To my knowledge, this is the last Toto Coelo video out there. I can’t imagine why this song didn’t do as well as I Eat Cannibals and Milk From The Coconut. Some of these lyrics are priceless:
‘Cause your castle is a nightmare
You’ve got batty friends who live there
Oh please, just squeeze
I go insane don’t tap my windowpane
……
Got to get my teeth in you
Necking is the thing to do
Even though they never know it
Positive or not
You and I coagulate
Vitalize a dying rate
Vladimir my dear
You know I’m after every drop
Get into a different vein
R.I.P is all the same
I was bitten now I’m trying
Transylvania
You’re the coffin I’m the key
We tune up in harmony
I’ll do anything for you
Except for mania
Then you have the video. I love this video. There’s something goofy in almost every shot.
They also make sure to pound it into your head that the song has something to do with sex. It’s a little difficult to miss that when you watch the video.
The dance isn’t the best part, but it’s pretty great. You can find numerous videos of people doing their own dance to the song:
They even performed this live for the German TV Show WWF Club:
Something tells me this song is what people think the Twilight films are until they’re unfortunate enough to sit through them.
If I have to break out a music video by Toto Coelo, then it’s a pretty safe bet that I don’t feel well, or have had a long day. Today is an example of both.
I don’t have a lot of guilty pleasures in the realm of music. I will usually defend just about anything that I enjoy. A good example of that is Debbie Gibson. Still, if I had to list one band that could qualify, then it would be Toto Coelo (or Total Coelo as they were renamed to in the US). I’m guessing they renamed the band in America so as not to confuse people into thinking they had something to do with the band Toto.
This seems to have been their only hit song. But they did a couple of music videos for other fun songs like Milk From The Coconut, which was supposed to be in the unfinished sequel to Grizzly that had them in it. They also did one called Dracula’s Tango (Sucker For Your Love). They’re all stupid, but fun. Just like this music video. I’m pretty sure Milk From The Coconut was supposed to be taken seriously. However, it’s tough to do so after you’ve seen them sing it on the stage in Grizzly II.
How do I describe the video for Milk From The Coconut? Oh, yeah. It’s easy. It’s a less serious, danceable version of Voices Carry by ‘Til Tuesday.
We have the uncomfortable dinner scene.
Voices Carry by ‘Til Tuesday (1984)
We have the scene where he is less than subtle about judging her because of the way she looks.
Voices Carry by ‘Til Tuesday (1984)
The scene where we see her trying to conform to some sort of ideal image.
Voices Carry by ‘Til Tuesday (1984)
We also get an ending that has the band going back behind the images of themselves that they broke out of at the beginning. In Voices Carry, we get the image of her trapped behind a translucent material that barely lets us see her. She doesn’t break free till the ending at the opera house.
Voices Carry by ‘Til Tuesday (1984)
Where Milk From The Coconut makes up for the absence of seeing the abuse boyfriend, is with these shots.
What happened here? Is that meant to imply that she was sexually assaulted as child? I would assume it’s just a loss of innocence from age, but not in conjunction with other images in this video.
The big difference between the two videos is that you can take Voices Carry seriously. This comes across as sad when you try to pay attention to it. Of course it’s difficult to do so when it’s brought to you by the same group that did I Eat Cannibals. And is still performed the way it is, with things that couch the impact of the lyrics and certain parts of the video.
It’s still one of my favorite songs that they did, and I appreciate them appearing to trying do something less frothy.
I don’t have a lot of guilty pleasures in the realm of music. I will usually defend just about anything that I enjoy. A good example of that is Debbie Gibson. Still, if I had to list one band that could qualify, then it would be Toto Coelo (or Total Coelo as they were renamed to in the US). I’m guessing they renamed the band in America so as not to confuse people into thinking they had something to do with the band Toto.
This seems to have been their only hit song. But they did a couple of music videos for other fun songs like Milk From The Coconut, which was supposed to be in the unfinished sequel to Grizzly that had them in it. They also did one called Dracula’s Tango (Sucker For Your Love). They’re all stupid, but fun. Just like this music video. I’m pretty sure Milk From The Coconut was supposed to be taken seriously. However, it’s tough to do so after you’ve seen them sing it on the stage in Grizzly II.
I’m guessing leather-clad Toto Coelo are the evil ones.
Whereas the multi-colored ones are meant to lure you in. I’m not sure why she pokes a balloon and it turns into an apple.
I wonder whether she was reading her lines off-camera or if there was something going on during shooting.
My favorite part of the video has to be the cannibal dance.
Mike Brady directed the video. He seems to have made about 80 videos from the beginning of the 80s through the 90s.
Jon Roseman produced the video. He worked as a producer, writer, and director on numerous music videos. From what I can find on sites other than mvdbase, he was a pioneer in music videos during the 1970s and 1980s. He even wrote an autobiography called From Here to … Obscurity. You can read some things he had to say about well-known music videos he was involved with over at Financial Times. You can find articles with him and other music video notables in Billboard magazine from the early 80s. There’s a quote from producer Paul Flattery in the book I Want My MTV that isn’t exactly kind about Roseman. I won’t repeat it.
Through the Shattered Lens 