or watching something and, for whatever reason, I lost track of time. Usually, around two, I always say, “I really should get some sleep …. but let’s see what’s on TCM!” If it turns out to be a classic film noir or an old horror movie, there’s no way I’m going to sleep.
Even worse is when I’m trying to turn off my TV but I accidentally click the button for Netflix instead and, before you know it, I’m watching old episodes of Degrassi: The Next Class. Then suddenly, I’ll realize that it’s not five in the morning and I’ve spent an hour yelling, “No, Maya! Zig’s no good for you!” at the TV. That’s happened more times than I want to admit.
Much like Gwen, I usually react to discovering that I’ve stayed up too late by walking around the house. Usually, I end up accidentally kicking a wall while barefoot or tripping over a stair. Once I wandered out in the backyard and somehow managed to lock myself out of the house. Of course, I was only wearing my beloved Pirates t-shirt and it was like 21 degrees outside so I quickly came to regret not getting to bed at two.
So, my point is, I like this video because I can relate to it. In fact, I’ll probably think about it a few hours from now, when I realize that it’s 4 a.m. and I’m still awake.
This video for Kill the Lights finds Britney Spears being — what else? — hounded by the paparazzi so she promptly flies off into space and goes to another planet. Unfortunately, it turns out that the entire universe is apparently obsessed with robbing Britney of her privacy.
This concept behind this video was the result of a fan fiction contest, in which people were asked to send their ideas to Britney’s management, via her website. The winner of the contest was a girl from Argentina, who titled her submission “Known Everywhere.” Believe it or not, I came very close to entering this contest myself. You have to remember that this was back in 2009, when I was in a much darker place than I am today. As such, my idea was for the video to be an homage to Lucio Fuci’s Zombi 2, with Britney going to a Caribbean island to investigate the death of Justin Timberlake and then getting bitten by a zombified Joey Fatone. My idea was that the video would end with zombie Britney eating Kevin Federline. Personally, I still think it’s a good idea but I never actually submitted it so I’ve got no one to blame for this video but myself.
Still, just imagine if I had submitted my idea and it had been accepted. (Seriously, I totally would have won if I had entered the contest.) Not only would Britney now being getting credit for the zombie revival but she’d probably also would have gone on to do any number of horror-themed music videos.
So, basically, I made a huge mistake by not submitting my idea and now the world is suffering.
Since today is Oscar nomination day, I decided that today’s music video of the day should be about Hollywood.
Or, at the very least, it should have Hollywood in the title.
This video presents us with a Hollywood that is the exact opposite of Hollywood glitz. It’s a Hollywood of cheap motels, too much makeup, and cigarette haze. However, it’s also a Hollywood where you can actually find a working VHS player and I guess there’s something to be said for that. This video is kind of depressing but kind of fun at the same time. I have a weakness for the film’s combination of trash and satire.
“Marilyn Monroe” makes an appearance, as she certainly should. When you’re reading about the Oscar nominations later today, just remember that Marilyn Monroe is both one of the most iconic Hollywood figures of all time and also someone who was never nominated for an Oscar.
(That said, she did appear in one of the greatest of the best picture winners, All About Eve.)
Through the Shattered Lens 