6. Guns N' Roses, "Patience"
Guns N' Roses had already grown weary of its new superstar status when the video for "Patience" was made in 1989. The fame-hungry glam hustlers of Appetite For Destruction were now spending most of their time looking unimpressed by the smokin' hot talent they were able to pull. GNR's ennui is best illustrated in the "Patience," via the way Slash handles his pet boa Pandora while several scantily clad groupies magically appear and disappear from his hotel bed. For Slash, handling a snake isn't merely phallic; it symbolizes his very essence. Nothing—not fame, women, even his band mates—will get between him and his boa. Which is why, obviously, Slash named his GNR side project "Slash's Snakepit."
7. Faith No More, "Epic"
At a time when hair metal and glossy dance pop dominated MTV, Faith No More's "Epic" stood out in 1990 for its adventurous musical and visual sense. The song itself was a classic single that pioneered a hybrid of rap, punk, and metal that unintentionally inspired some of the shittiest bands known to man later in the decade, but the "Epic" video is best remembered for the slow-motion footage of a flopping fish laid over the song's pretty, piano-tinkling coda. Like the song, the fish has no meaning beyond its visceral effect, which is both oddly beautiful and incredibly creepy. As for animal-rights concerns, well, at least the fish was immortalized in a way his breaded and fried brethren never were.
8. Michael Jackson, "Black Or White"
There are lots of animals in Michael Jackson's rock version of It's A Small World—the lions being hunted by the African tribesmen/backup dancers, the horses ridden by the Native American warriors/backup dancers, George Wendt—but nothing in the video captures the song's latent primal rage quite like the panther in the last two (notoriously banned) minutes. Via the exciting new "morphing" technology that was such a big hit in the early '90s, a panther prowling the alley outside the studio suddenly changes into Jackson, who does a few Moonwalker moves—scaring a stray cat with his pelvic thrusts—before taking out his frustrations over being neither black or white on an innocent parked car. Having sufficiently expressed himself, Jackson turns back into a panther and runs off into the night, solving the problem of racism forever.
9. Paula Abdul, "Opposites Attract"
Long before she became the queen of suspicious non sequiturs on American Idol, Paula Abdul was a bona fide MTV sex symbol. No doubt many a boy was ushered into puberty with the help of the David Fincher-directed video for "Cold Hearted," but when it comes to her legacy, Abdul will be forever the girl that danced with an animated cat for "Opposites Attract." MC Skat Kat—who likes the movies, while Abdul likes TV—isn't real, of course; he's actually voiced by three different rappers, including The Wild Pair and Derrick Stevens. Nevertheless, the clip proved so popular that the character was given his own solo album, 1991's The Adventures Of MC Skat Kat And The Stray Mob, proving that starfucking pays off, even when you're a cartoon.
« Previous | 1 | 2
- Comments