THE VIDEO Tesla, "Hang Tough," The Great Radio Controversy, 1989, Geffen
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SAMPLE LYRIC "Hang tou-OUGH! / When the goin' gets rou-ough / Hang tou-OUGH / you got to give it all you go-ot / keep your head above the ground / oh don't you let it get you dooown / oh you gotta hang tough"
THE VERDICT I know this isn't the most scintillating video, but it's a great song, and really what I need to be hearing right about now with a new quarter starting up and a zillion things on my plate. I have a gigantic soft spot for inspirational songs, and for my money no one does it better than Tesla -- I know some people say they go over the top, but I feel like these boys keep it right in the sweet spot between empowering and saccharine. Plus, who can deny the crazy guitar in this song? Not I, that's for sure.
After beginning with a semi-random brief re-enactment of the album's cover art, this video mainly features Tesla performing in a weird, empty room -- vaguely warehouse-y, but made of wood, and of course featuring the requisite random old chairs, signs, industrial fans, etc. All the damn fans in this video keep making it hard to see Tesla! And I don't mean like humans or metalheads or what have you, I mean literally like, they keep putting the camera behind a ceiling fan.
This type of empty room decor is a huge cliche of metal videos of the late 80s and early 90s -- are we meant to think they practice in there? Or that they just love warehouses? Are the old signs meant to evoke something? I have no idea, all I know is that everyone from Anthrax to Warrant is constantly performing in these empty rooms.
It's one of those things like how every chain restaurant -- and many independent ones for that matter, but I'm thinking of like TGI Friday's, Chili's, that kind of thing -- has to cover their walls with random tsotchkes, as if they actually found all these weird old signs, photos, musical instruments, sporting goods, etc. and thought "gosh, that would just improve the ambiance in here." I bet when you open one of those restaurants, their corporate just sends you a big ol' box full of like, random photos of sports teams from the 1920s and faux-old signs for like chicken feed or fresh eggs or something. Is it all the wall tsotch that separates casual dining from fast food?
But anyway, I digress. Back to this particular faux empty warehouse, and the five man electrical band (err okay, it's a video so probably lip-synching) contained therein. One other thing I always love about Tesla is their total lack of pretension. I mean, just look at everyone's hair. Or just look at drummer Troy Luccketta's hair. I feel like we could go to a tractor pull together and just hang out.
Same goes for the clothes. Jeff Keith does like to take his shirt off, to be sure, but he also wears those handprint pants in more than one Tesla video, so we can assume he owns them. I love that he's like "oh we're shooting a video today, so better go put on my cool video pants." I had similar pants circa 1986 -- cream-colored corduroy with handprints in pink, lilac, and teal. My brother had the overalls version with primary red, yellow, and blue hands. Jeff I think just like, took a pair of white jeans, dipped his hands in paint, and you know, went to town, but same idea more or less.
The only time this video really changes is during the bridge (which is fantastic, btw). Suddenly there's an oriental rug, a Tesla banner, a piano, a dining set, an old film projector, and Jeff Keith has put on white cowboy boots and a Canadian tuxedo. (I know, I'm bad, but it cracks me up every time.) Anyway, everyone's changed clothes. This also takes us back to the little boy from the beginning of the video. The two themes finally come together, as we see that the images of the boy are being projected onto the wall near Jeff (or at least, it's made to look that way, pretty obvious the stuff of the boy was added later).
The end goes back to the original set and original clothes, with everyone in Tesla going berserk. Tommy is on at least his third guitargasm, and if you thought Jeff could open his mouth wide before, well, wait till you see this. He's in Carly Simon territory here.
Something else that makes me feel like Tesla is unpretentious is that they tend to show everyone in the band about equally in their video, unlike pretty much any other metal band, where it goes 1) lead singer, 2) guitarist (if there's a solo and/or they're camera-worthy), 3) attractive women, 4) anything else they might possibly want to show in the video, 5) shots of everyone else in the band, if we have time. Oh, and these'll probably not show their faces, or have them completely in shadow, or something like that.
Not so with Tesla. Tommy Skeoch and Frank Hannon are out in front quite a bit, leaning on each other, tossing hair, guitaring it up. Jeff comes in and out, heading to the background any time he's not singing. We see Troy pretty often, mostly from overhead. Bassist Brian Wheat probably gets the least screen time, and we still see him pretty well.
They also have one of my favorite video cliches -- showing each member of the band in sequence -- at the end. It actually -- finally! -- makes the stupid cliche industrial fans useful, as the turning of the blades provides some of the transition from band member to band member. It also mirrors the pinwheel the little boy has, though what any of the parts of that sequence are meant to convey, I don't know. All I know is listening to this song (and others like it) definitely keeps me going.