THE VIDEO Warrant, "Cherry Pie," Cherry Pie, 1990, Columbia
SAMPLE LYRIC "She's my cherry pie / cool drink of water / such a sweet surprise / looks so good / she'll bring a tear to your eye / sweet cherry pi-ie!"
THE VERDICT I have wanted to write up this video forever, but not like this. Not like this! Obviously at this point in time, this isn't new news, but lead singer Jani Lane is dead at 47. Why, Jani, why?
Well, we all have to grieve the best way we know how. And you know me, I do it through blog posts. (Though I think Canter's did an awesome job, too — I love their cupcakes, so I imagine their pie is darn good as well!)
I already did "Heaven" — it was actually one of the very first posts I did on this blog, seven years ago — so we're going to go with for my money one of the greatest songs ever written. Yes folks, finally, it's time for "Cherry Pie."
Am I being sarcastic when I say I think "Cherry Pie" is one of the best songs ever written? Absolutely not. I really do. Have you heard the acoustic version on Metal Mania Stripped? It's un-effing-believable. It's a great bassline, Jani's vocal delivery is fantastic, and I mean come on, the song just builds and builds. By the end you're screaming the chorus!
I remember getting in an argument with one of my exes over this, with him claiming the metaphor was tawdry and lame, and me taking the side that it's amazing. I mean seriously — they make "swinging" work on so many levels! As an adult I appreciate it, and as a fifth grader I had no idea what the hell this song was about. Well done, Warrant.
I should also mention that technically my favorite part of this song is just the part where they yell "Oh yeah!" at strategic points in the chorus.
Now we all know — especially since it's been endlessly rehashed since his death — that Jani had a contentious relationship to this song, and wasn't always exactly stoked about the idea that it would be his entire legacy. (Which I mean for me at least it wasn't in danger of being, even if it was the centerpiece.)
In the end he seems to have embraced it, and I think he made the right choice.
It's a terrific song!
And the video! The video is unforgettable, and you know it. It's simple, it's funny, and it elevated Bobbie Brown from your standard rock video girl to full-fledged video vixen.
And even though Bobbie has talked a lot of smack about Jani since then, this video led to them getting married and having a daughter, Taylar. Plus I mean really, she was dating Matthew Nelson? Now that I'm thinking about it though, she definitely has a type... Stevie Rachelle is like a poor man's Jani Lane.
Anyway. Bobbie herself is definitely a type too — I've said it before, and I'll say it again, but she's a perfect example of this circa-1990 Christina Applegate type that everyone around then seemed to just love. Straight blond hair with bangs, heavy dark eyebrows, red lipstick, often one artfully placed mole... I call these ones "Great White girls" a lot (and indeed, Bobbie's in a couple of their videos) or when I don't know the girl in the video's name, I generally just refer to them all as Christina Applegate.
This was just the standard of beauty back then. I mean even if you think of models who were big at the time — like Niki Taylor was like a high-end Christina Applegate type. Or Kelly Taylor from 90210 — in early seasons, she's like a Christina doppelgänger. (I should also mention that Bobbie was even on Married With Children — the Applegate is strong with this one!)
Okay, now I've made it pretty far into this post without actually talking about anyone who's even in Warrant, let alone the video itself. So let's go there.
I love this video because there's actually very little to it — it's mainly the guys goofing around, and then little vignettes of Bobbie plus a few props. I remember I always used to wonder how they made these like, totally white spaces for videos or photo shoots or stuff like that.
Now I've been around that kind of stuff enough to know it's usually just a completely white painted room, but with a curve leading from floor to wall, so there's no corner and, if lit correctly, no visible difference between the two (the other alternative is to use giant rolls of set paper to create the same effect, but they're jumping around too much for that here).
Thus here Warrant appear to be in this weird, completely empty white space, save for their various red props.
What have the Down Boys brought with them? Umm, all kinds of stuff. Let's see.
First, an amazing red, black, and white wardrobe that they appear to be sharing (I'm pretty sure Jani and Eric Turner are wearing the same polka dot shirt in different shots). They've even coordinated their instruments, with red guitars, red amps, and a red drum kit for Steven Sweet (occasionally with actual cherry pies placed on the drums).
When they're all together, Warrant are mainly shot playing on top of giant red polka dots — gosh I love the polka dots of the late 80s/early 90s — but when they're separate, they're usually just on the white.
Bobbie is wearing pretty much the ultimate Christina Applegate girl outfit. Red lipstick (duh), giant earrings, a red bustier halter top, high-waisted yet extremely short denim cut-offs, a large belt, and red cowboy boots.
I have to say, I've been surprised how strong of a comeback this exact "denim panties" look has made. I'm not going to lie, it's a trap I fall into myself, but still, there are limits. If when you sit down, I can't tell if you're wearing anything on your bottom half, that's just weird. But anyway, I digress.
We watch Bobbie get into some silly situations, semi-acting out some of the lyrics of the song. First she's a red-and-white clad rollerskating waitress (she sort of looks like she works at Ruby's), tripping over Joey Allen's cord and somehow magically dropping a slice of cherry pie straight into her own lap (also having magically changed into black spandex bike shorts — now there's an early 90s look I don't miss). We also almost get the "swinging" literally with Bobbie in a team Warrant red-and-white baseball uniform, posing on a mitt-shaped couch.
Personally though I prefer the lips-shaped couch she's posing on a minute later, in her spandex shorts outfit (complete with black bra top, for that back-up dancer in an MC Hammer music video look). There are weirdly a lot of art references in this video — I could do a whole thing on all the metal videos that randomly reference "American Gothic."
It's not all that highbrow though. Probably one of the best-known sequences of this video is the firehose part. Bobbie walks by a red firetruck that the guys from Warrant are all sitting beside. They pull out the hose and all five of them spray her with the hose. Oh, I don't mean they take turns. I mean it takes all five of them to wrangle this thing, which appears to have about as much water pressure as a garden hose. Hmm.
In case that's not literal enough for us, we then get some close-up cherry eating, followed by another iconic image from this video — Jani with a fake smile on his face "ten miles wide." This shot is often used in decline of hair metal montages where they're trying to be like, "metal wasn't serious enough anymore."
Well you know what? We don't have to be serious all the time. Yeah it's cheesy, but I for one like that Warrant seem to be having a great time in this video. They can throw a bunch of instruments out of the back of a red car, or have Joey cry after he looks through binoculars and somehow sees Bobbie cut in half. (Think about it, if the top of her torso shows up in one eye and her butt's in the other one... something grim has happened.)
Also, can I please get a red-and-white polka dot sheet set like they have in the bedroom sequence? That might well be my favorite part of the video. The shots of Jani and Bobbie in profile make Jani look astonishingly hot, and besides, I think this is my favorite verse of the song. It reminds me of "Your Mama Don't Dance."
Before the video wraps up, we actually get another high-end reference — the cherry pie painting sitting beside the couch, which the car then appears to drive through, is clearly meant to look like the comic-panel-inspired pop art of Roy Lichtenstein (see, aren't you glad I took all those art history classes in college so I could write a blog about metal videos?). Well, I sure am.
RIP Jani.