I can't stop watching this evolution of MTV right now. It makes me remember how much I loved the changes in video making over the years. It used to be the creepiest video ever was "Shock the Monkey." Then for a while it was the B-52's "Legal Tender." But I've seen "Come to Daddy" by Aphex Twin, and I may never recover.

So, is it "Sabotage"? "Praise You"? "Losing My Religion"? "Doin' It"?

What are your favorite videos of all time?

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Answers

Oooh. I was an MTV junkie until 95 or 96. My all time favourite video is "Take On Me" by A-ha. I just love that video. When I was little, it was that video and Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time" that I loved best. Then later, it was Technotronic "Pump up the Jam" and still later, "Disarm" "Loser" "Mmmm etc." and anything by Nirvana.

I used to watch Rosie O'Donnell on VH1 back in the days when she told dirty jokes and had long hair. She hosted a standup show - it was pretty funny, I guess.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

I love love love "Losing My Religion". I love the lighting. I love how freaky and intense Michael Stipe looks dancing around.

But, my all time favorite video, is George Michael's Freedom. I love that video. I love the pretty models. I love the makeup, the camera angles, I love the sexy, intimate feel. I love the blond model (Tatiana? what is her name?) smoking the cigarette, with the smoke curling up around her face. I would have loved to be in that video.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Man, I was going to say a-ha. My seventh grade gym teacher was obsessed with that song and we had to do aerobics to it and "Some Like it Hot" by the Power Station every day.

It's not my favorite video, but my strongest video memory is when Thriller came out. That was some scary shit for a fourth grader. I remember being at the roller rink, and they'd play that video against the wall. Everyone would just stop skating and sit on the rink to watch it.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

hey! I thought of another one! "Everybody Hurts" by REM. That video made me bawl everytime I saw it. It got to the point where I just had to turn the TV off and do something else when it came on.

Yeah. I have problems. ;)

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

This answer is coming from someone who doesn't have cable, so my video memories are very select and limited. Although, when I house- sat one summer, admist the mess of that Chris Hardwick/ Jenny McCarthy show...oh, yes, Singled Out reruns...I saw a lot of videos. Especially LL doin' Loungin (who do you love, are you fer sure...LL...he's such a supah lovah man) and the superdrag Sucked Out video (who sucked out the feel-ING!)

I also had the pleasure to see the Blur Coffee and TV video. Awesome. And i adore Spike Jonze and the praise you video. I dance like that.

My weirdest video memory is when I went to stockholm, stayed with my sister, and stayed up all night alone in the big rattling house waiting for alternative nation (two years ago, kids. euro mtv kicks mtv's ass!) When it finally got dark outside, at 12am (for two hours) the house began to make noises, and the Radiohead No Surprises video came on. I was thouroughly creeped out.

So many good videos in Europe, though...Beck/Mike D/Jon Spencer Flavor remix...Belle and Sebastian...Whale...that "im horny" song and Ricky Martin before he got big! Dang!

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

"Buddy Holly" by Weezer. About that same time, I remember watching "Creep" by TLC a lot. Those girls kick ass.

I thought "Right Now" by Van Halen was profound back when it came out. It was the predecessor to Pop-Up Video.

"I'm Afraid of Americans" by David Bowie with Trent Reznor. Cool video.

"Fast Car" by Tracy Chapman.

And although I don't care for the song, I really loved what Juliette Lewis did in Melissa Etheridge's "Come to My Window" video.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Elisabeth.....do you know what is more embarassing than admitting that you watched old Singled Out reruns? Having to admit that you were actually on Singled Out. That is a little known fact that I rarely give out because I felt like a pathetic loser, so y'all better not tell anyone. People didn't understand that I was drunk and at a bar and got asked to do the show and developed a crush on one of the casting directors, oh no. They just assume that you are some poor single girl who couldn't get a date and HAD to go on singled out. Oh well, that is my own little slice of pop culture history. Or big hooch culture? I don't know.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

"Smells Like Teen Spirit"

For some reason, I was also mad about "If" by Janet Jackson. Brought back dance class memories.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

The best video ever (And you can blame my dad for getting me hooked on them) is Talking Heads' "Road to Nowhere". Everywhere you look theres something going on! My favorite part is the little running David Byrne in the bottom corner of the screen.

Another video I love thats kinda in the same vein as "Road to Nowhere" (the makes-no-sense-stream-of-conciousness vein) is "Where It's At" by Beck.

I also like, and these I guess could be a guilty pleasure too, "Material Girl" and "Human Nature" both by Madonna. I like HN because after watching it my friends told me I had the same type of body as Madonna, so that made me happy:)

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Helllloooo! Madonna Lucky Star! I soooo wanted to be Madonna, I WAS Madonna (as far as I was concerned). Also any and all Prince videos of course. Kiss was kick ass, he is such a little hottie in that outfit! I also LOVED Remote Control! See now this is where I start to feel old, that was a long as time ago. I too remember when the Thriller video came out, and the making of the Thriller video. yeah Leigh Anne, that was some crazy ass shit in the 4th grade! LL does it well in everything...ohhh baby, gotta love those lips!

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

No way B. Privett .... don't at all feel bad. i to this day cry whenever i hear that song and if the video is on, like when they do the flashbacks.. shoot.... i am a freaking mess! Everybody Hurts totally describes so many aspects of my life growing up. but as for favorite videos, it is all about early madonna stuff... she is so bold!
caitlyn


-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Pamie...do you mean the "Fish heads, fish heads, roly poly fish heads".....something, something......"eat 'em up yummmm." song by Norman Bates....or someone?

It's been soooo long since I saw that video, I can't remember a whole lot about it. I just remember it cracked me up.

I think my favorite video is "No More Words" by Berlin. It's all Bonnie and Clyde-ish and I was sooo in love with one of the guys in that band.

"Black Coffee in Bed" by Squeeze is one I always loved. I saw it again recently and I couldn't believe how cheesy it was.

sheesh

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Word on "Praise You" and "Buddy Holly." And pamie, how weird... I was just thinking of "Legal Tender" today for some reason or another....

Sentimental favorites for me are "Union of the Snake" (not only does Simon look awe-inspiringly gorgeous, but just go ahead and get me to explain all the Jungian archetypes and mythological hero-journey stuff going on there, too), "The Reflex" (I can still do all the -- and I use this term loosely in relation to Simon -- dance moves. But I won't demonstrate.), Cyndi Lauper's "She Bop" (all the sexual innuendos), a-ha's "Take on Me" (of course), Toni Basil's "Mickey," Culture Club's "War Song," Pat Bennetar's "Love Is A Battlefield," Wham!'s "Club Tropicana".... I could go on and on....

When're there gonna be some 80s Video Compilations, dammit?

I remember -- and no one else does -- a song called "Vans Can't Dance" by John Fogerty, with these claymation pigs.... No one ever remembers it. They all think I'm weird. I crave validation on this subject.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

i just have to agree with mis, yeah, George Michael's Freedom video, excellent, excellent. I'm a sucker for black and white stuff, and the models lip-syncing, (how on earth do you spell that!) very good video. thriller, well, i have to admit it's good, but i was really little when it came out and i would cry, running behind the couch to hide every time it came on. my sister would try to force me to watch it. bad memory! i love MTV and VH1, but every time i turn them on these days, they aren't showing music videos, its some program i've seen 10 times already! i mean, the 100 greatest women in Rock n Roll was good the first time, but not the 50th! i guess i just turn it on at the wrong times...

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

This is bringing back fond memories of the time when MTV didn't suck. I am with mis on the whole "Freedom" thing. That tome is the ultimate video. It has everything, plus near naked models. To this day, whenever I am in a bar, and that video comes onto the screen, I stop conversation and focus intently on the screen. It's frightening. The model's name is Tatiana Patize, or something with a P. The other one is ah-ha's "Take on me".

I miss the old

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Dawn--I thought that was "Zazz can't Dance" or something like that. I think I saw it once, but I don't remember pigs. Claymation, maybe. Pigs, no.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

Ah. Quick web search: it was "Vanz Kant Danz" off of "Centerfield". You didn't make it up. Alas, no confirmation re: claymation pigs. ;)

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

"Come To Daddy", for me, disproves what Anton Corbijn once said about how a mad song can never have a great video. All the techno bleeps and "I will eat your soul" theatrics are pretty useless. But those identical troglodyte kids and that thing which pops out of the TV and does that awesome shriek of the damned scary. There's a lot of other videos I like but as usual I can't think of them off-hand, maybe I'll come back when I can. One that I don't care for is "Praise You". The appeal of it just escapes me completely. I know that practically everyone else who sees it calls it the greatest video ever made, but I'll have to be in the minority because I can't stand it. Same goes for Mr Jonze's other "great" video for Daft Punk's "Da Funk"

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

I can't believe no one has mentioned "Safety Dance" by Men Without Hats! the one with the frolicking elf people.

-- Anonymous, May 09, 2000

I was just going to say "Safety Dance!" My friend Kate and I used to stare at "Friday Night Videos" (on a 13-inch b&w TV) to the point of glassy-eyed unable-to-blink-edness just waiting for it to come on. Also any Weird Al video.

Video nostalgia--Lord help us.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

Kim, you'll like this story. My high school had this substitute teacher who was an actor on the side, and he had appeared in Prince's "Seven" video. (the weird one with the dancing gypsies and black vinyl people) He was the old man at the beginning who dies or something like that. So when he came to teach a class, he would just show his Prince video instead of teaching the lesson. we loved that guy!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

I do, BTW, like the 70's theme of "Sabotage" and the "Happy Days" theme of "The Sweater Song", now that you mention 'em. Dawn's right,t hough--it's hard to top the sheer spectacle and scope of Duran videos. Nowadays, compared with things that came out much later, they look dated. At the time, though, most videos were stilted straight performance recordings. When compared to the mini-movies that most Duran vids were, it's no wonder they paled in comparison.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

Kaela...you are such a lucky dog! I loved the 7 video! That's like the last one they actually played on MTV. YOU ROCK : )

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

Thankyee, Milla!

Another no-I-didn't-make-that-up video was for a song called "Yo Little Brother" with some funky lookin' hairdo'd kid in it....

And how could I forget King's Love and Pride? Boots! Break dancers! Spray paint!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

WE got cable when I was five or six. MTV had just come out, my sister who was eight or nine loved it, I loved Pinwheel on Nicholodeon. She would beat me up and take the remote from me andmake me watch Mtv. I Developed a distaste for music television early on, and never really watched it much, and have not seen it since 1990 or so.

I seem to remember that in the early days of Mtv videos were wierd and creative, either strange concept things or mini-movie. As I hit middle and high school it seemed like most videos were just concert footage or choreographed dancers. This was the age of Guns-n-roses and Paula Abdul. I've been told that sometime in college Mtv stopped playing almost all videos and just did TV shows like The Real World. Now I've heard they launced a second station, M2 which plays videos again. I've heard there is a lot more creativity in videos now than there was in teh late eighties.

My favorite video of all time is probably Rokkit by Herbie Hancock, it was this wierd breakdancing music song and the video was all of these strange robot-like things in a dilapidated house.

Other favorites were Thriller (I remember it being a huge deal when it came out, there being announcements about when the full fifteen minute version would be played, etc), Take On Me as other's had mentioned, That Phil Collin's video with the giant Ronald Reagan puppets ("Land of Confusion?") and "We're not gonna take it." "Our love's in Jeopardy" and "Dancing with myself" were also great. Basically any video with monsters in it made my list.

My friend Scott and I were discussing last night how there are certain things that are in the collective sexual unconscious of every guy around our age (mid-twenties). Like once I mentioned the "Walk like an Egyptian" video and every guy in the room said something about "that eye thing" that the singer does and even to this day we all melt thinking about it. None of the women knew what the hell we were talking about. Other items on this list include the teenaged girl doing the split on the bed in that Billy Idol video, and the entire Paula Abdul "cold hearted snake" video.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

Ooh, David, I loved that Herbie Hancock video! I'd completely forgotten about it.

I haven't watched MTV in years. I remember when they first started up and had about 20 videos that they just played over and over and over. Now, I have to ask if they ever play music videos at all - every time I surf though, it's "Real World" or some other crap. But that may just be me, getting old.


-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

Sheesh, don't I feel dumb...I just saw George Michael's Freedom video. I only saw about 20 seconds of it, and I guess it's not in black and white! And I thought it was cool because it was. Don't I know what I'm talking about! Well, guess my memory's shot, but I still like the video.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

Yes I confess I was addicted to MTV once upon a time.

My favorite videos. 1. "Sabotage" by the Beasties rules: the part where the music stops and they're all eating donuts cracks me up EVERY TIME. 2. "Buddy Holly" by Weezer (wonders of technology) 3. "What's my Age Again" by BLink 182 (naked boys running through town. HILARIOUS!) 4. "Pleasure Principle" by Janet Jackson (say what you want but that woman could DANCE)

I confess there was a time that I adored "The Real World" especially the San Francisco edition with Puck, Pedro, and Rachel. Lord kick that guy out of the house.

OH yeah. I went to college with Jason from "The Real World" Boston. He never admitted that he was from Arkansas which just pissed me off!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

Oh, Twisted Sister.... I can still do the whole "What is that? A Twisted Sister PIN on your UNIFORM!" thingie, too! In fact, I did it to my brother a couple years ago and scared my brother.... Or the David Lee Roth stuff with "Oooh, breath mint! Our lips are sooo close!" "Ooooeeeeyeeewie! Not if you was the LAST immigrint grocer on earf, honey!"

Okay, I'm done now....

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2000

I'd say madonna since I was a freak fan back in the day [say from first grade-fifth!]. me and my friend used to put on mini concerts in my room for my mom. we even put on bathing suits and did that chair dance thing that madonna did in the key to my heart video I believe. I forget if that was the exact name. I remember I loved it though. my favorite madonna video was 'like a prayer' though..aah.

I will also mention 1) 'take on me' -aha. I got into that song. 2) 'today' -smashing pumpkins. they painted an icecream truck!! I didn't much like the smashing pumpkins when they used to play it all the time but I loved the video and grew to like the group later on. 3) 'paranoid android' -radiohead. yes, yes, I like the cartoon video!! augh!! vids with cartoons are original. 4) I used to like prince videos but I can't name them by titles. I just liked whatever he did...heh. at least back in the day.

I guess that's all for now. I know I'll think of others.

-- Anonymous, May 11, 2000

we had to sneak to watch vh-1 as we didn't have mtv and my father thought music videos would corrupt us. we still managed many hours of video watching. my favorites:

'pretty good year' by tori amos 'stay (faraway, so close!)' by u2 (it's just lovely. love wim wenders) 'so real' by jeff buckley. (never understood the gorilla suits, tho)

j

-- Anonymous, May 11, 2000

So many videos, so little time:

Human Behavior--Bijork

Wicked Game--Chris Isaak

All I Want is You--U2

Peaches--The Presidents of the United States of America

Bedtime Story--Madonna

Sheva (SP?)--Smashing Pumpkins

Ana Ng--They Might Be Giants

Don't Let's Start--They Might Be Giants

Fascination Street--The Cure

Last of the Famous International Playboys--Morrissey

I could go on all day.

-- Anonymous, May 11, 2000

Two words (ok, so it's really one word repeated twice...)

Duran Duran

-- Anonymous, May 11, 2000

i don't know the band or the music- but i love that video with three boys running around nekkid, it reminds me of being a kid.

duran duran videos are hot simon lebon and andy taylor-yum!

-- Anonymous, May 11, 2000

spike jonze rocks this forum

-- Anonymous, May 12, 2000

spike jonze rocks this forum buddy holly - weezer sabotage - beastie boys its oh so quiet - bjork (i'm surprised no one has mentioned this one yet!)

-- Anonymous, May 12, 2000

It's considered an "oldy" by MTV standards, but Aerosmith's "Janie's Got a Gun" remains my all-time favorite.

-- Anonymous, May 12, 2000

Buddy Holly - Weezer and all Spike Jonze videos, Coffee and TV - Blur, Playground Love - Air (No one's mentioned that one, despite it being directed by Spike's wife, Sofia Coppola. I have a thing for walking/talking inanimate objects.) Hmm... Dog On Wheels - Belle and Sebastian (Stuart Murdoch prancing around Glasgow, graffiti-ing and making superhero squirrels fly off bridges), Disco 2000 - Pulp, almost all Radiohead videos... I could go on for awhile.

-- Anonymous, May 14, 2000