Back to Kevin Seal, who looks into the camera seriously, apparently channeling Dan Rather, and says, “’88 was a really heavy year for a lot of us, including Glenn Frey.” Seal then cracks a smile and snarks about Frey for a little while, egregiously dropping the G in the title of his latest album, Soul Searchin’, and referring to his physique as “Body by Jake.” I didn’t remember the VJs being allowed to mock the artists the channel played so egregiously.

They cut to an interview clip of Frey himself, and it’s so much more ludicrous than anything Kevin Seal could say. Frey talks about the video we’re about to see: “It serves as a metaphor for what I’m sort of setting out to do this year.” Save the planet? Stockpile a lifetime supply of mousse? Eat Don Henley’s liver? “Which is, get new people turned on to soul music.” Oh. Well, since there’s an MTV camera crew here, this seems like a good opportunity to tell the viewers about the giants of soul music, maybe get some 14-year-old kid who’s never heard of Al Green to pick up The Belle Album. “Now we’re kind of doing that, I think people like Stevie Winwood, and Huey Lewis, myself hopefully, we’re doing a new kind of soul music.”

You heard him right–Frey aspires to join the hallowed ranks of Steve Winwood and Huey Lewis.

The video itself is somewhat anticlimactic after that (plus when Frey referred to “a new kind of soul music,” he apparently meant the really bad kind). The clip is indeed a metaphor for turning people on to soul music, meaning that it shows three young white people with expensive haircuts venturing into a bar largely inhabited by black people.

This is one of those typical juke joints: you know, a largely black audience dancing underneath a string of bare light bulbs while a hulking white guy in a plaid jacket belts out a midtempo ballad, backed up by a multiracial band sporting porkpie hats and dark sunglasses. The crowd seems enthusiastic, even during the part of the song that recycles the saxophone solo from “You Belong to the City.”

We track the progress of our pale-skinned visitors: two guys and a girl. The girl has long blonde hair. She stands about two feet away from Frey and gazes up at him worshipfully while he sings. Sometimes she gets a closeup with dramatic lighting. For the song’s coda, Frey pulls her up onstage, puts an arm around her shoulder, and sings the fade-out to her. I suspect that she is his real-life wife, or maybe his daughter.

We lose track of one of the white guys–early on, we see him staring jealously at the smitten white girl, and then he seems to disappear until the end of the video, when he’s passed out on the bar. The other white guy goes to the bar and tries to get the attention of an attractive young black woman. Gradually, he succeeds and they share a drink.

The video ends with the white girl driving her car home through a dusty back road, with her two male friends passed out in the front seat. The soul-music metaphor seems to have fallen apart a bit as the video progressed–is the takeaway that if you listen to soul music, you’ll hang out with cool dancers and get drunk? Is it that you might score with a black chick? The predominant message, really, seems to be that the mighty charisma of Glenn Frey can not be restrained by any musical genre, so if you value your relationship with your girlfriend, do not under any circumstances bring her within fifty yards of Mr. Frey.

“True Love” hit #13 on the Billboard charts, the last solo single of Frey ever to hit the top 40. (Who says there’s no such thing as progress?) You can see the video here.

posted 29 May 2008 in 1988. 7 comments

Deluxe magazine was a very fine but short-lived men’s magazine in the UK, circa 1998. I knew its editor, Andrew Harrison, because he had been my successor as music editor at Details. (He provided many amusing moments in the office, including his British bafflement at the Offspring: “What is this ‘self-esteem’? I’ve never heard of it!”) Returning to London, he started a men’s magazine, reasoning that there was room in the market for a smart magazine not as reliant on little-known-but-half-dressed cover girls as FHM or Maxim. As Andrew puts it in his online bio, this “seemed like a good idea at the time but clearly wasn’t.”

The Deluxe cover subjects: Jarvis Cocker (Pulp), Ardal O’Hanlon (Father Ted), Scary Spice, David Duchovny, Matt LeBlanc, Kate Beckinsale, Michael Owen (soccer), and Davinia Murphy (British soap opera Hollyoaks). All notable figures in UK pop culture (except for Murphy, who was notable mostly for being willing to pose in a sheet on the cover, and hence was a sign that the Deluxe master plan was not working out as hoped for).

I wrote two pieces for the magazine the year I lived in London, mostly because I enjoyed having lunch with Andrew. The first one was an essay about being an American going to his first soccer game (or as they insisted on calling it, football match). The second one was a history of ear mutilation, which for some inscrutable reason, had caught my fancy. If I was updating the piece today, I’d have to include The Big Lebowski, which includes a scene where Walter (John Goodman) bites off the ear of one of the nihilists who is pursuing The Dude (Jeff Bridges).

A few years back, I visited Flea’s house. He had a few scripts scattered on a table; he got offered movies on a fairly regular basis, and turned most of them down so as not to distract from making music. Flea told me the reason he had accepted a role in The Big Lebowski as Nihilist #2 was the ear-biting scene, particularly one stage direction in the script by Joel and Ethan Coen, which he still remembered with delight: “He worries the ear.”

posted 28 May 2008 in Archives, Articles. 1 comment

Another commercial break.

The first spot’s for MTV’s “Big Bang ’89,” the live party airing later that night, featuring “music and madness from New York and L.A.” (We see close-ups of those two cities on a map, in case we need some help remembering them, or maybe to help us find them in case we’re planning to crash the party.) We are promised performances by Robert Plant, Poison, Winger, Cameo, Hall and Oates, Escape Club, Bobby Brown, and Vixen, hosted by “the ultimate secret weapons,” Sam Kinison and Sandra Bernhard. All those names are accompanied by short video clips. The Poison clip is from “Every Rose Has Its Thorn,” and features Bret Michaels in a baseball cap, which is kind of the proto-version of the bandana-plus-toupee he’s been deploying recently. “Five number one hits in your face!” the announcer tells us. At the rate I’m going through these videos, it’ll take me only a year or two to get to the big show.

Next: a really trippy Coca-Cola commercial. “Here’s where the feeling begins,” the announcer says. Quick cuts of a snowstorm, silver space aliens, dancing black girls, and then out of nowhere, Earth, Wind and Fire materialize on a quasi-extraterrestrial set that looks like it’s been stuck on the backlot since the original Star Trek went off the air in 1969. The silver alien does the robot while drinking Coca-Cola Classic. EWF perform a short, funky jingle: “The ultimate sensation / When you’ve got the real thing.”

That’s followed by a spot for the movie Talk Radio (starring Eric Bogosian, directed by Oliver Stone, cast including Alec Baldwin (who appears not to be in this ad), music by Stewart Copeland (also not in this ad, which is set to George Thorogood’s “Bad to the Bone”).

Then: “Silver Eagle Records presents Michael Jackson, his greatest hits from the Motown years!” Clips of a young Afro’d MJ singing “I Want You Back” and “Ben” are intercut with footage of a Jackson impersonator, a silhouetted dancer with a Jheri-curl and glittering socks, presumably intended to send the message to skeptical young viewers that really, this is the same guy, even though we couldn’t get any actual recent footage.

The commercial break ends with another 15-second animated MTV bumper, this one of postcards from around the world (Holland, Paris, London, Australia, with each locale turning into an MTV logo). It’s somewhat less cool now that MTV actually is available all over the world.

posted 27 May 2008 in 1988. 1 comment

I’m going to start posting a photograph once a week: something old, something new, or an entry in the 48 Hours From Ground Zero series.

This week: a picture I took last June in Paris.

No, I have no idea why a Paris streetcorner has a mosaic of Q*Bert; I only know that on a different corner, I spotted a similar mosaic of one of the Pac-Man ghosts.

posted 23 May 2008 in Photos. no comments yet

You can watch “Together Forever” here. No, you won’t get Rickrolled–for that to happen, technically you would have to be misdirected to “Never Gonna Give You Up.” But since “Together Forever” was the next Astley single off the Stock-Aitken-Waterman assembly line, it sure feels like “Never Gonna Give You Up, Part 2” or Astley II: The Wrath of Rickroll. (A couple of decades earlier, Motown churned out Four Tops singles the same way, following up “I Can’t Help Myself” with “It’s the Same Old Song,” which was also barely rewritten, but at least had the virtue of truth in advertising.) “Together Forever” isn’t as good a song as its predecessor, by the way–the chorus is catchy, but the verses are relatively unmelodic and overstuffed with syllables.

Rick Astley was an elfin kid from England with an improbably big baritone voice. These days, that would make him the dream contestant on American Idol. Back then, it made him an unusual pop star. He wasn’t much of a dancer and although he was reasonably good-looking, he always looked like a 14-year-old wearing his dad’s suits. This video tries to sex him up a bit: he gets three backup dancers in various ’80s outfits who at one point all smooch him, leading to lipstick on his cheeks and eyerolling. Astley doesn’t do much dancing himself, beyond swaying from one foot to the other, so the video also employs male dancers to bust some moves with the girls.

There is also a romantic plot, intercut with the performances. Let’s track its progression:

Act I
Astley bumps into an attractive girl wearing a red beret. The location is unclear. Hallway in an apartment building? Judging by Beret Girl’s large portfolio, we are in a modeling agency or a magazine office. But considering the big black-and-white tiles on the floor, we might be in a ’50s-themed diner. At any rate, they collide and Beret Girl drops her modeling portfolio on the floor. They both lean over to pick it up, and gaze meaningfully into each others’ eyes. As she walks away, Astley expresses himself the way he knows best, by soulfully running his hand through his hair. Astley discovers that Beret Girl has mistakenly left behind one photo, which apparently has her personal phone number on the back, rather than a contact at her agency.

Act II
Beret Girl is in the bathroom, looking at herself in the mirror. She has purportedly just stepped out of the shower, since there is a towel wrapped around her head, but she has also taken the time to do a full makeup job. Astley calls her on the phone. She is grinning before she even puts the receiver up to her ear–maybe she’s watching something funny on TV. Beret/Towel Girl is using an old-fashioned rotary-dial phone, while Astley is calling on some modern design-statement phone with large ridges around the mouthpiece. They talk; Beret/Towel Girl does not seem worried that Astley is stalking her.

Act III
Same location this time–they’re still on the phone. Beret/Towel Girl takes the towel off her head to reveal blonde wet hair. Astley is looking at her picture. For some reason, she’s looking at her own picture too. Maybe this is meant to establish that he didn’t dial a wrong number? The plot’s not moving forward very quickly, but surely they’ll meet up again soon.

Act IV
No, they’re still on the phone. Beret/Towel/Wethead Girl smells a pink carnation. It’s unclear whether Astley sent over flowers or whether she just likes olfactory stimulation. Well, the song’s reached the bridge, so we’ll obviously get them back together very soon. Maybe she’ll even put the beret back on before the end of the song.

Act V
Still on the phone. I don’t think this relationship’s going anywhere. B/T/W Girl pulls out her datebook to make an appointment. (You know what this video really needs to give it some action? Show her searching for a pencil!) She writes in their date: 7:30 on February 14, Valentine’s Day. Judging by its placement in her datebook at the top of the day’s vertical column, this is actually a 7:30 am meeting, and they’re planning a romantic breakfast. She blows him a kiss on the phone and they hang up.

Coda
Astley’s on the phone again, raising his eyebrows meaningfully. Maybe he’s called up another girl to discuss how a video that’s all about planning a first date seems even more ludicrous when set to lyrics about spending the rest of your life together for all eternity, or maybe he’s just enjoying the nuances of the dial tone.

“Together Forever” hit #1 (for one week). You can watch it here.

posted 22 May 2008 in 1988. 4 comments

As promised a couple of weeks ago, I’ve added my 1996 profile of Oasis to the archives.

I did most of the interviews for the article in London (I met up with the band again a few weeks later in Boston). I went to the UK on a redeye flight; because I was young and stupid, I stayed up all night on the plane, listening to the advance tape of (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? over and over, prepping all my questions. I staggered through Heathrow, made it to my London hotel room, and promptly fell asleep on the couch for an unscheduled nap. I awoke with a violent start a couple of hours later, and discovered that I had just enough time to make it to my scheduled interview.

I was pretty groggy the whole day, but maybe that just put me more in Liam’s state of mind.

posted 21 May 2008 in Archives, Articles. no comments yet

Stiletto boots decorated with silver chains, a dramatically swelling synthesizer, scarves tied to the microphone stand, lots of makeup and hairspray–this must be a hair-metal band!

In the case of Vixen, the musicians slathering on the cosmetics were all women. I suppose this qualified as a twist, given that the Sunset Strip metal scene was populated by men who were responsible for fully 18% of L’Oreal’s bottom line in 1988, but it doesn’t feel especially transgressive.

The video for “Edge of a Broken Heart” starts off with dramatic backlighting behind the band–or three of its four members, anyway. Was the director looking for an iconic Charlie’s Angels silhouette? Was the bassist hungover and late for the shoot? After that initial band-winnowing shot, it’s a straight-up performance video: Vixen (returned to full strength once they escape from the backlighting) strut around the stage while the camera stays in constant motion, panning around the musicians. There’s no crowd, but there is a full-scale lighting rig, with lots of spotlights in hyper-swivel mode. Bleached-blond hair, enhanced with extra AquaNet volume and combined with bright klieg lights, produce the video’s visual motif: the way a radioactive comic-book glow appears to be emanating from the performers’ scalps.

Like all right-thinking people, I root for female rock bands, but this clip just isn’t very good. Part of the problem is that Vixen don’t have much in the way of moves. They seem awkward and stiff as they execute the standard rock poses (e.g., singer leans against guitarist while they share a mike), either because it’s the largest stage they’ve ever played on, or because their stiletto heels are taller than usual. (Singer/guitarist Janet Gardner does a particularly ineffectual thing where she waves her hands around, which I think is meant to pump viewers up, but makes her look like a kindergarten teacher trying to get the attention of her class.) The happy exception is drummer Roxy Petrucci, who’s twirling her drumsticks, flailing around, and generally rocking the (nonexistent) crowd.

The song was written, arranged, and produced by Richard Marx (who, I suspect, we will be hearing from again later in this countdown), and is a competent piece of pop hackwork. The opening line–“I can’t believe I could’ve been so blind, but love is strange”–sets the cliché meter pretty high, but Marx, never one to shy away from a challenge, matches it later in the same verse with “I don’t need another lonely night to dry my tears.”

“Edge of a Broken Heart” reached #26 on the Billboard pop charts. You can watch the video here.

posted 20 May 2008 in 1988. 3 comments

As you may have heard, this is Robert Downey Jr.’s summer. He’s currently ruling the box office in the hugely entertaining Iron Man, and he’s even better in the upcoming Tropic Thunder (written and directed by Ben Stiller), in which he plays an over-the-top Australian actor who dyes his skin black for a role in a war movie.

It marks the culmination of a long-running comeback (it’s been a while since Downey accidentally fell asleep in somebody else’s bedroom). I interviewed him two and a half years ago, when he was excellent in Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and Good Night, and Good Luck–I’ve just added the resulting Q&A to the archives.

Sure, you could read an up-to-date cover story on him somewhere else–but where else will he be so snarky about George Clooney, David Fincher, and Val Kilmer? (“Val was still a little bit in fat-king mode from Alexander, but he was dressed English preppie, so he looked like the middle of Act I of The Legend of Greystoke.”)

posted 19 May 2008 in Archives, Articles. no comments yet

Beck’s got a new album coming out soon, produced by the mighty Danger Mouse. I wrote a news story about it, which is in the new issue of Rolling Stone.

The album’s probably called Modern Guilt; when I spoke with Beck, he kept changing his mind and was trying to make a final decision.

“Chinese Democracy is still available,” I pointed out.

Beck laughed. “That has actually been on the list,” he said. He’s not the only artist to consider bogarting Axl’s title. “Everybody’s been waiting for somebody else to do it,” he told me.

posted 16 May 2008 in Articles, Outside. 3 comments

And we go to a commercial break!

First, there’s an MTV promo touting their dedication to new music. “Every major band was a new name at one time,” says a bass voice (moderately portentous, but without enough presence to get movie-trailer work). Then they flash the names of these brand-new bands that they’re backing with the full weight of the network, hoping that they’ll last for many years:

Escape Club.
Edie Brickell & New Bohemians.
Information Society.
Living Colour.
Siouxsie & the Banshees.
White Lion.

Wait, back up–Siouxsie and the Banshees??!? When this ad aired in 1988, they had been around long enough that founding member Sid Vicious had been dead for almost exactly ten years. Their first album came out in 1978. Some of those other acts had been knocking around for a few years before they put out a major-label album, but isn’t this a bit like touting Courtney Love as the fresh new face of the twenty-first century?

“Catch tomorrow’s stars today on MTV,” says the bass voice. And apparently, yesterday’s stars, too.

Spots follow for Michelob Dry, the movie The January Man (more on this later, because even twenty years after the last time I watched this countdown, I remember that they showed this ad incessantly), the Conductor (a battery allegedly optimized for “high-drain music machines”–the commercial features a spiky-haired kid in a lecture hall blocking out a droning professor with his Walkman).

Then a cool MTV promo, featuring 20 seconds or so of jazzy animation at some speakeasy: quick cuts of a cartoony jazz band and a hep cocktail waitress, while music skronks atonally behind them.

Back to the countdown, with “Welcome to the Jungle” as the bumper music. Kevin Seal is our host. Kevin was the host of 120 Minutes (which played what people still called “college rock” at that point, before “alternative” became the preferred branding term), and seemed to have more of an ironic sheen about him than the other VJs. “The top 100!” Kevin shouts and jumps over the counter, screaming. Twice. Twenty years later, Kevin’s still charming, but much squintier than I remember.

posted 15 May 2008 in 1988. 2 comments