July 2012 – 5000 Ways to Love You

Trillion & Duff “Doin’ It On My Shadow”

Trillion is back and this time Jody Lloyd has teamed up with frequent collaborator Mark Duff. The pair find themselves in the sticky hot Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur. “Nice budget though haha”, says a YouTube commenter, and indeed it’s a nice little mystery how the duo came to make their video in KL.

The video, directed by Marc Swadel, sees the lads being cool around a Sunway Lagoon, an expansive amusement park. It’s almost like a parody of all these Tarantino wannabe videos. Here are two guys in sharp suits hanging out at a fun family water park, posing for pics with tourists, enjoying the thrill rides. They even manage some music video sexface (Duff is the pro at this).

But just when all the amusement park fun gets a little too much fun, night falls and the action moves to “Duff’s secret underground disco bunker”, where a foam rave is in progress. We’re treated to shots of happy, smiling people getting their foam rave on, a reminder of a particularly malodorous part of the ’90s.

It’s a really fun, crazy video. And weirdly enough, it actually sells KL as a tourist destination. I want to go there and hang out at a water park. But I’ll skip the foam rave.

Best bit: the foam ravers looking like teachers on holiday.

Note: There’s an alternate version of the video that has Trillion’s rap turned into an instrumental break, with an earlier part of the video playing again to take the place of the rap performance.

Director: Marc Swadel
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… put your dog collar on.

Head Like A Hole “Wet Rubber”

YouTube uploader HEADLIKEAHOLENOISE introduces the song thusly: “a song developed from the find of a German porn movie in a works bin on the streets of Wellington. Enjoy!” Oh right, they just found it.

And indeed the video starts with footage of what appears to be an old porno with a Germanic voiceover informing us that “the gentleman is dressed up all in red, and the lady as it is done in pink”.

We don’t see the Euro pervs again, but were are introduced to HLAH, all decked out in leather, rubber, studs and a cowboy hat. They’re in a long wooden tunnel, gliding up and down it, which is probably highly symbolic.

It seems there was a bit of a ruckus regarding the video. A 1998 episode of the New Zealand music show “Squeeze” had a story on the “controversy surrounding their video for ‘Wet Rubber'”, even speaking to TVNZ’s head of programming standards. Well, it’s no AFFCO but I can see how it might ruffle some feathers.

The video and the song both seem intended as a pisstake of porn culture, and indeed it’s fair game, but yet when I hear the repeated lyric “Ride that whore! Make her blow!”, it makes me sigh. I’m going to blame it on the post-“Boogie Nights” (1997) mainstreaming of porn culture. The trouble is, not everyone is as clever as Paul Thomas Anderson, and it takes smarts to reference porn culture without going down the tired old route.

Best bit: drummer Hidee Beast earnestly decked out in bondage leather.

Director: Julian Boshier
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… OK in KL.

Deep Obsession “Cold”

Now it really feels like the late ’90s. Deep Obsession were a dance-pop duo, but the video is careful to feature producer/co-songwriter Christopher Banks along with singers Vanessa Kelly and Zara Clarke. Together they produced very successful, inoffensive pop, with a slightly dated housey sound.

The video takes its inspiration from the title – there’s a lot of blue, snow and fur. Brrrr. But for a group that always seemed very commercial in its nature, the video has a couple of uncommercial moves.

Even though Deep Obsession are a duo, we don’t see the two of them together until near the end of the song. So I’m watching them shot in black and white, sometimes with hats, sometimes with crazy makeup, and I can’t figure out who I’m looking at. It’s like the cold has made them forget one of their unique selling points.

Just to add to the weird, one (or both?) of them is bound like a chrysalis in Gladwrap, hangs upside down (well, the camera is upside down) and she looks really annoyed. Oh my. I’m actually starting to script my own version of a video for this song.

Were they actually taking the piss? The video ends with the three of them huddled together singing “Please hold me close”, like a DIY YouTube parody of an Abba video.

Well, whatever I can critique about this video, it doesn’t really matter. The song was the second of a run of three number one singles that Deep Obsession enjoyed in 1998/’99.

Best bit: the ice queen chrysalis – you don’t want to see it when it thaws.

Director: Rongotai Lomas
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… adventures in latex.

Criminal Lawyer “Legal Sunscreen”

This video appears to have initially been chosen for NZ On Air funding, but ended up not receiving it. But I’ve included it because it’s such a weird little part of New Zealand music in the late ’90s.

“Legal Sunscreen” was inspired by the massive hit single “Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)”, released by Australian auteur Baz Luhrmann. “Everybody’s Free” was a spoken word track based on life advice by Chicago newspaper columnist Mary Schmich, set to dance beats.

Meanwhile in New Zealand, the Canadian-born lawyer Christopher Harder penned a similar tune with a legal theme, giving various advice to listeners. Some of it is wise – be polite to the police – but other advice seems a bit, well, lawyery. Would anyone actually say “Is this a consenting kiss, touch or act?” to their date?

The video is a low-budget number. Dramatic black and white footage of the lawyer is cut with grainy video of the police, street life and other slices of urban badness. Occasionally key terms flash across the screen, making it seem like a sexed-up PointPoint presentation.

Retrospectively, the song has a bittersweet tone, as Christopher Harder was struck off the law practitioners roll in 2006, and later underwent rehab for drug and alcohol addiction.

Musically it’s not great. It feels more like a novelty single than the original did, but I’m not sure it was intended as a novelty. It feels like it’s quite earnest, expecting that it really will change people’s lives.

But perhaps it has. The song still has an enthusiastic audience online. YouTube commenters express their thanks for the sage advice, and the video is posted in forums by people wanting to share its tips. I like to think because of this song, there are just that many more people in the world being polite to the popo.

Best bit: during the safe sex section, there’s a brief microscopic shot of some sperm.

Next… the importance of dressing warmly.

3 The Hard Way “It’s On (Move To This)”

This song was released in 2003, but the funding is from the 1998 round. The group originally received funding in 1998 for a single called “Home”, but that didn’t get made. Instead the funding stayed on the books and was put to use five years later.

Eight years since their last single, 3 The Hard Way returned with the smooth grooves of “It’s On (Move To This)”. In contrast with the seductive hip hop soul of the song, the video is set in the Cask & Cleaver, a cowboy theme bar on Dominion Road.

But rather than being full of diners wanting an entertaining dining experience along with a delicious steak, the joint is full of gruff looking cowboys and fly cowgirls.

The cowgirls feature a lot in the video, and I think this is the first NZOA-funded video that has included video vixens. At the time it was a little shocking, with an extra layer of WTF for me as one of the girls had been a receptionist at my old workplace.

YouTube uploader and label boss Simon Grigg notes, “The video got some flack for having ‘girls’ in it, but within a month or two every 2nd NZ hip hop video seemed to be copying it. It was meant to be very tongue in cheek at the time”. And that seems a fair comment. The ironic sexy cowgirls paved the way for non-ironic booty girls.

The video has a bit of plot. 3 The Hard Way upset the cowboys, who throw bottles at them, “Blues Brothers” style. But there’s never a sense of true jeopardy. The lads quit their performance and run off with the cowgirls, where they go for a hoon along Dominion Road in a stretch limo. Just think about that – it’s the early 2000s, you’re walking along Dominion Road – maybe you’ve just enjoyed a gourmet pizza at GPK – when a limo full of conspicuously partying young hip hop dudes and bisexual cowgirls drives past. You look at them and think, “_______”. Yeah, me too.

Best bit: the painful reminder of the millennial trend for low-rise jeans 🙁

Director: James Barr
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… legal advice.

The Feelers “Space Cadet”

This is possibility the first video that’s not just inspired by the style of Quentin Tarantino’s films but also the non-linear storylines. The “Space Cadet” video is all about a briefcase which surely contains an antique McGuffin.

The story begins with James Feelers playing an assassin type, accompanied by a lady assassin. Both are wearing sleek black outfits and eyeliner, so obviously they don’t stand out or anything. The assassins retrieve the briefcase from the boot of a car and return to a sleazy hotel room.

We also meet James Feelers playing a crazy type person, holed up in a grimy lair, dressed in shiny black, wearing heavy eye makeup and being all crazy. And just for contrast, there’s the full Feelers experience, just three dudes in a band.

Ok, so let’s have some plot. The two other Feelers go to the lair of the crazy Feeler (he must be sleeping) and take the briefcase. The assassins later come around and are angered to find the briefcase has been taken. No worries – they find the two Feelers sitting in a car and shoot them nine times, take the briefcase and – whoa, etc – that’s the car and the briefcase from the beginning of the video.

Back in the hotel, the lady assassin shoots the James Feelers assassin, but yet we don’t ever find out what happened to the crazy James Feelers. I like to think he’s still there in his lair, caked in greasy black eye makeup and real stressed over his long missing briefcase.

Best bit: Assassin James’s “FUUUUUUUUUUU” moment.

Director: Kevin Spring
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… short popstar, tall girlfriend.

Sina “Don’t Be Shy”

Previously known for being “sweet Sina” singing the chorus of “How Bizarre”, Sina went solo with the sunny “Don’t Be Shy”.

The video is very simple, with Sina in an almost empty, windowless room, accompanied only by a chair, a bed and a guitar. This could be really dull, but the video was directed by Mark Tierney so it has style. It’s nicely lit, with some of that high-contrast lighting that was cool in the ’90s.

Though strangely enough, some of the camera angles aren’t so flattering. Sina’s wearing a halterneck top, and – as any disciple of Trinny and Susannah knows – a halterneck top on a larger-bosomed woman can look like a giant monoboob extending from the neck. This happens in a few shots and I’m surprised these made the final cut.

But monoboobs aside, this is a good, simple video that is a fine introduction to Sina as a solo artist. And indeed this piece of summery South Pacific pop made it to #2 in the charts.

Best bit: the brief glimpse of Sina’s jandal-clad feet.

Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… the assassin, the crazy man and the rock star.

Head Like A Hole “Comfortably Shagged”

In 1998 HLAH released “Are You Gonna Kiss It Or Shoot It?” aka HLAH: The Sex Years, on account of all the singles released off it being about sexy sex. There’s something cutely adolescent about it, like someone who’s figured out what sex is and wants everyone to know about it.

The video itself isn’t especially erotic or even sexy. It’s based about the very masculine, sweaty, smelly enviroment of a HLAH gig, alternating with Booga Beazley in a silver room. The lyrics speak of a man who’s in bed with “mirrors above my head”, but the bedroom presented is a mundane hotel room, with a chaste peach interior.

Then it’s time for some outdoor fun, with various outdoor high jinks, including the drummer drumming/hooning around a roundabout in Invercargill. The video then finishes with scenes from an outdoor concert in… oh crap, it’s Christchurch. No matter what HLAH’s sexy intentions were, seeing the dearly departed rose window of the Cathedral lurking in the background is an instant boner killer. *sad face*

Best bit: scenic Invercargill!

Director: Julian Boshier
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… from bizarre to sweet.

High Dependency Unit “Lull Dark Restart”

Videos like this are difficult to write about. This is not an especially commercial music video. It’s not playing by the same sort of rules that most other music videos use. If every music video sits somewhere on the continuum of art and advertising, this video is far down the art end.

“Lull Dark Restart” is mainly an instrumental track, with an ambient feeling. Most of the video is made up of micrograph footage of the workings of a watch. There’s a combination of traditional watch elements like cogs, as well as modern electronic bits.

Amid all this is occasional appearances from a guy wearing no shirt. He walks back and forth, looking meaningful, occasionally lip-synching the indistinct vocal samples.

This reminds me of the video for Cicada’s song “Winter”. Like Cicada’s video, “Lull Dark Restart” feels like it’s only meant to be a visual accompaniment to the song and isn’t fussed with selling records. And so I feel that the video isn’t really intended for me, but rather just for those who already enjoy HDU’s music.

Best bit: the gleefully implausible lip-sync.

Directors: Jason Kerr, Constantine Karlis
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… getting high on artificial grass.

Graham Brazier “Long Gone For Good”

Going solo after the world of Hello Sailor, Graham enters a stylish, noirish world of the night, where three bad people each end up dead in the boot of a car. But is this the real life or is it just a revenge fantasy?

Guided by the lyrics, there’s Shorty, who “thinks he’s a big man”, but meets a grisley fate after drugging a woman; Nancy the lurex-clad stripper who throws a jiggling client (eeeew) out of a high building; and a salesman (played by Paolo Rotondo) whose manic sales pitch ends with his beheading.

During the instrumental break, the screen splits into thirds and all three stories are simultaenously shown again, each ending with the same car in the same dark alley.

It’s left unclear whether there really are three murders or if it’s just a dark fantasy of stressed out individuals living tough lives.

This grimy world is left behind with Graham finding a smashed bottle of milk on his sunny suburban doorstep. Hey, that’s milk in bottles, even though back in 1998 milk was widely available in cartons and plastic bottles. But was it really smashed? Perked up by a cup of instant, Graham finishes the video by just playing the song, then he’s gone.

Best bit: the salesman’s glamorous mannequin prop.

Director: Marek Sumich
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… micro tick, macro tock.