Showing posts with label music video. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music video. Show all posts

Thursday, December 18, 2008

Beyonce Followup (Top Five music videos of 2008)


In my blog post about Kevin B. Lee's choice of Beyonce's "Single Ladies" as the sixth best music video of 2008, I remarked "If that's #6, I can't wait to see the rest." Now that I've seen the top five, I'm a little perplexed. Check 'em out. Here was my comment about the picks along with Kevin's reply:

# Matthew Kane Parker said 8 hours ago

Interesting picks. I doubt I would have given the crown to “Time to Pretend.” It’s an interesting concept, but damn, couldn’t they have stuck with an idea for more than 2 seconds? And frankly I found nothing of worth in Killer Mike’s presentation, that draws from Malcolm’s crazy pre-Mecca days in the Nation of Islam and that at several points juxtaposes scenes of black oppression followed by scenes of black on white violence with the lyrics “keep the pressure on” blaring out. It’s balls-out opportunistic demagoguery.


# Kevin said 1 hour ago

“It’s an interesting concept, but damn, couldn’t they have stuck with an idea for more than 2 seconds?”
Hmm, I sort of see what you’re getting at. I’m not sure if any of their ideas is worth more than two seconds - but cram it together in 5 minutes and it plays like the trailer for the greatest movie never made.

but yeah, in terms of fully developing a concept, “Wait for the Summer” is probably the most elegantly accomplished. It’s breathtaking how one moment blossoms or decays into another. But “Time to Pretend” is the one that replays in my mind the most, perhaps because it is, as you suggest, underdeveloped. More room for me to fill in the blanks.

“balls-out opportunistic demagoguery.” - that’s what they said about Stone’s JFK. And in a perverse way, one could say the same of the Beyonce video. God Bless America!


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Saturday, December 13, 2008

Best Music Videos of 2008: #6 - Beyonce! Single Ladies (Put a Ring on it)


Kevin B. Lee chose Beyonce's "Single Ladies" as the 6th best music video of 2008. If that's #6, I can't wait to see the rest. The video's brilliant! It's simple, stark, and mesmerizing, and the dance (though arguably plagiarized) is one of the first music video dances that I've seen that actually commits to the art of dance. It's not just something happening around some contrived circumstance - it's the centerpiece.

My only complaint: what about the SNL parody?

The original:



The SNL parody:

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Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Best music videos of 2008


Kevin B. Lee, film critic and fellow blogger, is counting down the ten best music videos of 2008. Yours truly helped secure the #10 spot for Scottish art student James Houston and his brilliant (and tragically belated) remix of Radiohead's "Nude":




Also, check out Kevin's reviews and video essays of the 1000 greatest films of all time (as compiled by "They Shoot Pictures, Don't They").
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