5000 Ways to Love You – Page 81 – Exploring the world of NZ On Air music video funding

Headless Chickens “Dark Angel”

I’m going to keep talking about how I love the Headless Chickens third album, “Greedy”. “Dark Angel” was the opening track and it instantly takes me back to my first year in Auckland, 22 and trying to figure how where I fitted in in the crazy city.

Despite my likage for the song, I’d never seen the video. It reminds me of the “Mr Moon” video, with colour layers floating over the top of the black and white band.

But this time around Fiona is gone, but there is a woman in the video. Taking inspiration from the opening titles of Bond films, the video features shots of a naked lady. Who needs a girl in the band when you can just use female body parts in the video?

I started to think about the woman. What if she was actually a Bond girl, Chookie Galore, a good girl who got involved with the Headless Chickens gang. Has she come to seduce you, Mr Bond?

There’s a strange vibe in this video. It’s very stylish and has a pretty colour palette, yet there’s a very strong masculine feel to it. The band have a sluggish yet menacing look about them. I wonder if the naked lady and the colours were thrown in to balance it out, to add a touch of femininity to what might have otherwise been too grunty.

I get the same feeling with every video from “Greedy” – something wasn’t good with the band. While the music sounds fine, the videos feels like something had broken in the band and was being held together with the thinnest thread.

Best bit: the brief glimpse of a little bird figurine. I sense a theme.

Note: This video was on YouTube, MySpace and MTV Australia, but now it’s not.

Director: Jonathan Ogilvie
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… Venice of the South Seas.

Head Like A Hole “Beatnik”

Tribute albums were big in the ’90s. As well as Flying Nun’s Abba tribute “Abbasalutely”, the label also released “God Save the Clean”, where local bands tackled the back catalogue of the Clean. HLAH’s contribution was their version of “Beatnik”.

The video keeps with the weirdness of the original video, opening with a spin around Albert Park where we meet Booga playing a disco-suited lout, which is as close as HLAH get to a beatnik. I mean, there’s no way HLAH could do the black skivvy and beret thing.

The beatnik causes trouble in a Jervois Road dairy and bothers some people outside St Patrick’s Cathedral. In the world of HLAH, men still wear walk shorts and long songs, so obviously they deserve to be bothered. There’s some more bothering at the Herne Bay Bowling Club, then the band heads over to the Point Erin Pool where they play on the concrete divider between the two pool areas. This video has so many Auckland landmarks that it could form the basis of a walking tour.

In the rool-trippy-as middle bit of the song, the action moves to the most amazing restaurant ever. All the walls have fish tanks on them and the room has freaky fishtank light. I want this place to still exist. I want to go there.

The action winds up with a saunter through the bowling club bar, then the band hangs out in the middle of Ponsonby Road. Guys, it’s not safe there!

HLAH take the Clean’s original song and throw it around a bit, having some fun with it. The video has that vibe too, and I love all the Aucklandic locations.

Best bit: the briefcase do-si-do with Mr Walkshorts.

Director: Julian Boshier
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

There’s actually a second version of this video, which is more like a remix of the original video. I don’t think it’s as good as the original, but it may be worth a look.

Next… would you like me to seduce you?

Eye TV “Wish It All Away”

Serenading used to be so much simpler. The young man would stand outside the abode of his beloved and strum a song – or hold up a boombox – and win her over. When Eye TV try it, things don’t quite go as planned.

It starts out well, as they being to play the song outside a house. But where is the object of their affections? I say “they” because it really does seem to be a group effort, as if the entire band if trying to win someone over.

The first person to notice them is a woman taking out the washing. At night? It’ll never dry. Slowly people in the building become aware of the woo-ers. A light snaps on. An old man frowns. A group of young women cheer. Two dudes grin. An older couple find the situation romantic. But what sort of house is this? Why do all these different people live in the same house? Perhaps it’s a halfway house.

The locals are well into the group’s dreamy 1950s-tinged pop ballad (except the old man), but there’s no sign of the girl. But suddenly she comes walking down the road, wearing a waitress uniform and slouchy old sneakers. But rather than walking like someone who’s been on her feet all day long, she’s doing a sexy catwalk strut, which looks really weird.

Finally the girl is reunited with the band. Proving that this is some sort of bizarre love quadrangle, the video ends with the four of them going on a romantic countryside date in a convertible. Modern love.

Best bit: the youths who carry a couch outside to enjoy the entertainment.

Director: Jesse Warn
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… dirty beatniks.

Bic Runga “Roll Into One”

This was the fifth single off Bic’s mega successful album “Drive”. The video, directed by Paul Casserly, doesn’t stray too far from the style of previous Bic videos. The focus is on Bic, with a twist of quirk.

Much of the video is shot in a very bold, high-contrast black and white with elegantly framed shots of Bic being cool – tossing and turning in bed and playing her guitar. But this is mixed with footage shot in other styles – grainy black and white, sophisticated high-contrast colour (highlighting Bic’s cheekbones) and casual handheld video. The formal shots of Bic are mixed with a mosaic of the more casual footage.

And then there’s the clown. Just when things were feeling normal-ish, a clown shows up wearing a white and red suit, a fur collar, googles and a flashing light on his head. And, being a clown in a video music, he takes Polaroid pics of Bic sleeping.

I kind of like videos like this. It’s not especially ambitious, just content to showcase Bic and the song. And the clown.

Best bit: At 0:56 Bic overpronounces “one” as “Juan”, making “let the days all roll into Juan”.

Director: Paul Casserly
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… A neighbourhood serenade.

Damien Binder “Stray Banter”

So, this is a weird one. This video is in the Kiwi Hits database as having received funding in 1997, but it looks the video wasn’t made then so the funding went back into the pool. The “Stray Banter” video finally appeared in 2001, but without NZOA funding. But I figure it’s worth including.

The video is shot in one take and slowed down a bit. By now I’ve grown weary of such techniques. It’s going to take more than that to impress me, yah.

So, Damien wakes up by the side of a country road and discovers he’s not alone. There’s been some sort of car crash. A confuses woman wanders around, a guy in a suit shouts into a cellphone and the contents of a suitcase are strewn on the road. A bewildered farmer, a small boy and a random cyclist look on the scene.

We eventually catch a glimpse of the car, which seems to have been involved in a head-on collision with… an invisible forcefield. And no sign of skidmarks either. Yeah, I’m thinking it’s an insurance scam.

The video seems to have been so caught up in the novelty of the scenario that the song have taken a backseat, feeling more like a soundtrack to a short film than the star of the video. Juice TV played this video a lot in late 2001, but while the images of the video were very familiar to me, I had no memory of the song itself.

Best bit: angry cellphone man – nothing can make him chill.

Director: Jonathan King
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… some sound advice.

The Exponents “Change Your Mind”

Jordan Luck, MNZM, is subdued in this video. He usually slips into rockstar mode with such effortlessness that it seems like he’s having to consciously rein himself in.

“Change Your Mind” is a fairly ordinary video for this era. It’s very much influenced by Tarsem Singh’s era-defining video for REM’s song “Losing My Relgion”, complete with flash-cuts, focus-pulling and a subdued palette.

The video is set in a house full of objects, like a junk shop. In one cluttered room, we see a mysterious redhead woman who’s obviously the cause of the drama which fuels the song. The band perform the song in a corridor full of stuff. Not quite up there with Sweetwaters.

Jordan is very handsome in this video. He his shaggy locks have been tamed into a short, tidy haircut and the camera lingers on his strong jawline, but he’s still allowed a touch of the old extravagance with his open-neck silk shirt.

This song – and indeed this video – isn’t what the Exponents are remembered for, but I’m happy that this video exists as an artefact of the late ’90s

Best bit: the red-headed woman dramatically screws up a blank piece of paper.

Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… a detour.

The Stereo Bus “Be A Girl”

“Be A Girl” takes us into a teenage girl’s bedroom where we find a forlorn Dave Yetton. The room is decked out with posters John Lennon, Bee Gees, the Eurythmics and David Bowie. I was going to say this doesn’t look like the bedroom of a ’90s teenage girl, but maybe it is. Maybe she not listening to cool bands like Vercua Salt or the Smashing Pumpkins and is instead holed up in her bedroom, listening to pop classics, sad that no one else gets her.

The beginning of the video features a lot of Dave lazing about on the single bed, his only friend a little doll. It’s all very bright, colourful and feminine, even though the song and Dave’s long face is dragging things down.

About halfway through we meet the rest of the band hanging out in a field by the sea, looking all quirky, just like something out of a JPSE video. I’m less convinced by these scenes. They seem a little tacked on, but maybe this is a fantasy of the girl.

I really like this song. It’s very fragile and raw, looking at female weakness in a similar way that JPSE’s song “Flex” look at the male. So I feel like the video hasn’t quite captured the essence of the song. But yet there’s a lot of charm in the video, with the lonely girl/man, alone her in bedroom, being a girl.

Best bit: Dave’s mutual wave with the doll.

Director: Andrew Moore
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Bonus! Here’s the Stereo Bus playing the song live on Ice TV, including particularly pleasing close-ups of the arpeggio guitar work.

Next… a strong jawline.

King Kapisi “Sub-Cranium Feeling”

“Sub-Cranium Feeling” was King Kapisi’s first single and it made it to number eight in the pop charts. The arrival of King Kapisi was interesting. One minute he wasn’t there, the next minute he’d always been there. And so this video is like the birth – or the creation myth – of King Kapisi, where he just comes swimming along, surrounded by colourful lavalava, a violin, LPs and family photos.

The video even starts with a little kid who comes running into a studio, straight for the microphone. Then we meet ol’ King Cabbage himself, frolicking in a mysterious dark pool of water. We also see him in a more ordinary setting, rapping into a mic, in a comfy cardigan and wearing specs.

YouTube uploader mindbait describes the video as “simple but great”, and that’s a perfect description. Nothing much happens in the video, but it doesn’t need to. It’s a strong song and the video works as a perfect introduction to the world of King Kapisi.

Best bit: the violin that emerges from the water. That’s munted it.

Director: Sima Urale
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… lonely teen girl.

Garageland “Feel Alright”

The last time we saw Garageland, they were a fun alterno-pop-rock group, good for having a few drinks and jumping around to. But the band changed. Guitarist Debbie left, the band moved to the UK and new guitarist Andrew Claridge came on board. But more importantly, the band had become more serious, more mature.

The “Feel Alright” video is an introduction to this new Garageland. Directed by British film-maker Gina Birch (formerly of post-punk group The Raincoats), the video consists of a grid of 12 one-take shots of the band, with each band member split into three sections.

Filmed in black and white in an urban wasteland with the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral glimmering in the background, it’s a slick video that is very definitely not playing up to any New Zealandness.

This song has always reminded me of an old instant coffee commercial, the way that instant coffee used to be marketed as a soothing, relaxing, comforting experience. And this video captures that feeling. Even when there’s a burning newspaper, a giant pumpkin or the dazzling reflection of the run, it’s still four dudes just hanging out, feeling alright.

Best bit: passing the pumpkin.

Director: Gina Birch
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… the first splash.

Eye TV “Dynamite”

This video is directed by Supergroove’s bass player Joe Lonie, who gained his directing chops through making all the videos for Supergroove. I’m not sure if this is his first video for another band, but it’s at least amongst his earliest. Joe’s music videos have a particular style – they all have a gimmick. This video can be summed up thusly: shot in one take, with sped-up footage, the band perform the song on the back of a truck at it drives around One Tree Hill. Kind of like Bjork’s “Big Time Sensuality” video, plus colour and a Kiwi location, minus the budget and Stephane Sednaoui’s artistic eye.

“Dynamite” is an energetic rock number, with the fierce, Nietzsche-quoting chorus “I am not a man! I am dynamite!” The video captures this energy, with the sped-up footage giving the video a crazy twitchy energy.

While the video has a gimmick behind it, the song and the general execution of the video don’t make it seem gimmicky. The idea of a “dynamite” person hooning up One Tree Hill and then coming down just as fast, fits well with the theme and tempo of the song.

But like other videos of this era shot at One Tree Hill, it now has a bittersweet flavour. Everytime there’s a glimpse of the now missing tree, a feel a little sadness. Poor tree.

Best bit: the two moments where Luke the drummer gets to come up to the front.

Director: Joe Lonie
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision

Next… drawn and quartered.