THE VIDEO Danzig, "Mother," Danzig, 1988, Def American
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SAMPLE LYRIC "Not ab-ow-uht tuh see yo-our li-ight / but if you wanna find hell with me / I can sho-ow you whut it's luh-uh-ike / 'til you're bleeding!"
THE VERDICT I know, I know. There are actually a whole stocking full of metal versions of Christmas songs, from Twisted Sister's "Come All Ye Faithful" (more or less to the tune of "We're Not Gonna Take It") to Dokken's "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" (by way of "Dream Warriors") to that "I Am Santa Claus" parody of "Iron Man" I remember being played on classic rock radio when I was growing up. Problem is, save for the last one, these are all really recent. And let's face it, people don't come to blogs like this (nor do I blog) to see what Dee Snider was doing in 2007. Instead, let's gather 'round the yule log (huh-huh, I said log) and listen to this darling tale told in the dulcet tones of Glenn Danzig.
Everyone in Danzig is huge -- they all look like that gigantic bodybuilder guitarist Alice Cooper used to have, or that other really ripped guitarist from Manowar. I wonder if they all had to be short though, to not make Danzig look bad. I've always felt like he'd be an amusing person to meet, not just because, as shall be seen below, I find him often hilarious (both unintentionally and intentionally), but also because he's my height, and while I'm a quite small girl, he's this massively ripped dude. And as such, he's surrounded himself with a bunch of other massively ripped dudes whose faces manage to stay obscured throughout this video, in spite of (well, more likely actually because of) it being strategically lit and in high contrast. What is it with spooky metal bands and high contrast black and white? Or with metal bands in general, I suppose.
But as per always, I digress. This video features mainly close-ups of Glenn Danzig's face and silly haircut as he bellows his way through this song, which has always been a favorite of mine. His super-deep voice is super-fun to sing along with, but unlike basically the entire Misfits catalog, this is slowed down enough to make it singable (and not too slow, like the sludgy "Dirty Black Summer"). Come to think, something about the tempo of this song is really ideal, as it is also really great to dance to. Is this what Danzig intended? Not sure, but its a lot of fun.
Anyway. We get face close-ups, which occasionally give Glenn a bit of a baby bird look. When he switches from "mother" to "father," he opens his eyes, and tries harder to make spooky faces. This is enhanced by the switch with the first chorus from shooting him straight on to shooting him from above, with his face now lit from beneath rather than from one side. Anyone who's ever held a flashlight under their chin at a slumber party is well aware of this trick. We also get to briefly see the drummer (Chuck Biscuits, who for the record is not dead) and guitarist (Jon Christ from Samhain), though again, not their faces.
Eventually, all this spooky face-making leads a bunch of hot women to show up, all staring intently at something off camera. We don't know what, though we do see a shadow of a cross on the wall behind them. We then see Danzig from a new angle, implying -- if we extrapolate from everyone's sight lines -- that he's talking to these women. We then see one of them up against a wall, with shadows crossing over her. We'll call this one Kim Basinger, not because she looks that much like her, but because for some reason, that's the association I make with her hair.
Then we see a second woman in the same position, only this one is, in my opinion, much much hotter. Amazing hair and makeup look that we will deem the Christina Applegate (though again, in my opinion, this girl is much hotter than Christina Applegate). She's got more of a spunky look to her, whereas Kim Basinger appears more alarmed.
Danzig swivels around so he's facing the camera for his close-up, and makes loads of baby bird faces as he delivers a power vocal. We also briefly see the guitarist, and Christina Applegate (remember, not the real one, just the lady who I'm claiming has a hair resemblance to her) making eyes at the camera. Next thing we know, Glenn's got a torch. This leads to a lot of screaming.
We then see, in silhouette, Glenn clearly standing on a box (or maybe the woman is kneeling?) and wearing finger extensions menacingly placing his hand on the head of a woman with bizarrely well-defined breasts. This is interspersed with shots of the Christina Applegate girl dancing (see? I told you this song is good for dancing!).
Then we see reaction shots of Glenn and the Kim Basinger lady, both with shafts of light falling across their eyes, followed by shots of just their eyes. Then we actually get to see a little more of Glenn's body and -- prepare yourselves -- he's not shirtless! It appears he has actually been wearing a sleeveless hoodie this whole time. Who knew. At this point in the video, the faces he's making are totally OOC. He's gone from baby bird to like, basking shark in terms of mouth-openness, and he keeps getting a little bit of an Elvis sneer lip-thing going. We then see him really high up and from far away -- is this supposed to make us think Glenn's tall?
And then ... ALTERNATE VERSION ALERT! If you're watching this video on MTV (back in the day) or Vh1 Classic (now), you'll see some close-ups of what appears to be the Christina Applegate lady lying on her back (you just see her head and shoulder), loads of Danzig yelling, and more of the silhouette spooky hands thing. However, if you're trying to watch this video on the internet now, the ONLY version you'll find is the original, which MTV rejected at the time (but which apparently everyone's down with now, since the edited version is unfindable).
In which case, here's what you'll see: Suddenly Glenn's body gets fully lit, and we see he's standing on a giant, upside-down star/pentagram thingy (there's some kind of additional symbol in the middle of it, but it's hard to see from where I am). We don't just see a woman's head lying down, instead we pull back from that shot to see she's lying on a blood-stained altar with a giant skull with devil horns up above it, wearing only a black bikini. Danzig and Christina Applegate are looking on with concern. Someone's hand claws the woman's stomach, then next thing you know, Danzig is hoisting up a white chicken by its feet, and a big spatter of blood appears on the woman's stomach. A woman's hand uses two fingers to draw an upside-down cross in the blood. Then inexplicably we get a shot of Christina Applegate lying on the table -- her outfit identifies her as not the same woman who was lying there a minute ago and instead the one who was standing next to Danzig, but Glenn's not going to let a little thing like continuity get him down. Then we see another lady (similar looking to the Kim Basinger one but not the same gal) tasting the bloody fingers and then making eyes at the camera -- eww.
What does all of this have to do with Christmas, you ask? Admittedly, not the most. Except that Glenn Danzig's love of blood landed him a prominent role in a Christmas-themed episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force -- thus landing him a prominent place in my heart (admittedly, not as if he didn't already sort of have one). If there is one quality I admire in people who appear to take themselves deeply seriously as does Danzig, it is the ability to then turn around and poke fun at themselves, and Danzig does to brilliant effect in "The Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past From the Future." I mean really, after watching him actually pretend to sacrifice a chicken, what else would have logically come next? Let's hope it's collaborating with Shakira for real. Now that's something I wouldn't mind finding beneath my Christmas tree.
P.S.: Don't even tell me you don't know where the title of this post came from! My other obvious option was "I cannot live with that guy. He is so annoying. He is so frightening. And he doesn't wear a shirt." But I couldn't decide on the optimum way to condense it.