Martha, My Dear: ILM's All-Time Video-Poll Results Thread

(xxpost) You might be right (but wouldn't "didn't" be the word to suggest facetiousness?).

I still love the much-despised "Shiny Happy People" (even by the band itself) song and video.

Yeah! Same director

missed a few placements. titillation in music videos often feels so cheap, but idk if any piece of visual media has smoldered quite like "wicked game" before or since.

"Wicked Game" = not even the sexiest beach-set music video.

It isn't, but it has two of the sexiest people on the beach.

Horny-ass Wikipedia entry:

In the middle of the video, Christensen is seen only in her black lace bra and panty; other times, she wears only a men's white brief.

I feel sullied by the mental image of a Wikipedia editor hornily hyperlinking the word "panty"

is your world on fire

Go in and add a time-stamped link to the word "middle."

What a Wiki game to play

"Wicked Game" = not even the sexiest beach-set music video.

― Les hommes de bonbons (cryptosicko), Thursday, March 17, 2022 12:40 PM (eight minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah but herb ritts def directed whichever you think is the sexiest one

Oh, did he direct "I'm Still Standing"?

I've finally figured out the complicated world of hyperlinks. So I'll have that in place for the top 25--bold text, hyperlinks, everything.

Now go ahead and request one more thing. I dare you--I double-dare you.

nervous lol

total request dead

Sorry everyone, videos set on the beach have to have a shot of the singer/band performing while buried up to their necks in sand. This is known as the Huey Lewis rule.

I dare you--I double-dare you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IprBx1OlBk

I was thinking of a certain movie...

Sexiest beach video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQaQLsAW188

xps 'losing my religion' had to be my REM pick, despite my not particularly caring about it as a kid, because it captures an aspect of my memory of the 90s in a way that few other 90s artifacts do. rustic, sepia earth tones, pseudo-historicity, a mystique of sophistication, it reminds me of the pier 1 imports my mom decorated the house with, intended to offer the feel of a place that had been lived in without the dust and dirt of a real old object, decor that in retrospect is imbued with melancholic longing or an ennui of emptiness, which i also associate with the song

Nice. Few huge surprises so far, in that I can readily recall the overall vibe of all but one of these videos from the titles. (I'd never knowingly seen the Orbital one, but I think I get the appeal.) Pretty sure I contributed points to four: Devo, Sparks, Massive Attack and Grimes. So w00t!

I was asleep through this day of results but thanks for accommodating our formatting requests!

Double lol to President Keyes' last two posts

My lol was for Keyes’ “I’m Still Standing” ref, just to be clear

Was any Duran Duran nominated? They were routinely said to have embraced the potential of the music video more enthusiastically than many at the time. And they spent notoriously large sums on them, etc. But I'm guessing the world and ILM have overwhelmingly moved on from that sort of shtick.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3544112/

*adds to watchlist*

Duran Duran got 66 points in total, 47 of them for "Hungry for the Wolf", the rest for three others (one vote each). Their lasting impact was not lasting, at least not here--Rob Sheffield is still an enthusiast.

Kind of amazing that DD didn’t place. Also I would have thought “Rio” would be the top vote getter. Then again I haven’t seen those videos in decades

It was only recently I saw the 'dirty' version of "Girls On Film"...very clearly not designed for wide broadcast, although I imagine it did air on the Tophat Playboy Channel.

I did vote for "A View To Kill".

another person-walking-around video

I'd have nominated/voted for "Sapokanikan" by Joanna Newsom, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, probably to no avail.

Natalie Merchant’s “Carnival” is another good one in the person-walking-around genre

There's a walking-around video in the Top 10...I voted for Green Day's "Walking Contradiction," which sorts of fits, except the focus is on the surrounding chaos, not the walkers.

Björk was considered an important video artist

Her visuals are "pushy" and tip the scale for me too far into whimsy/weirdness, I'm sated just listening to her music.

anyone with affection for Rio is strongly recommended to watch (at least the first half-hour of) the film at that IMDB link

Didn't click on the link...I quite liked that movie. Their new-wave song (a video, too, if I remember it right) was brilliant.

I can see why Björk videos might resonate to varying degrees depending on one's appreciation for her music but the 'Bachelorette' video (by Gondry, of course) is like objectively astounding. I have to imagine it'll show up in these results eventually.

xps 'losing my religion' had to be my REM pick, despite my not particularly caring about it as a kid, because it captures an aspect of my memory of the 90s in a way that few other 90s artifacts do. rustic, sepia earth tones, pseudo-historicity, a mystique of sophistication, it reminds me of the pier 1 imports my mom decorated the house with, intended to offer the feel of a place that had been lived in without the dust and dirt of a real old object, decor that in retrospect is imbued with melancholic longing or an ennui of emptiness, which i also associate with the song

I'm tempted to say that the gap between the images in music videos and "life" was clearer before the Internet became part of everyday life, and that it was easier to be bored and to feel that emptiness -- not sure how much it's the adolescent versus the historical moment.

I voted for "Man on the Moon" (the "Losing My Religion" video is one of those I can't really see because of my antipathy for the song). That was definitely a key video for me in appreciating the artistic possibilities for the form, even though it's well along the timeline (and supposedly borrows liberally from Bruce Conner, whose films I've never seen).

The first Bruce Conner film I saw was a found-footage thing called “Take the 5:10 to Dreamland” (1976), which blew my mind. Devo’s “Mongoloid” video is another Bruce Conner found-footage work.

"star guitar" is the greatest visual representation of how it feels like the landscape syncs up with the music in your headphones when you're staring out the window of a train

― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Thursday, March 17, 2022 10:32 AM (eleven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

not sure I've seen the video but can confirm, after a "Star Guitar" drive across Kansas at sunset

biggest surprise today... "Oblivion" had a video? something about that feels retconned

It got lots of rotation on MTV; it’s how I discovered the song…

i am enjoying this rollout

also old grumps & younglings may not recall everyone suddenly wearing tennis headbands to emulate marl knopfler & money for nothing video was THE coolest thing anyone had ever clapped eyes since “Thriller”.
we didn’t get out much

and then def leppard ruined it by recreating the same animation for the lets get rocked video & all nostalgia left my body

Yeah the "Money for Nothing" video blew my mind at a young age. tbh I voted for it having forgotten about that one awful lyric, might have given me some pause had I remembered

Their lasting impact was not lasting, at least not here--Rob Sheffield is still an enthusiast.

― clemenza, Thursday, March 17, 2022 9:08 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

do you mean their videos?

“oblivion” video was def a big deal at the time, maybe only in tumblr and the blogosphere, but that area of the culture deserves representation here

didnt vote but im glad radiohead 'just' placed, i remember vhs taping that off mtv as a teen & watching it over and over to find out what was said @ the end

do you mean their videos?

In terms of Duran Duran, that's probably what I meant; in terms of Rob, more general. There are probably bands out there influenced by them musically, and image-wise, that I don't know.

I'm just sitting around, may as well start. I move pretty quickly--would be happy to finish today.