Questions Begged by Popular Videos of the Modern Age

in re: that new Alanis Morrissette video where she's walking down the road and people keep appearing and disappearing and handing her stuff:

1. Could she look any more like my wife's cousins, except less cute?
2. Does she think that no one has ever seen the Jarabe de Palo video that she totally ripped off for this one, or that people just don't care, or both?
3. Would the video be better if she was nude but all blurred out like the last one?
4. How does the song sound? I always mute it when I see it.

in re: Sara Evans' "Suds in the Bucket":

1. Is it a great thing that the teenagers in the video are not all glammed-up and hawt like in most videos, that they look much more like the real kind of teenagers who run away from home for love? Or could they just not afford really hot 20-something models to pose as teenagers?
2. Does Sara Evans look like she's lost 15 pounds since "Perfect"? Maybe it's the lighting but her face is all scary skinny now.
3. Does Evans think that the "biddies in the beauty shop" won't see her mocking their gossiping ways? She's sitting right between them, doing that handsignal for "talk talk talk"...they're chippy but they're not blind. I'd be surprised if they didn't beat her down. They're some large women.
4. Does "Suds in the Bucket" sound really incredibly dirty to you?
5. Is this the best country single of the year? (Bonus answer: no, but it's #2, but it won't get critical love because it actually sounds like country music.)

"Suds In The Bucket" is grebt. and Sara Evans is foine. and yes, the teens in the video are weirdly not.

and oh c'mon, when you say "won't get critical love", you know you just mean it isn't pimped out enough for Chuck.

chuck yeah al but look,
the gretchen/big&rich thang
gets love all over

but poor sara e
even got unfairly slammed
on all music guide

in re: Hoobastank, "The Reason":

1. Do they realize that their record company has just doomed them to jail by releasing video records of their clever heist? That stuff's gotta be subpoena-able.
2. Do they realize that their lead singer is the young John Cusack (Better Off Dead/Sixteen Candles era), except Asian?
3. Do they realize their name is Hoobastank? Do they just shoot straight up in bed at 3 a.m. going 'God damn it what were we thinking? We named our band HOOBASTANK?'

in re: Gary Allan, "Songs About Rain":

1. Why, when the song states very clearly that he's driving around in his car, is he in a speedboat? And why would he need a speedboat to prowl the swamps of what I assume is Louisiana?
2. Why is the African-American pianist only shown like one time, and then consigned to vague blurry shots of his fingers playing--oh, never mind, I think I know the answer to this one.
3. Why are all his videos centered around him cruising around on cool vehicles like dirtbikes and speedboats? Is it to distract attention away from the fact that his face is all squashed into the middle of his head with all kinds of extra room all around it?

in re: Gretchen Wilson's "Redneck Woman"

1. Sorry, not buying it. In every article/interview the whole authenticity/sassy redneck thing is trumped out, but she can't even play the part convincingly in the video. She looks like a glamor girl in badass's clothing, and barely even strums her guitar. Plus her name is GRETCHEN.
2. One of the girls in the chorus of redneck girls in the bar is wearing a baseball cap, but it looks worn so much more like an ironic trucker cap than as a redneck girl being a redneck girl.
3. All the cameos in the video are thrown in kind of winking knowingly and in a very rap video kind of way, with the references to Hank, Tanya, Skynyrd, etc. much in the same spirit as shoutouts to Big and Pac.
4. By extension the clumsy Big & Rich-as-Country's-Neptunes comparison kind of works because they pop up in there just like Pharrell would.

you guys watch too much tv.

Go back to bed, old man Hulkington. Who told my old gym teacher he knows how to rap?

Al, you just lost your country credentials. TONS of girls in white-trash towns are named Gretchen...I know, I grew up in a place a lot like Pocahontas, Illinois. Plus, I think she really is driving that pickup, her eyes are on the mud ahead of her instead of on the camera, she's sliding around pretty convincingly. Are you upset because she actually looks hot when she strips to do laundry? I'm not.

And I have no idea what you're on about with Big&Rich/Neptunes being "clumsy." They ARE! And if Hank and Tanya are in the song, they get to be in the video too.

re: "The Reason", the part that always strikes me is that last moment of the video where they're sitting around basking in the success of their heist, when suddenly in the distance they hear approaching sirens. it seems very tacked-on, like MTV insisted (which they often do) that changes be made for the video to illustrate that CRIME DOES NOT PAY. also Miccio made a good point on his blog about how this and the Yellowcard video are pretty craven attempts to dress up very unmacho rock songs with crime movie cliches to make them seem less like pansies.

Miccio has a blog?

sorry, maybe it's just a knee-jerk reaction to years of being subjected to various incongruous comparisons shoehorned into the "_______ are the Neptunes of ______" format.

(x-post, that was a response to the Big&Rich thing obv)

I linked Anthony on Gov't Names, btw

in re: Big & Rich, "Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)":

1. Isn't John Rich gonna get really hot driving the convertible in the hot sun while wearing a fur coat?
2. Isn't Big Kenny flirting with disaster by sporting the Tom Petty top hat?
3. Why is the model/mannequin so unresponsive to Kenny's cowboy love rap? Does that not imply that he is so unsmooth as to need a blowup doll for a girlfriend? Does that not also imply that all cowboys are desperate losers who will never get real life girlfriends?

(i link miccio
on my weblog all the time,
i was making 'joke')

Big Kenny = Bud Bundy

(x-post, sorry, my sacasm detector's on the fritz)

Black Eyed Peas -- Let's Get It Started
1. Who answers their cell phone by singing into it?
2. Does he realize that those red gloves look really stupid?
3. Is this a video? Because at times, I could swear it was an ad for camera phones.
4. What's with the crowd surfers? a) Is it physically possible for them to be thrown that high? I think not. b) Even if it was, you'd expect to *see* them surfing, and then thrown. But everyone is dancing furiously, and therefore are unable to support a crowd surfer. So they seem to appear out of nowhere! c) Are they able to jump extremely high? d) Is it an optical illusion -- i.e. are there trampolines or stretched rubber sheets hidden in the crowd? e) since everyone is dancing, who is catching these people? I hope nobody got hurt during filming.

Black Eyed Peas win my vote for "creepiest" looking group that I can think of. No, really, "creepy". That one dude with the hair and the wack clothes and that face, yuck. He wins the Yukmouth.

Usher -- "Burn"
1) Does Usher have a dandruff problem?

Lenny Kravitz -- "Runnin'"

1. Why haven't you been beaten with sharp sticks?
GOTO 1
RUN

Britney Spears -- "Everytime"
1. Is this the creepiest pop video in ages, or what?
2. After "Toxic"'s see-through outfit, and now the bath scene here, how long can it be until Britney does full-frontal?
3. WTF does the song have to do with the video?
4. Why does her hair appear grey when her boyfriend pulls her from the bath? Her skin was ashen, but does Britney understand that this should not apply to hair as well?
5. I hate songs/videos about "the pressures of fame". Do you?
6. If the death was just a daydream while Britney was underwater in the bath, why the need for birth/death imagery? Who decided to make an (awful) attempt at deeper imagery in a Britney Spears video?

britney spears - "toxic"

1. is this hot or WHAT?

pink-not sure of the name of the song

1.is that eddie izzard?
2.is he only in the video because he bears a startling resemblance to pink?

re: "Toxic",....

1. Right after Brintey -- in red-headed cybergoth "Run Lola Run" mode -- snatches the whatsis from the whoozyvault, she is confronted with a series of lazer-triggered obstacles. While she funkily bodyrocks her way through them, there's a quick cut to a clip of a couple gettin' it on in a shower. They do not appear again. Who be they?

re: you are my joy - the reindeer section.

does my emotional reaction to this clip about two knitted dollies mean that i have become old and lost my edge? i fear the answer is affirmative