Chapter 4: You Can Walk Backwards Into the Future.

10/24/2014

Day 24: Let's Begin! So, the title of this chapter takes it's name from the "motto" of a certain 2 hours show that aired from midnight to 2 AM every Sunday evening on MTV. That show was 120 Minutes, and I was a little bit obsessed with it for the majority of my high school days. Now, as mentioned, the show was on MTV, so how did I get to see it? The simple answer is: friends with cable and VCRs, first Leo, and then Jovon. The regrettable thing about entire situation is that in retrospect, I don't think that I was particularly nice or grateful that my two best friends were kind enough to tape a show for me every single week for something like 4 years. In fact, I think that at times I was kind of an a-hole about it if for some reason I missed an episode (I did say I was a bit obsessed, right?) This chapter of my story deals with my love for that 2-hour slice of TV bliss. Today's selection is from the band XTC. I am not a huge XTC fan by any stretch (if fact, I kind of don't like them...), but the video for this track, "The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead" is one of my all time favorites. It is one of the those videos that tells a story in such a way that it enhances the song itself.  The Peter Pumpkin head character is a generic martyr; an everyman who fought the powers that be but eventually paid the price ("but he made too many enemies of the people who would bring us to our knees"). The video appears to draw a parallel between JFK and Jesus Christ in a way that all politics aside is certainly interesting.  Once again, "Let's Begin!"

10/25/2014

Day 25: Ah, 120 Minutes, how I loved you so. Receiving that VHS tape from my friend was the highlight of the week for me for a while in my high school days. I would pour over each episode making careful note of the position on the tape of any video that I really liked, and then I would literally go back through each episode and copy those videos to yet another VHS tape (because of course we had two VCRs set up to do that). I would up with an archive of roughly 35 hours of videos, all on VHS, and all still in my media cabinet, complete with a hand written index on notebook paper. Today's selection was one of the first video to go into that archive, a super fun track called "Stone Cold Yesterday" from the Connells, a band that 120 first introduced me to. I distinctly remember some sort of goofy intro to the video in which host Dave Kendell says something like, "what do I want to see? I want to see the Connells running through a field of daisies!" Uh... yeah you do.

10/26/2014

Day 26: One of the beautiful things about 120 Minutes is that even though I was starting my music collection from scratch, it allowed me from time to time to be the first member of my circle of friends to discover a new band or a new track. Or, in the case of today's selection, an old band with a new sound. In the 1980's the band Echo and the Bunnyman was a staple of college radio. They broke up in 1988 when singer Ian McCullough left the group, but parts of the band remained and in 1990, they release a new album Reverberation with a new lead singer by the name of Noel Burke. The video for the album's first single and today's selection "Enlighten Me" was another one of the first videos that I remember from 120 and one of the first tapes that I ever bought because of 120.  I was probably also the first time that I got to share one of my tapes with the likes of Leo, Alvan, and Bob. History has not been very kind to this album (it is hard to replace a legend behind the microphone), but I still really like its funky, Indian take on early 90s alternative music. I mean, who doesn't want to hear a sitar solo, every once in while?

10/27/2014

Day 27: As I mentioned earlier, to me the music video is a lost art form.  After all, there are so many different types of videos. Videos can simply show a performance, they can tell a story (either related to the subject of the song… or not), they can be artsy, or if they are like today's selection, they can just be off the wall weird and pretty hilarious.  The band King Missile is perhaps best know for a later song about a certain part of the male anatomy that was detachable. But before that little ditty their singer simply professed that "My Heart is a Flower." This video has something for everyone: gardening, an organ, a dude in a bear suit, waffles, board games, dental hygiene, pedicures, and group shaving. It's 2:42 of zany awesomeness. Oh, and to the guitar soloist at the 45 second mark... you are on probation... you know what you did...

10/28/2014

Day 28: Sometimes I think those folks in the advertising business are on to something. Thinking back now on some of my favorite videos, the ones that still stick with me today tend to be the funny ones, like today's selection, "Don't Ask Me," by Public Image Limited. If memory serves, this track was one of those odd little new "singles" that gets wedged onto a best-of album such that a casual fan might consider buying the whole album. For me, I didn't have much exposure to the Sex Pistols until later, so this video was essentially my introduction to John Lydon / Rotten and his good (but not great) 2nd band.  This video seems to fall into the category of the "story telling," but it does it with a bit of humor.  Or, maybe it is just that British people all seem funny, even if they seem to be warning of the dangers of pollution. No matter. I was so amused by this video that in the early days of high school, I took once paused this video on my VCR, took a photograph of the screen with my 35 mm camera, and hung the photo in my locker after writing out a speech bubble that said, "I am so perplexed." Hey, I never claimed to be a normal kid.

10/29/2014

Day 29: Just for the record, I just want to say that my consumption of 120 minutes was not completely one sided.  More than anything, 120 helped to grow by tape collection (and they were tapes), and I did attempt to share some of that music with others. We already saw evidence of a mix tape that I made for Lissa. I also  remember I once made a mix tape for Heather, and I even cut together my own best-of video collection for Ryan. Both of the latter two compellations included today's track "Sexuality" from Billy Bragg. Upon reflection, this might be my favorite video of all time. Despite the provocative title of the song itself, for me this song is more about learning to accept yourself and others for who they are and, well, just loving each other.  One of the first lines says it very well, "and even if your gay, I won't turn you away. If you stick around, I'm sure that we can find some common ground." But the bridge of the song has one of the greatest song lines of the 90s, "Safe sex doesn't mean no sex, it just means use your imagination." The video itself is just pure joy. I mean, who doesn't love a goofy British guy that sings in a thick accent. And hey, isn't that Johnny Marr on guitar?

10/30/2014

Day 30: One of the key draws of 120 Minutes was its charismatic creator and host Dave Kendall. Dave was the epitome of cool to the 16-year old version of Paul. Sadly, Dave decided to step away from 120 in 1992. He was replaced by some joker named Lewis Largent, and the show was never quite the same again (no offense to later host Matt Penfield, who was cool... but still not Dave). One of my last memories of Dave was a brief comment that he made just before airing the video for today's track, R.E.M.'s "Drive."  Dave said, "Not to suggest that R.E.M. would every write a *bad* song, but this one is *really* starting to grow on me." I thought he nailed it. The slow burn, minimal nature of the song and the simple video of Michael Stipe crowd suffering in black and white does tend to creep up on you.  Good stuff.  I should also mention here that in one of the Stockbridge year books from the early 90s, there is a photo of me in Van McWilliams's class wearing a t-shirt with this album cover on it ("Automatic for the People"). For the record, I still own that t-shirt, and I have been known to break it out on casual Friday every once in a while (and for our 20th Year Class Reunion). Hey, if the shirt fits, right?

10/31/2014

Day 31: In the post Dave Kendell years and as alternative music grew in popularity and exposure, I slow but surely lost interest in the show. By the time I got to MSU, I had cable in my dorm, but I don’t think I watched it anymore. But every once in a while, my love of the music video will creep up on me once again. A few years ago, I ran across a link to a new website that contained an archive of old videos from the Cure. While on the site, I ran across the  video for today's selection, "Pictures of You," and from the first few beats on the chimes, I was quite literally flooded with memories: memories of those old times in Stockbridge (some good and dome bad), memories of how I first fell in love with music, memories of many of you, pictures of you in my head, perhaps. The lyrics of the song speak more about a bittersweet longing for a lost love: "If only I'd thought of the right words, I could have held onto your heart." Looking back at your youth is also bittersweet, even for someone like me who doesn't really believe in regret (more on that at a later date).  The whole experience just really touched me on that particular day, all due to a group of British guys paying in front of palm trees in a snow storm. It was magical.

And with that, I would like to close this chapter. From time to time, when I would look back at my music collection, it occurred to me that it essentially all started in 1979 with the first album from the Cure and the B-52s. I essentially ignore everything that happened before that. However, in rare cases, I will grant an exception to the 1979 rule, and that exception is the topic of our next chapter.