Seeing all those glorious mullets and baggy t-shirts and big-block plaids earlier sent me wandering around the InterWebs in search of more of the nostalgic same, which eventually led me to 80s-Music.net and the following compilation of music-video clips that span the entire decade. It’s pretty fun:
Is it just me or did music go to hell the year after I graduated from high school (1987)?
I’ve noted before that I’m not a big fan of Christmas music, and the stuff from that I do like tends to be of the more melancholy, wistful variety. The upbeat songs usually make me squirm, because their cheerfulness so often strikes me as synthetic and forced, if not downright hysterical — “Carol of the Bells” is a particular offender in the “hysteria” category; it always sounds to me like the performers are going to ram their bells down our throats if we don’t acknowledge their mantra of “merrymerrymerrymerrychristmas!” — and also because I simply don’t want to give into their shiny insistence that everything is holly-jolly-wonderful. So I was a little bit surprised at just how happy this old music video made me feel when I ran across it earlier, especially considering that I’ve been teetering at the edge of my annual funk for a couple of days:
Yes, I know this song — “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” by Band Aid, in case you don’t remember — and its American counterpart, “We Are the World,” are sappy and condescending toward the very people they were recorded to help, and we all got really damn tired of hearing them every five minutes (especially “We Are the World,” which at its peak was well-nigh inescapable). But I got a kick out of seeing the old clothing styles and trying to identify all the participants, and… well, hell, I’m not going to apologize for the fact that this little piece of ’80s claptrap made me feel better on a gloomy morning. Maybe it’ll do the same for someone out there…
Via Sullivan, who made me smile with his quip that, “George Michael’s hair always makes my yuletide gayer.”
For the record, I still miss my mullet.
Something occurred to me yesterday while I was watching a re-run of The Incredible Hulk on our local RTN affiliate. Well, actually it occurred to me during a commercial break: of all the “as seen on TV” crap products that used to fill the airwaves with their seductive flim-flammery during the ’70s and ’80s, how is it that the only one that seems to have followed us into the 21st century is the Chia Pet? Seriously, this is what turns out to be the timeless kitsch classic that endures? Whatever became of the Pocket Fisherman, Mister Microphone, and those el-cheapo plastic boxes that were supposed to let you mold snow bricks and build igloos but somehow never quite worked as advertised? I wonder about these things…
Incidentally, that episode of The Hulk was an unbelievable confluence of nostalgic awesomeness… first of all, it was The Incredible Hulk, a series I watched pretty faithfully as a kid (and yet oddly, I can’t really remember a single individual plotline; of course, they were all pretty much the same plot, weren’t they?). It was set in one of my favorite cities, San Francisco (even though it was obviously filmed on the Universal backlot in Burbank), and the story involved a young cop struggling to choose between the path of peace offered by his zen martial-arts instructor and the violent quest for revenge advocated by his older brother. The older brother was Gerald McRaney of Simon & Simon, another childhood fave series, while the young cop was played by none other than my main man Rick Springfield. The episode felt like it might have been intended as a stealth pilot for a vehicle for Rick, as by the end of it he’s become the new master of the dojo (following the death of the old master) and a private eye who promises to take only the clients he can really help. If it was a pilot, it’s too bad it wasn’t picked up… it might’ve been interesting. Kung Fu meets The Rockford Files, maybe…
A few excerpts from a particularly astute piece at the ever-amusing McSweeny’s called “Fifty Years of Popular Songs Condensed into Single Sentences”:
I’m having one of those downer days when I’m feeling nostalgic, wistful, a bit melancholy… yes, I mean moreso than usual, you bunch of smart alecks! One of these days, I oughta…
Anyhow, I’ve been thinking the last couple of days about relatively obscure songs that I used to like and haven’t heard in many years, trying to remember their titles and track them down in some form or another. Here’s one of those songs, Dennis DeYoung’s “Desert Moon,” which seems to perfectly match my mood today. I don’t think I’ve ever seen this video before now. It’s pretty cheeseball, what with the bad acting, occasional patches of banal dialog, and DeYoung’s purple big-block-plaid shirt (actually, I always liked those large-patterned plaids back in the day, but even I have to admit that it looks pretty dated in 2008). Still… I like the song, and on days like this when you can feel the summer heat gradually draining out of the world and autumn lurking just over there in the shadows, I like to listen to this sappy old stuff. Maybe you will, too…
Ah, Saturday morning. Blessed Saturday morning. You know how I know I’ve been spending too much time at the office lately? Because cutting my lawn — an obligatory chore I usually perform only grudgingly — was actually kind of pleasant this week.
You know what else is kind of pleasant? Making lists and doing memes. Yeah, I know I was bitching yesterday about how I’ve only been able to do memes and photos lately instead of writing real blog entries — whatever those may be — but you know what? I like doing memes, and I’m in a better mood today.
Once again, this is a meme I borrowed from SamuraiFrog, who seems to be finding all the best meme-age lately. In this one, you go to a particular website and enter your birthday to find out what the Number One song was that day, according to Billboard, for every year you’ve been alive. Commentary is apparently not required, but you know me…
One brief proviso: I haven’t paid much attention to popular music in years, not since Cobain and all those other throat-singing, flannel-clad mopes from Seattle turned rock into a dirge and hip-hop claimed ascendency on the pop charts. Which means I don’t recognize many of these titles until we get back quite a few years. Yeah, I know, I’m an old fart. For the record, I’m listening to Janis Joplin as I type this, so take from that what you will.
Anyhow:
You know, every time I’m close to despair over the fact that all the pop culture I loved in my youth is now being remade, re-imagined, mashed-up, or just plain forgotten, and that nothing really ever seems to stand the test of time, least of all the crap I like, I’ll hear an anecdote that restores my faith, however briefly, that all is not lost…
And tonight’s entertainment is:
You know, at this rate, I’ll have managed to see all those ’80s bands I missed back in high school by the end of this decade…
If Rick Springfield isn’t your thing, perhaps you’d prefer some classical?
That new Journey CD I mentioned a couple days ago is a great summertime listen, but the album I’m really waiting for — man, that feels weird to even think, let alone admit, because this is the first time in a very long time that I’ve actually been anticipating a new music release — is Venus in Overdrive, the latest from my main man, Rick Springfield. It’s not hitting stores and online sellers until July 29, but the first single from it, “What’s Victoria’s Secret,” is already peeking out from behind the curtain: The Girlfriend heard a few seconds of it on the radio yesterday, and I’ve just found the video below. This may or may not be the “official” video — I’m not sure if this is just a performance on some TV show or if this is the actual promo clip made to go with the song — but give it a click anyhow and see what you think:
I like it — there’s a definite “Jessie’s Girl” vibe there, but that’s okay by me, and it suggests that maybe Rick is trying to get back onto the charts after a long time in the wilderness. The press release for Venus confirms that he’s going for a more light-hearted, radio-friendly sound than his recent efforts (shock/denial/anger/acceptance was a great album and a fine artistic achievement, but song titles like “Every Night I Wake Up Screaming,” “Your Psychopathic Mother,” and “Idontwantanythingfromyou” don’t exactly appeal to a mass audience, you know?), with Rick even going so far as to refer to the new album as “Son of Working Class Dog.” Hopefully that’s a good descriptor of what the fans are likely to be hearing shortly: some good-time pop-rock with strong hooks and maybe just a hint of grit around the edges. (Working Class Dog was, of course, Rick’s big breakthrough record, the one that spawned “Jessie’s Girl” and a couple of other singles; it was also the very first LP I ever owned, and lyrically a bit darker and more grown up than most people remember.)
In any event, it’s shaping up to be a great summer, musically speaking at least…