METAL VIDEO

METAL VIDEO

Rick Johnson

Performance videos—can’t live with ’em, can’t return unused portion for refund!

At least, that’s what I always say. Well, not always. Sometimes I say, “They have no morality—they’re dead,” like the old lady in Zombies Of Mora Tau, or even, “How can a disaster happen to a disaster?” as my idol Col. Klink once queried.

Seriously, though, is this the backlash or what? In the olden days, when rock videos were as new as Rid-X, everybody complained there were too many metal vids consisting solely of the artists standing around onstage singin’ “Wooo” like they were figures to be found inside some specially-marked box. I mean, if it’s true that TV beams vamoose the planet and head on out of the solar system foreverlike, I’m worried what a superior alien civilization might think of our culture after catching those early 38 Special numbers.

Not that the wave of story vids that came along next was any more impressive. I never thought the day would come when I’d tire of watching beautiful models in scanty lingerie perform arcane, symbolic functions and bend over a lot. But cometh it did, and pretty soon I was fondly recalling the good ol’ days of straightforward singin’ and strummin.’ Not to mention the plethora (means mucho) of government and church groups that waxed swarm to protest that all the sex ’n’ violence on MTV was turning Our Nation’s Youth into mothersniffers and serial killers. Ha ha—serial shoppers is more like it.

So here we are, back in a cycle of performance vids like the new “Indians” clip from Anthrax. Some great music in there—the ’Thrax sound is so vibration-charged, you don’t really want to listen to it, you want to remove squashed bugs from your skyscrapers with it.

And some pretty wild visuals as well. The way the band jumps around, you’d think they all just bought Toyotas or something, and when the singer dons a huge feathered headdress for further inspired war dancing, the pix are at least as exciting as being charged with an aggravated misdemeanor for improper disposal of a body.

I get tired of all these stage shenanigans though, so thank goodness my heroes Motley Crue came up with the miscreant’s bedtime story, “Girls, Girls, Girls.” Any tune that kicks in with a salute to internal combustion is OK by me. and the band completes the picture by roaring up to a sleazy strip joint on big sputtering hawgs.

Ordinarily, I look forward to each new Crue video with the same gleeful anticipation I'd greet circumcision-reversal surgery. This one’s a beaut, however—packed solid with lots of distaff body parts flashed onscreen like so much boat parade coverage. Yup, the Motleys visit a stripteaser’s hoedown, proving once and for all the boys possess normal male plumbing and not just toll booths. The diverse personalities of the group are much evident; while Nikki crawls onto the stage with visions of baby shoes dancing in his lustcrazed begonias, cool guy Mick plays it smart by lounging around the girls’ dressing room, impressing them with his guitar moves. Kinda makes you wanna spray jigsaw puzzle conserver on the scene to preserve it for posterity. If you’re one of those that think all this flapping of bod reduces women to the level of two-slice toasters, all I can say is more jelly\

Please Wash Hands Before Returning To Work!

The best solution to the story-vs.-performance video controversy—which rages on like the eternal debate over the true originator of the catboxfiller industry—is the half ’n’ half approach of such outfits as TNT in their “10,000 Lovers (In One)” clip. True, the singer looks like what you’d expect to receive for redeeming your Plush Toy Certificate, but they beef things up by superimposing the squirming players over a screen of itty bitty go-go dancers undertaking bent gyrations of a sort normally reserved for the soybean pit at the Board Of Trade.

Good plot, too! A kid locked into a nowheresville serve-anddestroy mission behind the counter of a hotdog stand spots some yummy girls motoring by outside and immediately dives through a plate glass wall, the better to nuzzle their interior. When the boss objects, TNT appear, shove a loaded frank in his mouth and light the fuse. Talk about a dynamite wienie!

Y&T use a similar method in "Contagious.” This time, the story line’s your standard “dopey guy taking a luv goddess to the prom”—where he'll be set upon by bad boys who’ll use his face for the traditional spiking of the punch. Only guess who’s playing at the prom? All three million American’s who suffered head injuries last year? Close, but not quite—it’s Y&T, who, through some mysterious, indefinable activity possibly related to fomenting, cause everything to work out groovy. Incidentally, “Contagious” is a really catchy tune. I’d say it has a contagious riff except I already went and used Anthrax up at the front, thus ruining a nifty disease transition.

Trapped in a strange ’graph without a transition or a paddle, we grasp at “I Want Action,” the latest by Poison. Uh-oh, looks like another foodas-sex metaphor job, and me without my electric bib!

No big deal, “Action” doesn’t make a whole bunch of sense. We start out with the guys at a crummy restaurant (possibly Chez Chlime) where the ketchup bottle still has Joey Tempest’s fingerprints all over it. When they cut to the band playing on their personalized stage set, we’re ready ’cause we all caught “10,000 Lovers” a little bit ago. But then they cut back and the eatery has been replaced by a strip poker game attended by the musical ones themselves and—hey, awrite!—a flock of underdressed models! Lost us on that one, Mr. Director! Excuse me, madam, is this the pontoon brassiere department?

The fellas are cheating of course, packing mitts full of aces under the table and wicked grins over. C’mon Poison—we know you’ll never take your clothes off on TV until you graduate from the Liposuction Society! And besides, I’ve seen this exact same idea used in many a video through the years. The last one I remember was Ratt, and the first one I’m pretty sure was in one of those 38 Special eyeball tortures of the early '80s. Do enjoy the way they end it though, with snatty still pix and facsimile autographs of each individual Poison. Gee, which one’s Menudo?

Now that we’re finally seeing a swing away from the pure performance end of the vid spectrum, I’m glad we still have Judas Priest to treasure. Their show is in my own personal Big Three, right up there with Time Approximate After Baseball and Portions Mechanically Reproduced. The ’eos from their live LP are real concert clips, not overstaged, posed-to-death studies in cheap cinematography.

Hey, didja catch Rob H. when he hosted Headbangers’ Ball? The ol’ galoot’s looking pretty cool, especially since he picked up one of those new Hoffritz electric shavers with the high tech Stubble Device.

Best part came when Rob was reduced to six inches tall through video trickery for his interview with the Killer Dwarfs. Man, they could’ve stomped him like a stinkbug!

The boot heel droppeth not, however, and Halford was allowed to live long enough to introduce live video versions of “Another Thing Cornin’ ” and “Breaking The Law.” Some purt good rockin’ in there, despite a couple fashion blunders. Better give the peroxide bottle a rest K.K.—your hair’s starting to look like simulated exhaust fumes! And Robby Baby, just one last suggestion: instead of all that rancid leather, next time why not say it with lead?

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Incredibly Stupid Commercial Of The Month: The noose of suspicion drops around some top-notch candidates this time. Who’s the lucky winner? Is it Patricia Neal for her poignant, insurance-companysponsored revelations that nearness-to-death makes one appreciate “the smell of salt and air” and the “sand between your toes?” How about the smell of that sand between your toes, Pat? Or will Sprint take the prize with the silly claim their long distance service is “twice as quiet” as the competition’s? Is that anything like twice as pregnant or half as dead, concept fans? Don’t matter none, since we knew all along that this month’s big stupid is Richard Simmons and his fabulous “Deal-AMeal” diet cards. Bloat guru Simmons—the only man on television who can actually wring his hands using only his voice—reassures us calorie hoarders, “Look, I don’t care what else you’ve tried.”

Uh... you mean like heterosexuality, Dick?