THE VIDEO Slaughter, "Up All Night," Stick It to Ya, 1990, Chrysalis
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SAMPLE LYRIC "[Awake from dusk till dawn] / watcheeeng the sceeeeeeene at niiii-iiiii-iiiight / [stars are shining down] / they'lllllllll be shining down on you and I / and I'll hold you till the mornnnnnnning liiiiiiii-iiiiiiiight / Everybody sing it now! / Up! All! Night! / Sleep all day!"
EXCESSIVELY DETAILED DESCRIPTION This video opens with dramatic footage of a fiery sun setting behind clouds, which transitions into a Frederic Church-esque sunset shown from beneath.
We go from these picturesque scenes to a uh, well, it's a metal barrel or trashcan with a fire burning in it, an behind it we can see a tall slim woman walking two Doberman Pinschers. We then see the back of a leather jacket with the word "stick" clearly legible in metal studs. A person passes in front of the camera, and we see a man in jeans and a fedora and a woman wearing a skirt and boots both sitting on either a broken-down couch or just piles of something against a brick wall. Based on the light projected onto the wall behind them, they seem to be sitting beside a swimming pool (they're not, but it's that kind of wiggly light).
A bunch of red neon lights squiggle past, then we see a man in a suit standing next to a sign in the shape of a Chinese or Japanese character reflected in a car window. The window rolls down to briefly reveal a strangely lit, bored-looking woman. We cut to a black and white shot of a boot tapping on the floor, then see from above the man opening the car's door and the woman's legs sliding out.
The woman who was sitting against the wall takes off the guy's hat and puts it on herself, doing a sassy turn. She's wearing a sort of cropped blazer over a very full knee-length skirt -- it's almost like, you know, in case you forgot it's 1989, there's your cue. She shakes her butt, and the camera pans down and shows the reflection of this in a puddle. Then we see the woman, having gotten out of the car, stepping pretty much out of frame.
Finally, the song starts, and we get some quickly cut together shots of Blas Elias and Tim Kelly before what can only be Mark Slaughter's stunt double jumps off of a riser and lands to do a somersault while Dana Strum jumps across his path.
The (probably) real Mark proceeds to start doing some wussy dancing, which we see for a little while. The band are playing in one of those sets where it's like a warehouse full of random crap piled up -- you know there’s a giant fan in there somewhere, a lot of large discarded signs, and probably Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation warming up in one of the other rooms.
We cut to a shot of a slithery woman's legs in a long, sheer skirt, before coming back to see Blas standing up to bang on some cymbals hanging overhead before Mark starts singing. He grips the mic stand with one hand and focuses much energy on looking steamy, which is hard when you sing in a falsetto. Cut to a rain-spattered sidewalk, following stilleto'd legs walking the pair of Dobermans. We briefly see a black and white shot of a woman rubbing her head and looking positively orgasmic, but it's mostly just Slaughter dancing around.
Then we go to a spotlit woman dancing around in the rain on a fire escape. She's whipping her hair everywhere, but mostly arching her back and rubbing her studded leather bustier thing (it reminds me of when Beavis and Butt-head watch the Danger Danger video for "Naughty Naughty," and they see a sexy silhouette of a woman, and Beavis says something like, "Whoa, Butt-head check out that chick! I think she's hurt or something, her back's all bent out of shape!" and Butt-head says, "No, dumbass when a chick's got her back all bent like that it means she's hot." Same era, same idea).
A guitar is strummed, Mark pouts, and as Blas tosses his mane to the back we can for the first time see the bass drums propped on their sides behind him: "Stick It to Ya" and "This Space for Rent." What, Slaughter lame? Anyway, we’re back in the alley with that girl dancing around. She's taken off her jacket to reveal a satiny bra. This makes the backlit Slaughter (sorry, Mark Slaughter that is!) shake his hair back and forth, while a square grid of lights to one side of him keeps turning on and off.
Leather bustier woman goes nuts in some steamy fog, and then Mark does the lamest dance ever (it's like a slightly more metal version of the cabbage patch). We then see a woman with a truly prodigious amount of blonde hair wearing a suit with truly prodigious shoulder pads. She spins to walk toward… a ton of water spraying out of something, maybe an opened hydrant.
Back at the mic, Mark smiles a lot (it's the shot that always gets used when VH-1 is like "Slaughter were the lameasses who ruined metal for everyone," which they always sort of claim). He bops around and semi-mimes the lyrics while the rest of the band sing along. Have I mentioned yet that he is wearing ripped jeans, a white tank top, and a black leather vest? No? Well, he is.
Next we see a red-lipped blonde in black sunglasses in front of the neon signs from earlier. Soon after, we see her defending her satiny skirt from a sudden, very low to the ground gust of wind. The guy by the wall coughs and stands up, while the now fully jacketless brunette dances on. Her one move seems to be holding her arms by her head while she gyrates her hips. The guy goes and stands by himself. Slaughter continue goofing off and sort of rocking out, and that blonde (who now has caught hold of her dress) gives the camera a look, and we see the leather bustier girl, all worn out, leaning against a wall by a different neon sign. Oh, nope, now she’s dancing around in the fog again. Never mind.
The band members all sing along, and the shoulderpad lady walks her dogs in silhouette while water sprays behind her. A couple pass in front of her as she appears to walk through a construction site. The bustier lady is back on her fire escape, and apparently it's raining again. Slaughter seem to redouble their efforts at screaming "Up all night!" with as much vigor and passion as possible, the camera cutting between them so itis like Blas yells "up" and shakes his hair, then Mark yells "all" and grins, and Dana yells "night!" and tosses his hair.
As we head toward the solo and Mark's wish to stay up 24 hours a day, we see a guy in jeans and one of those horrible haircuts every man in America had at some point between 1988 and 1992 -- you know, shaved to the ears, and long on top. Hideous. He tries to follow the blonde and her Dobies. She blows him off, and he does a very exaggerated spin and kick that puts me in mind of like, every commercial for everything from the early 90s and also begs the question, are those Bugle Boy jeans he's wearing? (If you're thinking of clicking that bad boy, scroll to the bottom paragraph to see where I was going with that one.) Mark spins and the guy does an additional fruitless kick before the solo begins.
During the solo, we see more shots of the two main women, plus lots of Mark and Dana headbanging in tandem. They even let Mark hold a guitar. Blas pouts ridiculously, and in some shots Mark has the guitar while in others he's just high-stepping and pumping his fist. Everyone spins their guitars around their necks, and Mark does his cabbage patch dance again. The leather bustier woman appears to be reaching the height of ecstasy out there on her fire escape.
As they reprise the chorus, all women in the video give the camera knowing looks, and the blonde continues to lead her dogs through the construction even though a big rig is coming up behind them and yet another fire hydrant explodes. Mark shares his microphone with his bandmates, who at this point (and who can blame them? They've probably been doing it for hours) are just screaming "up all night!" with their mouths wide open. Both Dana and Tim have like, spasms where they stare at their guitars and then jerk their heads back, jaws agape.
The song concludes with Mark pumping his fist one last time. We see Blas' actual bass drum with the band's logo on it, then the leather bustier lady calming down and stepping away from the camera, then we pan across a puddle to find the girl and guy now sitting peaceably together beside the brick wall. The chauffeur dude gets back in the front seat of the car and closes the door, and after he slams it we see clouds racing across the sky, followed by the sun rising once more.
THE VERDICT Slaughter are a pretty horrible band, but I am going to go out on a limb here and note that this is not that bad of a song. Okay, except for the very beginning and the end -- the kids singing "America the Beautiful" are both annoying and pointless, as are the sirens and crap, although those are at least like "night noises" or what have you. But anyway yeah, I don't think this is a terrible song. It's very accessible. I like the verses fairly well. Mark Slaughter's voice is, as always, a bit high-pitched for my taste, but since this is sort of a scream-along song, it doesn’t matter too much.
Now I recognize and I admit that at at least one time in the not-so-distant past, I made a statement to the effect that if I could time travel, I would go to 1990 to get on Mark Slaughter. These were, clearly, ill-advised remarks, as Slaughter are hella lame (even if Mark himself is honestly, not a bad looking guy and in fact, seems to get better looking with age). This is really their only half-decent song, and if reports are true, they're basically all assholes (or at the least, Dana and Blas are. Mark's their pawn, and well, Tim's dead, so you can’t really criticize him).
On these reports, I can't really comment, but on the oft-made observation that Slaughter somehow were the death knell of great 80s metal I will. In a nutshell: They weren't. Yes, they tried to get away with wearing flannel shirts whilst incorporating the overall aesthetic of Guess? Jeans ads. Yes, Mark's a cute kid. But honestly, this is not what killed 80s metal. Nirvana's Nevermind isn't even what killed it.
What killed it was the insane glut of abominably crappy bands signed during the period when every record company's A&R guys were just looking for any act with a lot of hair and a lead singer with decent cheekbones, thinking that those two factors were what was making records sell -- truly pathetic tripe merchants like Shotgun Messiah, Vain, Babylon AD, Dangerous Toys, Bulletboys, and Danger Danger (jeez – mentioning them twice in one writeup), to name a very few (many thanks to this amazing site, which does an awesome job of actually finding information on some pretty thankless bands). I would argue 110% that it was hideous acts like these (which make mid-level bands like White Lion seem like visionaries and true artists) that brought mighty metal to its knees, not Mark Slaughter's chipper dance moves.
