I Don't Like Monday / Jeremy

So Pearl Jam finally released their original cut of 1991's "Jeremy." The outstanding RockTownHall wondered which was better, the song "Jeremy" or its predecessor "I Don't Like Mondays" by the Boomtown Rats, and which video was superior.

I always loved "Mondays"—the song, that is—even (or maybe especially) the version from The Secret Policeman's Ball. And props to Bob Geldof for writing about something so harrowing while it was still so fresh and doing so in a way that's, to my ears, sensitive and doesn't go for the easy out in any way. (And for admitting how inherently problematic it is to have a successful single about something so tragic.)

I do wonder about the song's arrangement: there seems to be a bit of a piss-take about the original recording of "I Don't Like Mondays," which could be like the Rolling Stones adding the choir to the beginning of "You Can't Always Get What You Want" in that it deflates the artist themselves, or it could be an honest attempt at being Artsy, or it could be them backing off the emotional intensity a bit by throwing up an ironical shield. I like it...but I'm not sure it was the best way to go. Although, hey, it gave them their first and only hit, so what the hell do I know?

What's more, the video has a surprisingly lasting power to it, given its relative antiquity.

But I feel it loses the courage of its own convictions in the final third, perhaps due to record label restrictions—that's entirely speculation on my part—as it starts to verge on almost goofy (Geldof does a surprisingly good but entirely inapt Mick Jagger impersonation and the interpretive dance in the background is a resounding failure) where earlier it had felt significantly more earnest.

Meanwhile, being earnest has obviously never been an issue for heart-on-their-sleeves-no-matter-what Pearl Jam. And this finds them absolutely firing on all cylinders—the lyric is outstanding in the way it's simultaneously sparse and yet filled with snippets of details which tell so much. Musically, it's an unimpeachable slab of rock and roll, with its slow build giving a tiny hint of what's to come but not really preparing the listener for the relentless onslaught approaching. I'm unfortunately not a fan of vibrato, which means there's only so much I can love Eddie Vedder's vocals, but here they do nothing but work 100%. And of course, Stone Gossard and Mike McCready are one of the great guitar duos of all time—if they're never going to threaten Duane Allman and Dickie Betts, I'd certainly MUCH rather hear them play than Keef and Woody. (If perhaps not quite as much as Keef and Mick Taylor and not nearly as much as Paul Westerberg and Bob Stinson.) Most of all, Pearl Jam was kicked along by Dave Krusen, who just absolutely rips it up on this song. (Matt Cameron is an excellent drummer and Pearl Jam has said that without him joining they wouldn't have been able to keep going so I'm glad he's a member but to my ears he's by a huge margin their least good fit musically.)

And where the earlier video is surprisingly effective, the latter has the benefit of a decade of advancement in video technology and understanding of the medium and while it can perhaps seem a bit overly emo from this much later vantage point, that's not taking into account how devastating it was at the time. So I'd argue it's leagues better, especially since, unlike the Rats, PJ doesn't back down at the song's climax...and that's putting it mildly. Also, Eddie Vedder looks like an answer to the question no one ever asked: what if they Joker had pinkish skin and was possessed by the devil? Not sure if that's what ol' Ed was going for but, again, damn sam, is it effective. So I'd say the video is a decisive win for Pearl Jam, while the song is a draw.

I lived in San Diego for about a dozen years. And my last year there, I suddenly thought, hey, I wonder where the inspiration for "I Don't Like Mondays" happened. Surprisingly hard to find the exact address—not impossible, but five years ago, surprisingly difficult. And it turns out not only was it about a mile from where I lived, but the street was one I'd pass on at least a weekly basis on my way to the grocery store, meaning I'd driven by it hundreds of times. I haven't been there in three or four years now, I guess, and Google Maps seems to indicate they've finally torn it down and put up nice new houses. Life moves on.

Owner of a Lonely Heart

I am amazed by this video. Amazed that it took me nearly 40 years to witness its majestic awfulness. Amazed that this was made by the same band at roughly the same time as the other video they did for the same song—a video that would be (justifiably) played to death by MTV. Amazed that they decided to cut away from Trevor Rabin just as he's about to sing the echo to the title in the chorus. Amazed by the comments it's engendered:

That looks like something a junior-high school band did for their drummer's aunt's public access cable TV show.

"MOVE YOURSELF."
Hardly moves

The ratio of awesome music to awkward visuals is staggering

No parrot has been harmed in the making of this video, several stylists and visual artists died during production though.

The setting sucks. Was the whole budget spent on the parrots?

Mom! Dad's singing in the living room again.

The singer even looks like he rushed from his summer job at the Thrifty Drug ice cream counter and forgot to take his nametag off.

If you mute it, the singer appears to be a daytime kids TV presenter talking over educational concepts for the kids who were too ill to go to school.

When every contestant in the "world's least cool man" competition wins!

Holy shit this is bad. They must have felt amazing in the studio: "look Trevor Horn is making us sound like the future". And then they made this.

Good god that’s awful. I couldn’t get through the whole thing but assume the sand worm from Beetlejuice came along and ate all of them.

Now I know why so many serial killers like prog rock

I mean...just look at this thing. Are any of those comments wrong? Or even unfair?

(Okay, this one may be a little unfair. But funny!)

I feel sorry for their lonely hut. Someone should move in.

Outta My Head / Separate Ways

How, in this post-post-postmodern world do you make a good video for your fine song? With a shot for shot remake of the worst video ever, of course.

I have very mixed feelings about this remix culture society we find ourselves in, where memes are so prevalent and truly great works of art are often first introduced to and best known by younger viewers/readers/listeners by the snide (and often very funny) jokes made out of them and at their expense. On the one hand, I love the way the internet has granted so many artists the tools and audiences to enable them to create in a way they likely never would have a few decades earlier. On the other hand, I don't think it comes without a cost.

But this? This is just gold. 

Shostakovich Prelude and Fugue no. 17 in A-flat Major

I am gobsmacked and beyond delighted to find one of my favorite YouTube channels, the utterly delightful smalin, has a new video out—its first to feature not only the greatest of Soviet composers, Dmitri Shostakovich, but a piece from my absolute favorite work of his, 24 Preludes and Fugues, op 87, performed by the greatest of Soviet pianists, the brilliant Sviatoslav Richter.

Any Way You Want It

So I've known this song for the vast majority of my life. And I've even known the vast majority of the words for all those years. But I'd never actually thought about any of them, or seen the video, until this week, and both are so much greater than I could have expected.

First, there's the intro, which was the third longest 40 seconds of my life, behind only any 40 seconds of the day I spent deep sea fishing on really choppy seas, where every single one of the hundred or so passengers were vomiting until their stomachs were emptied, at which point they continued to dry heave for hours until finally returning to shore blessed short, and the time I had two ruptured discs in my back and felt like the bones in my hip and leg had turned to lava. And right after those comes that intro.

Then there's the first shot of the band, which has bass player Ross Valory in the EFG, with singer Steve Perry and guitar whiz Neal Schon in the middleground and poor original singer/keyboardist Gregg Rolie hidden in the background. But not quite as hidden as superdrummer Steve Smith, who's hidden by Valory's shoulder for absolutely no good reason—had they simply moved the camera about four inches to the left, he would have been visible (as would the rest of the band) and they wouldn't have had to insert the next quick shot of him in the name of fairness. A sign of how primitive early videomaking was? Of how drummers are so unjustly overlooked, despite the occasional exhortation to give the drummer some? An omen of things to come? (The thing to come most soon is the mini-jitterbug kneeshake Perry executes right before the opening verse starts.)

And what an opening verse:

She loves to laugh
She loves to sing
She does everything
She loves to move
She loves to groove
She loves the loving things

I've never really heard—certainly haven't ever paid attention—to that final line. But now I literally laugh out loud every damn time I hear it. "She loves the lovin' things." You're damn right she does. Those lovin' things? She's not just fond of them. Oh hell no. She outright loves them. Oh my great googlymoogly. Poor T.S. Eliot, never mind Smokey Robinson or Roger Waters, must be (sometimes posthumously) positively green with envy at the lyrical concision.

That may be ever so slightly unfair. After all, later we'll learn that they do indeed sing of said lovin' things—this is simply foreshadowing!

And then there's the chorus:

Any way you want it
That's the way you need it
Any way you want it
She said, any way you want it
That's the way you need it
Any way you want it

Which is a bit more ambiguous than I feel comfortable with. How does he need it? And what precisely is this it in question? I don't feel that's ever properly resolved. (And yet, somehow, looking at this gentlemen, I'm okay with that.)

Watching the video, you can see that Perry keeps wanting to make his trademark circular motions, but perhaps he hasn't quite perfected the move. It's always so instructive to be able to retroactively trace an artist's growth.

But then comes Schon's guitar solo...and it's undeniable. The guy can not only play—he's got oodles and boodles of technique—but he knows how to construct a solo that starts strong and builds, with melodies every bit as strong as the song's main melodic theme.

None of which seems to placate Rolie. Except for one blurry shot where he's smiling in the background, the poor bastard (in stark contrast to Valory, who seems to be having the time of his life) looks like he's in hell—his Paul McCartney puppy dog eyes meets Nick Drake's tortured soul making clear he wouldn't be in the band for much longer.

Also, keep an eye out for the quick shot of the board for absolutely no reason whatsoever. A nod to Buñuel, one assumes.

And then there's that last twenty seconds of the video. You're thinking that watching the record return to its resting place is the emotion capper, or perhaps that it's the early music video equivalent of Satre's No Exit...but either way, you're wrong. Because just when you think this primitive video offering can't get any more transcendent, there's that final shot of Perry doing his best Arthur Fonzarelli, which only goes to emphasize just how magical Henry Winkler was, and how difficult to pull off that level of cool really is.

Finally, why the hell is the video—from the official Journey channel—ever so slightly out of sync? What are they trying to say with such an unorthodox presentation? I know it means something, that it's just not just a sloppy oversight. It's got some much deeper meaning and I must know. (I'll even let them explain what the it is.)

Some Guys Have All the Luck

So previously I had declared this here perhaps The Most 80s Video Ever. Then a very unkind pal sent me this Rod Stewart video and I may have to reassess.

The animated effects, the deliberately herky-jerky framerate, the neon juxtaposed against the Patrick Nagel-like black and white, the drum machine, the chiming synths, the cheesy humor at the very beginning, the Miami Vice outfits...and of course, Rod the Mod at his Jaggerian pranciest. And if there's an artist in the world who has less standing to sing this nice guy anthem, I don't know who.

Needless to say, I love every second of this.

After the Fire

DT and I were talking a while back about post-Keith Moon Who LPs, as well as subsequent solo albums from various Who members. And I recalled that the Pete Townshend-written Roger Daltrey track "After the Fire" was really good.

But what I didn't recall was that the video itself gives Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart" a serious run for its money when it comes to Most 80s Video Ever.

Sure, that's some earnest damn emoting at the beginning there, but then, Roger's always been a heart-on-the-sleeve singer. (And, if biographies are to be believe, guy.) And, yeah, you might think that one dramatic whiparound was enough, never mind seven. That's right, seven; I slowed the video down to half-speed, just to make sure my tally was right—although, admittedly, on the last one, he does a 270, rather than a 180, so I'm not positive if it counts. But what makes the opening work for me is how much drama he gets out of...lighting a match. Yeah, he later uses that match to spark a genuine conflagration, but that's in the future. At the moment the match is lit, it's just a surprise Spanish Inquisition-like appearance of...a match. And not even one of them really big mamajamas, neither; it's just a simple bog standard match, like used to be on the counter for the taking in restaurants and hotels and convenience stores. And yet the gravitas, the drama—it is simply glorious.

And I remembered right: pretty sweet tune.

Favorite Song Friday: Press

Look. Let's this get this right out of the way up front: I'm not saying this is a great song. I am, however, saying that it's far better than its reputation. And, moreover, I'm saying I love it so very hard.

Sure, its production is ridonkulous, and I say that as someone who has loved unabashedly and unreservedly many of Hugh Padgham's records. And yet it's hard to deny that the production is so 1980s it should be wearing parachute pants.

But it's not all the production's fault. Macca's style is in full bloom here, for good and bad. The good is that, of course, it's an insanely catchy song, with a bridge that most good artists would kill a dozen homeless people for in order to use it as a chorus. And the verse is even catchier. And neither comes close to how catchy the chorus itself actually is. And his voice sounds great, even for him—once you get past the silly pseudo-accent he adopts for the count-in. And, frankly, the overt sexuality of the lyric is somewhere between bracing and kind of embarrassing, and good for him. (I think.)

But then he throws in bits like the "Oklahoma" part and what the hell is with that? First of all, structurally, it's weird—the kind of weird he seems to revel in, as though he'd mastered the perfect pop form long ago and so has to deliberately try to sabotage songs in order to keep things interesting. (To be fair, he's probably not wrong.)

Anyhoo, the most famous musician in the world can do many things, but convince someone he's a boy from Oklahoma ain't one of 'em. I mean...look at the expression on the woman's face at 2:14. She tries to be cool and pretend she's not utterly stoked to be in the presence of a damn Beatle...but she can't. No one can. And no one's not fully aware that Sir Paul McCartney was born and bred 4475 miles from the Sooner State. And then, to make things worse, he has the silly drum break, apparently determined to outdo (or perhaps indo) John Fogerty on "Zanz Kant Dance."

Wow. That's a lot of negativity from a guy who claims to like the song. And I don't really have all that many arguments to counterbalance the criticisms. Except this: it's Paul. And all that stuff is true, this is kind of a lousy record, well below "Silly Love Song" standards (and I'm not kidding about that). But it's still got Paul damn McCartney unleashing that impossibly great voice on a fantastic melody, the kind which inspired the brilliant Douglas Adams to write:

Arthur could almost imagine Paul McCartney sitting with his feet up by the fire on evening, humming it to Linda and wondering what to buy with the proceeds, and thinking probably Essex.

Also the video's a hoot.

Supposedly this is literally the first time McCartney had ridden the underground since 1962. That's pretty believable, but would also make a dandy urban legend. Either way, watching the reaction of people realizing they're near a Beatle just doesn't really get old, and he's so damn charming that his deep-seated need to please and be liked somehow doesn't grate (too much). Also, his hair looked better back before he started dyeing it.

So. Yeah. Not a great song. But at least every few years I'm hit with the urge to listen to it and whenever I do I find myself playing it a half dozen times because really some people just wanna fill the world with silly love songs, and what's wrong with that?

Backstabber

This is a hysterically accurate dead-on parody of early 80s rock videos, up there with "Total Eclipse of the Heart" and "Separate Ways." The fact that it's real just makes it all the better.

A pal sent it to me. Shocked that I—such an avid MTV viewer—had never seen or even heard of it before, I went looking for more info, and found this, which sums it up perfectly in the comments: "what the hell?"

Face Dances, Pt. 2

I had neither heard this song nor seen this video in several decades, and yet I was amazed at how well I remembered so much of it, from the melody to some of the lyrics to a lot of the visuals: I always especially loved the screeching guitar part at 2:25, neverminding the fact that his hands should be moving down the neck and not up.

But what I don't remember ever knowing is that the song is in 5/4 but that during the choruses, the drummer—either Mark Brzezicki or Simon Phillips, the credits aren't clear—plays as though the signature has switched to 4/4.

Also, are guys really supposed to use that much aftershave?

Blow Away

This is such a horrible video. Even granting that the medium was in its relative infancy, it's still pretty terrible, thanks to George looking typically tense and awkward as he's being forced to mime in extreme close-up, dance, and frolic with, among other absurdities, a giant bath toy duck.

If you've never seen this before, no, that's not a typo. A giant bath toy duck.

But saying he was "forced to," despite appearances, isn't actually right. The video's director was Neil Innes, best known for sharing a birthday with me and for working extensively with Monty Python—so much so that he was sometimes known as The Seventh Python, and not without reason, writing or co-writing many of their songs, and appearing as (among other characters) the lead minstrel following Brave Sir Robin around in Monty Python and— the Holy Grail. Oh, and of course, he was the creative mastermind behind something called The Rutles. So I guess it's safe to say George—producer of (and actor in) Monty Python's Life of Brian, had some idea what he was getting into when he tapped Innes to direct this thing.

But that's not why I posted it. I posted it because it came up in my playlist this morning and listening the opening few seconds I realized that while no one in the world would put George Harrison in a list of the Top 10 Best Slide Guitarists, I will say that he very well may be the single most distinctive slide guitarist ever. His tone, his style, his melodic approach bears no resemblance I can hear to Elmore James or Duane Allman, leaning instead on his pop instincts, as well as perhaps his beloved Indian music—which, given the slide's ability to glide to or lightly touch upon notes a regular fretted guitar can't, might have allowed him to more closely approach Indian music's use of microtones.

Also, the goofy smile he gives the very first time he sings "be happy" is itself reason enough for this video. This horrible, horrible, wonderful, glorious video.

Dancing in the Street

Amazingly, or perhaps not, this is significantly better than the original, if only because it's shorter and Bowie isn't so oddly overshadowed.



[H/T: the great Dangerous Minds.]

Life on Mars?

You may have been wondering, "say, what on YouTube has the combination of the most beautiful sounds and the most unintentionally hideous visuals?" Well, wonder no more!

I ask you to focus on sailors fighting in the dance hall—oh, man, look at those cavemen go.

She's Gone

Even without the restrictions of MTV to push against, this very early Hall & Oates video is shockingly challenging, frighteningly explicit and almost maniacally intense.

The horrific realism of the Satanic representation is enough to make anyone a believer. 

We Are the World

I'm not exaggerating when I say I have never seen a more fascinating bit of rock and roll filmmaking. Just watch as Bob Dylan is patiently guided through his verses by Stevie Wonder. When Bob can't find his way into the song, he turns to Stevie and asks for help. "Can he play it one time?" Dylan asks. And Stevie Wonder does play it. But not one time. He plays it and then he plays it again. And then he plays it again. And again. Quincy Jones may have been the official producer of the session, and he is a presence, but it's Wonder who really produces this section of the song, teaching, encouraging, coaching Dylan.

It's hard to reconcile how timid and uncertain Dylan is at the beginning with the popular view of him, but his unease almost seems to border on fear at times, as he asks Stevie to play and sing his short lines over and over. Others shout encouragement, as if it were a sporting event; you can hear Bruce Springsteen at several points, including him calling out to assure his dissatisfied idol, "that sure sounded great, though, Bob."

But Stevie Wonder's the real star here, even seeming to forget himself, dancing and clapping in the background, when Dylan finally gets into it. He plays Dylan's section repeatedly, helping Bob figure out what he wants to do, and making the key suggestion to the booth to put more drums into the mix, a seemingly odd idea which seems to help Dylan immediately. Bob's relief and gratitude when Lionel Richie joins Jones in congratulating Dylan upon completion of his part is palpable and even endearing.

Bob Dylan is many things. A genius. A monster musician. The most influential American songwriter of the past fifty years. Clearly wickedly funny, intelligent, erudite, sarcastic, private. But the one thing I'd never have imagined he was is sweet.

(You're So Square) Baby I Don't Care

This was one of the very first Elvis clips I ever saw. I'm sure I'd seen bits and pieces, especially when he died, but few of them stuck with me. This, though...I remember watching this and thinking, oh...right. I get it. Now I get it. 

There was a period where MTV used to play this fairly often. I'm not sure why—maybe it gave them some sort of hipster cred, putting it on between the latest hair metal and some Brit synth pop. Or mabye it was simply that it was less than two minutes long and made programming easier.

All I recall is that no matter who it came between, artists I loved, artists I hated or artists I didn't really care about, it was more than a breath of fresh air: it was absolutely spellbinding. The easygoing manner, the way he clearly has no training as a dancer and yet is almost liquid in his movements as the music starts in his feet and works its way up his legs until he brings into song, the small smile, as if this is all just a private joke you're in on together, the overall insouciance, it all added up to the best two minutes on MTV. I'd watch this and think, sure, Dylan and Lennon and Springsteen are all open about it but, no, I don't care what the bios say about Anthony Newley and  Lindsay Kemp, this, this is where David Bowie got most of his moves, not to mention where Robert Plant got his...well, pretty much everything.

Elvis had the voice, he had the looks, he had the moves and, most of all, he was just. so. damn. cool. It came three years after the true beginning, but watching this is very nearly like being able to witness the big bang of rock and roll.

And just check out the expressions on the faces of the extras; not one of them seem to be acting.

Girls in Their Summer Clothes

"The girls in their summer clothes
In the cool of the evening light
Girls in their summer clothes
Pass me by"

Over on Facebook, Scott and I are counting down the Top 50 Bruce Springsteen songs in alphabetical order. Hopefully, when complete, the list will run here someday. Hopefully. Hope is a good thing, Red.

Anyways, we just got to “Girls in Their Summer Clothes” as part of our countdown (yeah, we’re only on the Gs. What of it?) It’s not an obscure song—it’s newer (2007) and all, though fans seem to appreciate it—but it’s not exactly one of the first, say, few dozen songs you think about when you think of Bruce Springsteen.

What a song, though. As if Bruce spent a day with Brian Wilson (in a good way), walking along the beach and then later exploring some warm, breezy pop stylings in the studio. This is a close to a Pet Sounds sound as Bruce ever came, with layers of guitars and keyboards and effortless timekeeping by Max and Brendan O’Brien’s lush and glossy production. At once hopeful (“Things been a little tight, but I know they’re gonna turn on my way”) and then suddenly mournful (“She went away — she cut me like a knife”) and then back to hopeful again right away (“Hello beautiful thing — maybe you just saved my life.”) When Bruce shows you more than one side of the coin, the results are almost always impressive.

And then there’s the video, which I found and posted on Facebook and I’d almost forgotten about. Because sadly, these days I just don't think about music videos anywhere near as often as I once did.

Bruce has never made a prettier vid, and this is certainly in the running for the prettiest videos ever produced.

A gruff but resolute Bruce walks along a chilly early summer beach under hazy sunshine all alone, through a light fog as the waves crash in foamy white splendor. Sand-drawn hearts disappear as the water takes them out to sea. Seagulls fly and in and out of the frame in chaotic precision. The video shifts from whitewashed tones to black and white to brilliant, popping blues and reds. Angelic images mesh with windswept beach scenes as Bruce sings, sometimes with a guitar, sometimes not. And intertwined with these shots over and over, but never once in the same shot as Bruce, are the girls.

Old ones, young ones, black ones, white ones, some running, some posing, all quickly in and out of the frame with a smile or a knowing gaze, or sometimes both. Bruce has spent so much of his life as a singer/songwriter watching the pretty girls and pursuing them, it was about time he put as many of them as possible into one hypnotically lovely video. And what’s fascinating is the way the video echoes the song: the girls he sings about all “pass me by,” leaving him alone. There are dozens of comely female faces that pop up in the four minutes of this video. None of them are with our singer. That’s a perfect touch, one that wonderfully conveys the song’s ethereal mix of melancholy and whimsy.

My favorite part of the video comes around the 2:41 mark, just after the bridge, as Bruce sings “Hello beautiful thing…” Four shots come, all in a row. The first is Bruce, alone by a pier, sans guitar, beckoning the “beautiful thing” to come to him. The next is a positively stunning young woman shot in closeup, smiling sweetly amidst a fog that breezes past her, which is then followed by a statue of an angel, nearly bleached out in the sunlight. Finally we are back to Bruce, now with guitar and familiar cocksure pose, again singing straight into the camera about “Just a glance….”

Only about 7 seconds pass in this time, yet so much ground is covered. The longing for closeness from the singer, followed by two stark ideals that have played such tremendous roles throughout Bruce’s career: the gorgeous face and the literal angel, neither of which stay around longer than a glancing vision. Finally, we have the confident and driven singer again, alone with the guitar, ready to move on after one more glance. It’s a wondrous sequence that spotlights the fleeting sense of romance that Bruce has been chasing for his whole career.

As the video fades into a chorus of “La la la las” and more images of the girls hit the screen and run away, Bruce ends up as he started. By himself on the beach, bathed in sunlight. Alone for now, but ever hopeful.

Natalie Imbruglia: Torn

Sometimes I get the silly idea that I spend too much time on YouTube. Whenever I start to take such an absurd notion seriously, I think of Natalie Imbruglia’s "Torn."

For those who’ve never seen it, or don’t recall, do yourself a favor and take a gander—if you're pressed for time, just check out the first 45 or so seconds.

Okay, so now presumably I can talk about it and not have to worry about spoilers. As you now know, if you hadn't before, the video starts off as a standard semi-narrative video, a plaintive waif singing in her apartment, intercut with shots of her boyfriend, sometimes in the background, perhaps post-tiff, or the two of them kissing romantically.

And then out of nowhere another guy pops up—literally, he pops up into the frame—and moves both Natalie and her "boyfriend" back about a foot and half so the camera can catch more of them. And you wonder what the hell was that? And then you realize that he’s the video’s director. And then the video cuts again, and she’s singing once more. And another cut and you see folks working on the set behind them. And they keep quick cutting so that sometimes it’s just Natalie singing to the camera, all heartfelt and emotive, and sometimes you’ll see the make-up artists working on her hair, or the crew members working on the set, or her and her co-star acting out their planned roles.

It’s an odd and incredibly unusual choice the director made. The story goes that they shot a normal video but in the editing stage realized that showing the "making of" section in the actual video itself had never been done and was really interesting.

And they were dead on. It’s fascinating. Because, and this is a bizarre paradox, by showing the behind-the-scenes stuff, they manage to both highlight the inherent artificiality of videos and give us a true glimpse of the artist behind the song at the exact same time.

It’s an amazing feat. You see her getting her hair done, you see her and her co-star screwing up their blocking, you see her idly stretching between takes, you see them kissing passionately before suddenly breaking it off in irritation and—best of all—you even, at two different points, see a wall on the set either collapse, or nearly so, and crew members rushing in to avert disaster. And it all both illustrates perfectly how artificial all videos are and yet how authentic this one by dint of its honesty in revealing its artifice.

By letting us see these screw-ups and unguarded moments, by occasionally dropping the façade, this video lets us see the real people behind the pretense, in a way that’s very, very rare indeed. Not even interviews or concert videos can do that, because in those situations the artist always knows the camera’s rolling. Here the camera is basically ignored except during an actual take, so during the several days of taping, it simply morphed into another part of the furniture, at least much of the time. It became the proverbial fly-on-the-wall, and therefore, by extension, so did we.

The heart of the video may be the second time through the chorus, where she sings "illusion never changed into something real." She sings all the previous lines of the chorus directly into the camera—the longest uncut shot of the entire video—but halfway through this line they cut to her waiting for a shot to be set up, with a light meter being held in front her face, making sure the lighting was just right for optimal effect. In yet another beautiful twist, this video itself proves that line about illusion to be untrue, to be an illusion itself, and in doing so, uncovers yet another layer to the entire thing.

I should mention that if it weren’t for the greatness of the song itself, originally by Ednaswap, the brilliance of the video wouldn’t count for much. But "Torn" is an utterly perfect pop song, with good lyrics, a great, ever so slightly off-kilter melody and absolutely flawless production. When it first came out I was completely entranced, but assumed I’d eventually tire of it. It’s been fifteen years now and although I’ve probably occasionally gone years between listenings, I’ve yet to get bored with it, even after hearing it scores, maybe even hundreds, of times. It is as wonderful as pop gets. The fact that there’s a video that’s up to its incredibly high standard is not merely a nice bonus, it's astounding.

But it is a very, very nice bonus indeed. And as great as the entire video is—and it is—the most glorious part is at the very end of the song, during the easiest (and one of the most effective) slide guitar solos in pop history. Just as the slide come in, Natalie begins dancing. But it could not possibly be more obvious that her dance wasn’t choreographed or even planned. She simply whirls around like a child, dancing the way you do when you think no one’s watching. Apparently, she was mortified when she saw the video and discovered the director had stuck that oh so unguarded moment in there. Which is understandable. She looks like a moderately graceful person just screwing around—miles away from the typical pop star, with her razorsharp and terrifically impressive moves honed to a cold, machinelike perfection.

This is not one of those dances. This dance is…well, it looks kinda goofy. It looks fun. It looks warm and spontaneous and joyful. It actually looks most like the home videos a sibling sometimes posts on YouTube, hoping to embarrass the 12-year-old caught dancing when he thought no one was watching—frankly, I'm surprised no one's edited a lightsaber into her hand yet. But it's not embarrassing, not in the slightest. It’s magnificently human and vulnerable and sweet in a way we so rarely see in popular culture. It is utterly transcendent and the marriage of that naked moment and the beauty of the music behind it reminds me of just why I love this stuff so much.