Music Videos #12: In Which There is Dancing, and it is In the Streets.
1) Morcheeba, 'Rome Wasn't Built in a Day'
Director: Malcomn Venville
From the 2000 album Fragments of Freedom
www.youtube.com/watch
This video starts our trip through the world of spontaneous synchronised dancing, and keen viewers might note there is something about this which makes parts of it look all wrong. That's right - while this was one of the hit songs of the early twenty-first century, and has a chorus that still gets stuck in my head on occasion, a decade later, the video has one huge mistake, and that's the bit where people are dancing at different speeds in different shots! Nothing looks worse than a video where the director seemed to change his mind about the style halfway through. If I sound harsh on this video, then it's just because I'm so disappointed. This could've been a classic, and has the fantastic mass dancing that I've come to expect from good videos (see Feist) in the final moments, but overall it seems to fall victim to indecision: either it's a huge musical number, or it feels like it's improvised. You can't have both.
2) The Afters, 'Never Going Back to OK'
Director: Gavin Michael Booth
From the 2008 album Never Going Back to OK
www.youtube.com/watch
I will make a tiny concession for this video: yes, I am disappointed that this isn't actually a single-take video. I would have been impressed if they had pulled it off, or at least made it look more like it was one (see OK Go). It's still pretty cool, and what I like about it the most is that it's a) very low budget and b) revels in the fact. They didn't pay for a choreographer; in fact, they probably just asked people if they could 'do cool dancing'. They didn't do much in the editing room, just threw on some effects. But it's this kind of thing that gives the video its charm (that, and the good old stinger at the end of the video for all the people wondering whether The Afters just operate in a musical theatre world or if they are the new Pied Piper). One other thing comes to mind from this video, and considering they're a Christian rock band, it's probably unfounded, but I might detect a 'Once More With Feeling' reference with the woman getting a parking ticket?
3) The Bumblebeez, 'Dr. Love'
Director: Tom Kuntz
007 album Prince Umberto and the Sister of Ill
www.youtube.com/watch
Finally, something that is so delightfully odd I can't find anything to be disappointed in. In order to be disappointed, I would have to have expectations. This video defies expectations. To summarise: the backup dancers in this video are apparently local homeless men, who were given a hot meal in exchange for dancing in a music video. Now, if you hadn't watched the video you would probably start screaming 'exploitation!' but this is somewhat different. I'm not denying that co-opting the underprivileged into your music world isn't a little unusual, but The Bumblebeez aren't mocking the dancers in this video. Instead, they're doing something that borders on concept art: take homeless people, adorn with magic marker tattoos (which will be used as the centrepiece for a Daft Hands-style section at the end of the video) and have them as zany backup dancers for a very catchy piece of music. Now if MIA could do that instead of making political videos about ginga genocide, I might be more inclined to pay attention.