THE VIDEO Ratt, "Lay It Down," Invasion of Your Privacy, 1985, Atlantic
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SAMPLE LYRIC "You know you really want to lay it down / right now! (and how!) / I know you really want to lay it down / right now! / laaaay it down / lay-it-down / laaaay it dowwwn / lay-it-down"
EXCESSIVELY DETAILED DESCRIPTION The video opens with a scary, scary clown entertaining kindergarten-age children at a birthday party. He's making a balloon animal as the camera pans toward him. We can hear lots of caterwauling, a kid yelling, and kids blowing those annoying-ass noisemakers in the background.
The clown is focusing his attention on a creepy little boy (think a female Wednesday Addams) wearing a little gray suit with a bowtie. The clown himself is clad mostly in white, with almost entirely white makeup and a giant white ruffle around his neck (with similar ones at his wrists). The rest of his outfit is red and white striped, but it's barely visible. He's wearing a tiny, glittery red top hat perched on his head that says "Chucko" on it.
Anyway. The camera comes in toward the clown, then out, and we see that the children are all seated at a large dining table covered with a white paper tablecloth. The room they're in is pretty spartan. The walls are painted gray, and there's a white sparkly tinsel banner (like they hang outside at car dealerships) hanging in one corner. A little boy in a paper hat throws a handful of confetti, then the camera comes back up to the creepy little boy at the head of the table. We can see the clown moving around behind him, then the camera focuses in on a pale, slightly less creepy little girl. She has long blonde hair held back with a headband, and she's wearing a frilly white dress.
The scary boy smiles at her eagerly, and we see another little girl blowing into a noisemaker. The clown leans down beside the boy and says, "Okay now Stephen, blow out the candles." The little boy sucks in air to blow them out, but then the little girl says, "Wait, Stephen don't forget to make a wish." The clown and boy look at each other, then the clown nods and the boy lays a finger across his lips in thought. His eyes roll back into his head and he looks like a very small Eddie Munster.
The boy nods and then leans forward to blow out the candles. The clown also leans forward, and the top of his hat begins to spin rapidly at the same time as we start to hear some guitar. We hear a whoosh noise, then we finally get to see what little Stephen wished for. It's Warren DeMartini! Seriously, he read my mind, because that is what I am wishing for for my next birthday. At the same time though, you have to think it would have been cooler if Warren had crashed through the ceiling onto their table, like in "Round and Round." Instead, he's just kind of in some weird, misty backlit place.
Um, apparently he also wished for Robbin Crosby, Bobby Blotzer, and Juan Croucier, too (sorry, they're not on my list). They're all playing in a misty, weird place full of blue and white lights, and also black backdrops that look like they got stolen from a high school's modern dance studio. Robbin swings his arm around and pouts er, points at the camera, and Stephen Pearcy starts singing.
As he points and sings, "I know you don't really know me," a blonde with heavily frosted hair (and heavily frosted lips) turns to look at him. He takes a step toward her and, duh!, she's totally wearing the older, sluttier version of the little girl's dress (it's also white and frilly, but it's off the shoulder, belted, and features a fairly high asymmetrical hem). Our man Steve, meanwhile, is dressed quite a bit like a pirate (even for him). He has a black scarf tied around his head, a pouffy, spangly, open white shirt, black uh...what I can only describe as either pantaloons or knee-length britches, and then white stockings and white boots. And of course he's wearing that most important pirate accessory, tons of eyeliner (she's packing heat in that department as well).
The rest of the band rocks out as Steven pursues her through this forest of black tubes. Robbin points a lot, Bobby dramatically swings his arms, and Juan and Warren lean into each other and sing. I must say in this video Warren looks a bit like both Patti Smith (hair) and Keith Richards (ability to see all his teeth through his cheek). Still hot though.
As the second verse begins, we see the little boy at his birthday party with his eyes closed, and he's either just rocking out or miming drumming (tough call). Meanwhile, swashbuckling Stephen Pearcy is following the girl around the tube forest. She's kind of standoffish, looking away from him and leaning on poles, while he dances around and repeatedly exposes his chest, telling her he knows she really wants to "lay it down." He does a really lame kick, and she walks away, showing off her stiletto-heeled white boots.
She finally shows mild interest during the second chorus, as Stephen jerks his fist toward his body a bunch and the rest of the band sings along. Stephen creeps up behind her and whispers in her ear, "I know you only want romance." (This according to numerous sketchy lyrics websites -- to me it sounds like, "I've known you only one time, will you marry this?" Which I know, yes, makes no sense, but listen to the song, it definitely does not sound like "I know you only want romance"). She seems skeptical anyway. Then, in a truly inappropriate turn of events, we see Little Stephen whispering in the little girl's ear (she has her mouth open in shock). He says, "I'll give you all that I can."(I'm not disputing that one). It's gross, it's creepy, it reminds me of that stupid Titanic joke in the middle of "Oops! I Did It Again." It makes me reference horrible, awful things. Clearly, a low point.
Luckily, we're out of the woods fast, and back to rockin'. The girl with adult Stephen does indeed look like she's going to "give [him] just one chance" to "prove [him]self in loooooove." Warren busts into the solo, playing a cool guitar with a polka dot snakeskin motif. I will admit though, the guitar looks like it weighs more than he does.
Stephen dances and spins while the girl watches him, and Little Stephen continues drumming with his eyes closed while the little girl watches him. Robbin, Juan, and Warren all sing at once, which is kind of cute -- they look kind of like a girl group. Stephen swings his hair (and a long earring) dramatically to turn toward the girl, and she turns toward him and makes a meanish face. We hear a whooshing sound as they step toward each other and clasp hands (palms up, sort of Rocky Horror elbow sex style), lit from beneath.
Their image fades away until we see the clasped hands (just holding hands the old-fashioned way) of the little boy and girl. The clown is leaning over them, and the little girl says, "Stephen, what did you wish for?" The boy looks at the camera and does Stephen Pearcy's patented lick-thumb-and-point manoeuvre.
THE VERDICT Translation: I wished that in the future, you'd lose interest in me, and I'd have to win you back by dressing like a pirate and begging you to "Lay It Down." Um, what? This definitely isn't my favorite Ratt video, and I'm not just saying that because I hate children. After such intricately plotted masterworks like "Wanted Man" and "Back for More," this video is a letdown. Most of the video is just the band playing on a crappy set (okay, make that an especially crappy set), and then the whole plot about a 5-year-old fantasizing about whatever is just really unseemly.
Or is that really the plot? The more I think about it, the more I wonder: Is this video a flash-forward for the creepy little boy, or a flashback for Stephen Pearcy? It's unclear when the children's birthday party takes place -- it could be the 80s, but the children are dressed in such a weird way (and also the clown is so self-consciously retro) that it could just as easily be the 60s. At the same time though, the whole point seems to be that the little boy is fantasizing the whole thing, even though the performance part is the "real" action (i.e. clearly taking place in the 80s, albeit in a forest of weird tubes and colored lights). So possibly it is Stephen Pearcy having a flashback from the future about a time he wished and saw into the future. Whoa. I'm blowing my own mind.
Maybe it's just indicative of the weird relationship Ratt is depicted as having toward women in all of their videos. In spite of having lyrics that are almost 100% about women, the videos tend not to imply that Ratt actually get women. I mean, "Way Cool Jr." is just a weird p.o.v. camera thing, the women screw them over in "Back for More," and even in "I Want a Woman" we never actually see anyone from Ratt share screentime with an actual woman (though a) would they really want to anyway? and b) this video does also include the frequently used [in Ratt videos] conceit of having a woman watching or monitoring them). The only exception I can think of is "Slip of the Lip," where Stephen gets to make out with the spy lady who's trying to find out what this whole Dancing Undercover thing is all about.
Maybe they think it's one of those devices like they use with boy bands, where they'll have like, the wrong number of women on screen so they don't seem like they're paired off with the band members, thus making the band members seem more available as foci for relationship fantasy. I don't know though. To my mind, it's more effective to show them with women, so you can be like, "Yo, I'm gonna take her down. Get off my man!! Step away from Warren DeMartini!"