“Happy Song” was the fourth of the eight funded videos from Rubicon’s debut album “Primary Colours. The album had 14 tracks, so more than half of them had music videos made. That beats both Fiona McDonald and Tadpole’s previous total of seven videos from one album.
This video sees Rubicon in spaaaace, with a parody of both Star Wars and Star Trek. Actually, I don’t think you’re allowed to do that. I think mashing up those two strongholds of popular science-fiction culture makes people really upset. And for a song that’s about happiness, that’s a bad thing to do.
The Rubicon trio are on the bridge of a spaceship, each wearing skivvies in primary colours with the group logo, which oddly enough is more reminiscent of the Wiggles costumes than the Star Trek uniforms.
It’s a lighthearted video, with plenty of “we’re under attack!” acting, which involves hurtling oneself across the screen. After fighting off attacking ships, the lads soon discover the alien enemy is on board the ship, requiring doofy laser guns to be deployed.
The song sneaks in a drum solo (Paul Reid is does a Karen Carpenter and sings from his drumkit), and while the band rock out in their civilian world, back on the ship the trio are fighting off a bad guy (who looks like an extra from Hercules) with budget-as lightsabers. The enemy defeated, the group go in for hugs. And so their happy broventures in space continue.
It’s a Rubicon video. They were, for a couple of years, really popular and made fun videos that their young fans enjoyed. And hey, if James Bond can go into space, so can Rubicon.
Best bit: the not-quite-solid lightsaber animations.
Director: Andy McGrath
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision
Next… star quality.
that equals Fiona McDonald and Tadpole’s previous total of seven videos
It turns out what I got wrong was the total of videos from Primary. It was eight tracks (!) not seven. But thanks for doing some crowd-sourced subediting. Much appreciated.