Y&T, "Contagious"

It's Prom Season!  

THE VIDEO Y&T, "Contagious," Contagious, 1987, David Geffen Company SAMPLE LYRIC "(Ohhhh, ohhhh-ohhhh, ohhhhh, ohhhh) / Ooh, is gettin' dangerous, it's con-tayyyy-jus!" [Repeat repeatedly] 

THE VERDICT Now I know for people who are serious about their Y&T, Contagious is more or less the band's death rattle. But for people like me who are decidedly unserious, well — get ready for a shocker — I freakin' love this song. 

I know, right? Me? Y&T? Who'da thunk it? 

But apparently while a slick production, soaring vocals, and chanting don't work for Y&T diehards, for me it can't work better. I listen to this song all the time — it's a staple in all my workout mixes. I don't think they sound like Bon Jovi wannabes (Bon-nabes?) at all — I just think they sound hella good. 

And the video! Oh the video. This is truly Y&T at their finest. It's like they've taken all the elements of their previous videos — young protagonists, bad 80s movie feel, Airplane-esque sight gags, transformations, and so on — and melded them into one ultra, mega, mecha Y&T video. 

They really outdo themselves on this one, folks. And I love it. (I think for this whole post, just imagine me talking to you as if I were Will Ferrell doing James Lipton.) 

The video kicks off with a random kid riding a skateboard down the sidewalk, and then a shot of a slick-looking 80s guy in a tux cruising in a convertible (he's basically the James Spader of this video). The skateboarding kid (who's wearing a Y&T tee, btw) gives the convertible dude two thumbs up. As the guy stops in front of a little bungalow-style house, the non-Meniketti members of Y&T pop up for the first round of "Hey!"s. 

We then see James Spader's date — an attractive 80s blonde in a white strapless dress. You know the type — pearl necklace, french twist, hot in a bitchy way. Yes, she's more or less the Jessica Wakefield of this video.

The guys in Y&T smile and step away from the camera as she leaves her house. As Jessica leaves the frame, we get our first glimpse of the video's protagonist — a classic 80s movie nerd in a striped suit and heavy-framed, thick glasses.

 

Hmm, what should we call him... So many options for 80s movie nerds, from Revenge of the Nerds to Weird Science to... oh my gosh, you know what movie I watched the other day 'cause it was on Netflix Watch Instantly? Zapped, with Scott Baio. I forgot how amazingly weird that one is. It's sort of like a really non-scary horror movie that's kind of a comedy. 

Also, I think since previously I'd always watched it on the USA Network (always such a good source of bad teen movies during the daytime when you were on school breaks) I hadn't realized how much toplessness there is in it. Dude, there's a freakin' ton. 

All right, this nerd here is reminding me of Scott Baio, because he's got that "I'm not really a nerd, I am just being made to act and dress this way" vibe, so I'm inclined to call him Chachi. But I think that's too confusing, so let's just go with Screech. 

Screech swoons seeing Jessica all dolled up. Meanwhile, Y&T are lurking nearby, plotting something. We see Jessica leaving from what I assume is her house, while Screech (with his pants pulled up well past the navel) is leaving from a house next door labeled "Alpha Chapter Chess Club." Whatever Y&T, we get it, he's a nerd. No need to over-establish things here. 

Jessica hops into James Spader's car, and Screech (standing next to an old-school bicycle) waves enthusiastically at her from beside his porch. Jessica and Spader exchange a look, and she rolls her eyes. Screech becomes embarrassed, and the power couple drives off. This makes 3/4 of Y&T, who appear to have been hiding in the bushes the whole time, totally crack up. 

Screech takes off on his bike, but he's quickly stopped by Dave Meniketti himself grabbing his handlebars and singing in his face. They pull Screech off his bike (which one member of Y&T helpfully rolls out of the way), and at last, we've got all four guys in Y&T. 

Two drive up in a powder blue convertible (license plate 'SLICKER') while the other two toss Screech into the car. They drive off, with both guys in the front seat turning all the way around to continue singing at Screech, who's jammed in the middle of the backseat. Screech looks like he's gonna puke as they push and pull him while singing straight into his face. 

Oh, get ready for a Y&T silly visual gag — they drive past a bungalow house with a couple standing in front of it looking like Grant Wood's "American Gothic" (weirdly, this is so not the only metal video with an "American Gothic" reference). As the Y&T car rolls by, we see a flash of pink and green light, and then suddenly the farm couple have wild blown-out hair and sunglasses on, as if they were in an old Maxell ad. This makes Y&T crack up, but appears to terrify Screech. Y&T are supernatural!

 

And suddenly, we're at the prom. We get all these little random establishing shots which are great. Spader helps Jessica out of his car. A seriously MC Hammer-looking dude (he's got that weird tiny ponytail!) gets out of a Jeep Wrangler, while another couple walks by. 

Y&T pull up in front of a large banner that reads (in multi-colored block letters) "Warren G Harding Summer School Registration June 6th." They appear to be grabbing at something outside the car as they pull in. Then we see a random kid in a tux spraypainting the side of a dumpster, adding his tag before casually tossing the spraycan in the dumpster and being joined by his date. Seriously, can I watch this movie? 

Y&T hop out of their car, leaving a confused Screech behind. He fumbles his way out of the car, and the camera follows a couple's feet as they enter the school. They begin to climb stairs, while the camera goes under them, joining a dice game. Y&T join, and after Dave Meniketti rolls the dice, he then waves his hand again. A flash of light appears, and suddenly there are like two dozen dice, all sixes. 

The dudes who they seriously appear to have dressed as Run-DMC circa "My Adidas" appear nonplussed, while again Screech seems absolutely freaked out by Y&T's magic. (I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention that the dice players also include a white guy dressed as Ad-Rock in "(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party)", down to the red Stuyvesant t-shirt.)

Y&T bust into the prom, again pared down to a trio— what, did the director only let their drummer be in shots where he was sitting behind something? (The car, drumkit, etc.) That's cold. Oh no wait, there's four. Dang, did they get rid of their old drummer? (Again, this is how you know I'm no Y&T superfan.) 

They all sing enthusiastically. There's a dorky band playing onstage ("Yellow Tangerine," according to their bass drum) beneath a banner with what I assume is the prom's theme, "I did it my way." This repulses Y&T, and with an explosion of red light, they replace the band (and their banner and balloons, which gets switched to a Y&T banner). Y&T immediately commence rocking. 

Also yeah, this is totally a different drummer. I honestly hope that guy left the band for real, and they didn't just ditch the chubby guy they formerly had for this video (though if they had, it'd fit with the ethos of this video).

 

We see a couple of nerdy-ish guys enjoying the music, one dribbling a basketball. We also see a table of people watching, including I swear to god a guy who looks like their old drummer, who is holding a skateboard. I also enjoy the "surfer couple" — a blonde girl in a bikini top, sarong, and pukka shell necklace, and a blonde guy in just a white blazer (no shirt) and a similar necklace. Seriously, they could've stepped right out of "Party All Night." 

We can see balloons and streamers behind them, as well as a poster that says "Harding High School congratulates Dwayne Poindexter." Okay, I'm assuming that's Screech, but we can't see what he's being congratulated for. 

Ohh the next bit is classic Y&T video. We get a juxtaposition of first a quartet of nerdy, school-marmish women drinking from tea cups, and then a quartet of exaggerated biker types spiking the punch, with one woman taking a bite out of her cup and then spitting it out. 

We also see a couple of dudes in trench coats, hats, and sunglasses watching from the side — I'm not even sure what this is supposed to be. A new variety of nerd? Narcs? Principal? No idea. 

Jessica and James Spader walk through the room, and Screech tries to stop them. Spader soldiers on, but Jessica actually slows momentarily. Screech looks mortified and slinks away. We see many shots of Y&T chanting and rocking out, then another very Y&T gag — students dropping guns on a table in front of a man and a woman. At first it's hard to see, but there's a chalkboard to their right that says "Check your weapons here." 

There's also another congratulations sign behind the man at the table, but again, it's been placed too low to read what it's for. I don't know why they'd go to the trouble to make those signs and place them in the shots just to have them be obscured! 

The camera zooming into Meniketti's mouth tells us it is, indeed, "time to get wiiiiild." All the students at the prom jump up from their tables at once and begin enthusiastically dancing right in front of the stage (this shot was a bad idea — it's wide angle, and lets us see just how few people are actually there). I should also mention all Y&T's amps say "Y&T" on them. Not Marshall, not even Peavey. Just generic — oh, I mean, Y&T. Sure.

 

Screech makes a grab for Meniketti's guitar, and Dave waggles a "tsk-tsk" finger at him. He then points right at Screech. Screech spins around and slowly points at himself, and then poof! In a blast of gold light, he becomes transformed into an 80s movie hottie in a white tuxedo. He even winks right at us! 

Yes friends, Screech has become Zack Morris. Jessica is of course terribly impressed by this, while her date James Spader is much less so. Zack looks over at her all "How you doin'?" She seems amazed by this and hurries to his side. 

Zack then points again, and with a flash of green light turns Spader (or at least his head) into a cheap rubber mask monster. Meantime, Y&T are rocking hard, and Jessica is all over Zack. With the final round of "Hey!"s, Y&T take it over the top, while Jessica and Zack turn to us all slick in dark sunglasses. 

The moral of this video? Don't be yourself. Sure, they've got a lot of wacky Y&T stuff here, but come on — no robot?! This video has everything but the robot!! 

And weirdly, I feel like for me at least, this is the moral of this song — don't be yourself. Y&T stray from their straight-ahead rock roots and Def Lep it up, and I love it! 

This is, of course though, a really treacherous message. In both cases, you're giving up the affections of those who truly loved you for those of a hot, shallow girl who was previously only interested in making fun of you. It works in the short term, but as Y&T quickly found out, not in the long term. 

Honestly you guys, this video is like a vaguely supernatural version of Can't Buy Me Love wherein no one learns a valuable lesson about learning to be yourself, or even just about not whoring yourself out just to replace your mom's dress you accidentally spilled wine on. 

Mötley Crüe, "Live Wire"

This Video Is MADE OF WIN

THE VIDEO Mötley Crüe, "Live Wire," Too Fast for Love, 1981, Elektra

Click here to watch this video NOW!

SAMPLE LYRIC "'Cause I'm alive! / Liiiiiive wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-re! / 'Cause I'm alive! / I'm a liiiiiiiive wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-re!"

EXCESSIVELY DETAILED DESCRIPTION The video opens with an image reminiscent of Scooby-Doo (for me, anyway) -- a semi-transparent, floating skull with a pentagram drawn in red on its forehead floating in front of a lit candelabra. This disappears, and the camera slides over to the right to capture the hand of Mick Mars at the guitar. We then see the hand of Nikki Sixx beckoning before his bass.

We see Mick's hands again, then we see Tommy Lee pound twice quickly on the drums. Next Mick finally gets a shot with his face in it, then Tommy points from atop his drum kit. Then it flashes back and forth between Mick playing guitar and Nikki holding his scary-looking bass behind his head. Before Vince Neil has even jumped down into the dry ice fog, we already know: This video is going to RÄWWWWWWWWWWWWWK.

Vince immediately begins shaking his platinum mane, and then we see Tommy from above. He has a gong behind his drums, so get ready (okay, he doesn’t actually use it). Vince and Nikki jump around a little, and Mick looks scary (duh) as Vince begins to sing. Vince is wearing red leather pants and a matching red leather vest with two large, studded belts, one has black and the other is like all studs. He's also got on multiple studded wrist and arm bands, as well as little fingerless leather gloves that say "Mötley Crüe" on them in the original style which he also wears in "Looks That Kill." Vince shakes his hips in a way that almost makes you forget how he'll look in a few years. But not quite.

Vince also moves around a lot and appears to sing every single word, so yeah, a lot of things are different. In a few of the shots, you can see that there's a big "Mötley Crüe" sign somewhere in back, but only the word "Crüe" (again, done in the original logo style) is visible toward the right. This video has a bunch of mostly red lights in it, and often Vince's hair seems kind of glow-y, but for the most part it's real dark. Also, forgot to mention, Vince has a big choker-style leather necklace on with something hanging from it. It may be more than one, actually.



After a long time of Vince (hey, they wanted him to be the face of the band, after all), we see Nikki. He maybe has some reddish streaks in his hair, and is super pale with bright red lipstick. He's wearing a sleeveless leather top with some chains across the front, big studded black leather fingerless gloves, red leather pants heavily draped with bondage-style chains, and black thigh-high boots.

We then quickly see Mick (who's mostly obscured throughout the video, he's wearing all black though) and Tommy. Tommy's sitting down for the duration of the video, but on his upper half he's wearing a torn, sleeveless fishnet top. Also, in case I forget to mention the obvious: Not a lot of tattoos at this point.

Vince gets really into things! Wow, this video is like a piece of living history. Even Mick hoists his guitar aloft for a moment. Mick has on his scary black cheekbone makeup, which he shows off by making a mean pouty face. We then get an overhead shot of Tommy, who by later standards is barely in this video at all. Mick makes more badass faces, then Nikki actually windmills on his bass a la Pete Townsend. With the build-up to the second verse, Vince makes emphatic movements with his mic, and Nikki continues to emphasize how hard he is rocking by headbanging with his entire upper body. Tommy wails on the drums, and Vince leans in toward Mick as he starts singing again.

Just like with the first verse, we mostly focus on Vince while he sings. He struts around with his mic like a real effing star, it must be said. He also emphasizes his vocals with a lot of, well, pointing, and sometimes he also points with his pinky to make the Dio symbol. Vince sings the awesome lead-in to the chorus with lots of pointing, then we see Nikki, Tommy, and Mick again, but for like two seconds each. It's mostly Vince screaming "I'm a liiiiiiiiiiive wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-rrrre!"



Next up it's the weird break, which Vince signals by sweeping his arm across his body and the lighting crew signals by switching from red lights to blue. Shots of the different band members playing fade into each other as the guitar kind of goes all sludgy for a second. Vince briefly channels David Johansen (this is a major compliment coming from me), then for whatever reason we see a green-lit, heavily-lipsticked Tommy Lee struggling against chains. He uses the Dio symbol to try to break them. This fades into a shot of a green-lit Vince lowering a blazing torch.

At this point, the real Vince begins to scream as the song starts to rock out again. Vince makes the Dio symbol with both hands as fire explodes on either side of him, leading in to what was at that time Mötley Crüe's biggest gimmick: Lighting Nikki's pants on fire. If it weren't for this video, it'd be just another anecdote in The Dirt.

Nikki hoists his bass aloft whilst his pants and boots burn. We then see Vince's hands grabbing either end of a "Live Wire," as he brings them together there's a big flash of green light. It also causes a lot more fog to appear, and when I say a lot I mean a lot. When they go to a wider shot, you can still see Vince, but you can't tell Nikki and Mick apart! (Note: Reading this for the second time, I'm not quite sure why I felt the exclamation point was necessary, but I'll let it stand anyway.)

Even though flashpots continue to spew flames in the background, the fog clears and you can clearly see Vince prancing around and Nikki and Mick leaning against each other up on the drum risers (this is also probably the most Mick's moved in any of their videos). The song only gets more badass as it nears it's conclusion: Vince sings super fast (and still gets all the words), Tommy drums wildly, and Nikki pounds his bass with his fist. Mick even gets in on the act, not so much spitting blood as sort of having a bunch of blood fall out of his mouth.



For the last two little start-stop things in the song, which are more exaggerated than the ones at the beginning, we first get Vince making a cheekbone-emphasizing pout while whipping his head around to the left, twice. Mick makes dramatic faces with his blood, and Vince flails back and forth with his mic stand. For the last one (the one with cowbell), Tommy even does his mouth open, one hand behind head thing!

Vince, Nikki, and Mick, work their way to the center of the stage to strike a pose just as the screen begins to shrink and spin off into the distance, leaving us with a still image of the album cover with a little picture showing the band silhouetted (sort of like how they are in the very beginning of "Too Young to Fall in Love") in the bottom left-hand corner.

THE VERDICT Um, it must be obvious by now, right? This video frickin' rules. I love it. I am having trouble finding any sort of fault with it at all. I guess maybe Nikki hasn't reached his maximum potential hotness yet, he’s still saving that for "Dr. Feelgood."

That's really it though. This video is like an amazing time capsule into the history of the Crüe. I mean, imagine if a video like this existed for Guns N Roses? "Sweet Child O' Mine" is like as studio as it gets ("Concept Version 1" my ass). While this video doesn't have a like insane lack of production values, it still gives you this look at the band's sort of original aesthetic. It's also (to my knowledge) the only video off of Too Fast For Love, so it's the only one where you get the original Crüe sound, which is really, really different from where they wind up later. It's just so raw sounding, I friggin' love it.

I also love the pentagrams and all red/black color scheme, which only really lasts through Shout at the Devil. Nikki still does it for Theatre of Pain, but by then Tommy and Mick are in all-black and Vince is having his brief dalliance with white and pink. Theatre of Pain is however where Nikki begins a multi-album flirtation with polka dots, which I adore. He looks so glam! But oh yeah, this video. Well, it was awesome.

Dio, "Rock N Roll Children"

Dio is for the Children

THE VIDEO Dio, "Rock N Roll Children," Sacred Heart, 1985, Warner Brothers

Click here to watch this video NOW!

SAMPLE LYRIC "Rock n roll chilllldren! / uh-looone uh-ga-ai-ai-ai-ain / Rock n roll chilllldren! / without a fri-ie-ie-iend / but they got rock n roll!"

EXCESSIVELY DETAILED DESCRIPTION The video opens with a lengthy prologue that is usually cut up, but I'll present it here in full because, you know, I'm like that. Stuff that is in brackets is what usually gets cut, no brackets means it's what you'll always see (if that is, like me, you are often in circumstances where you would see the video for "Rock N Roll Children").

[The video opens on a dark, damp street, with the camera hovering above it. A man walking towards us drops a newspaper in a garbage bin while another man, walking away from us, approaches a girl waiting beside a building. Even though costumes will soon place us firmly in the 80s, a car from the 40s or 50s is visible parked on the street.]

[Camera zooms in behind man's head: "Excuse me, I think you're really sexy."]
[Close up of girl's face. She's approximately 14 and definitely not sexy: "Get lost."]
[Guy's head, from side: "Hey, I was just saying I like you. I think you're really beautiful."]
[Girl shrilly interrupts him: "I said beat it!"]
[Super-hot teenage boy approaches, gently shoves guy: "Yeah, beat it!"]
[Guy moves away: "Hey, you know you should be more polite."]
[Girl, turning toward him: "And you should mind your own business."]
[Hot guy: "Yeah, I said beat it." Shoves other guy's chest.]
[Guy, pointing at hot guy and turning away: "Watch your step."]
[Girl rolls eyes at hot guy, who's looking hot -- he totally looks like a young George Lynch! Other guy, still pointing, finally walks away.]
Girl opens her arms in exasperation. "You're late."
[They start walking down the street. Hot guy: "Hey, I rescue you and you complain?"]
Girl, upset: "Where's the guitar?"
Guy, looking especially hot: "I wanted to..." (Girl interrupts: "What's in this bag?", rummaging through the shopping bag he's been carrying the whole time.) Guy: I wanted to talk to you about that."
Guy: "You see, I sold it."
Girl, incredulous, or at least incredibly pissed: "You did what?"
Guy: "I got myself a job, okay? But I needed to invest a little money."
Girl: "You gotta be putting me on!" [Points at herself and says, "Hey, that was mine too, you know!"]
Guy pulls valet hat out of bag. "Come on...(silly voice) Can I park your car, madam?"
Girl: "This is it. This is the end. You look path-et-ic." She turns away from him.
Guy, indignant: ["Look, I could pay for the guitar in a couple of weeks.] I could be making 200 bucks a week."
Girl, disgusted: "Oh, so you sold out. Yeah, well maybe I'm getting out now, too!" Lightning flashes and they both look around, startled. Thunder crashes.
Guy: "Crazy weather..."
And the song at last begins as the girl pulls the guy into the dusty curio shop they have been standing beside the window of the whole time.

The camera's above them as they enter the shop, which is dark, deserted, and full of crap like empty bird cages and old globes. As lightning flashes again, we first see Ronnie James Dio, who's looking rather dandaical in a white collared shirt with some kind of large brooch at the neck and a rather foppish black jacket. He's expressionless as lightning illuminates his face, and since he's pretty much out of context with what's been happening so far, we can't tell where he is.



The girl and boy pause to look into a crystal ball (which contains something we can't see) while a marionette spins over their heads, then we're back with the lightning and RJD as he begins to sing. We cut away from him, and back outside the mean guy is back, gesturing toward the curio shop, and he's got a cop with him (imagined dialogue: "See, officer? The chick I was sexually harassing was right here").

The boy and girl lean in close to the crystal ball, but its still unclear exactly what's inside (a person, probably Dio). The girl notices the guy and cop through the window (we also see a large model ship) as rain streaks down it, and she gestures to the boy, who looks up. They run backward into the shop and take refuge in a large wardrobe. We then see Dio singing again, more animatedly, and we can now tell that he is also inside the curio shop. As he sings, "Just like somebody slammed a door -- Bang! Yeah!" the doors of the wardrobe slam shut on the boy and girl. The doors then reopen, to reveal that the boy and girl are gone and have been replaced by light and fog. Meanwhile, Dio has crept over to the door (the way it's shot, he looks about three feet tall) and he turns the sign in the door's window from "open" to "closed" and draws the shade, giving us a meaningful look.

The boy and girl emerge, finding themselves in a shadowy, spooky world made entirely of two-by-fours. They walk cautiously, and we cut away momentarily to see that RJD is now watching them in the crystal ball, which he waves his hands around dramatically. The light from it causes him to look especially creepy. The boy says, "What's happening?" and we see an overhead shot of the world they're in -- it is actually a giant, spooky maze made entirely of two-by-fours and lit by a full moon. They're starting off, as far as we can tell, in the center of the maze.

Before we go any further, allow me to give a quick description of the two main players. The Girl is quite short (probably about my height, 5' 2") and a little heavy. Okay, by a little heavy, I basically mean not built like the women in every other heavy metal video. Her face looks like a 50-50 mix between Ashlee Simpson and Kelly Osbourne (I'm not kidding at all), and she has medium-length dark brown hair cut in a sort of rocker shag. She's not wearing much makeup. She has on a sleeveless white t-shirt with a large red cross on it accompanied by black silhouettes of airplanes, and she has a black bandanna tied around her neck. She's also wearing two studded belts (one wide, one narrow) over the shirt, and yellow and black tiger-stripe leggings. I can't see her shoes well but they're flats, possibly Converse.

The boy is, again, so hot. He totally looks like a young George Lynch. He has kind of spiky, somewhat long hair that's very teased. It's dark brown but has been highlighted blonde, and he has that sexy olive skin (just like George). He's wearing a t-shirt I can't see very well underneath a black, sleeveless vest, and he has a red bandanna around his neck. He's also wearing slim black jeans, and has another bandanna (that's I think yellow but might just be white -- the lighting in this video is horrible and all of the colors are washed out and very drab) tied around his left thigh. He has another one tied around his right calf. He's definitely wearing Chuck Taylors.

Anyway. They're in the spooky room, walking around horror movie-style (eyes wide, arms out, moving sideways). The girl's holding her arm out toward him, but he's already peeping down a hallway. As he passes through the doorway, a gate crashes down, trapping him there, and he turns and runs up to the bars as the girl panics. She brings both her hands to her face and we can see that she's got a bunch of bandannas, bracelets, etc. tied around both wrists.

She begins walking toward him, slowly, with one arm out, then we come in close to her face as a look of puzzlement comes over her, and she slowly turns her head to look over her left shoulder. There, behind her, we suddenly see a woman in a red dress holding a wrapped gift standing next to a Christmas tree, while a man and another teenage boy sit on a couch beside it. There's also a coffee table with some more gifts sitting on it. The man stands up and crosses his arms, and the woman holds the gift out and says either "Merry Christmas, dear" or "Merry Christmas, Sarah" (sorry, not sure), causing RJD to really go nuts with waving his hands around his crystal ball. In the ball, we see the girl start to smile and walk toward them, while the boy slams his hand against the bars and turns and walks away.



The girl accepts the gift from the mother, who clasps her hands together in delight. She takes the top off of the box, and we cut to a shot of the boy running down the halls and falling and sliding. The girl (who, I'm sorry, is actually wearing fingerless gloves with two large, studded cuffs on her wrists) has unwrapped a bouffy white blouse with a Peter Pan collar. She looks at it oddly, and as she holds it up to herself she suddenly sees herself in non-rocker clothes with un-teased hair and no makeup on. Disgusted, she hurls the shirt to the ground and starts crying. We see both the real her and the illusory non-rocker-her cry and run off, and the father points after her. The mother crys, the brother laughs, and the father admonishes, and as we see them all closely we can see that they're all a little weirdly made up (like if Andy Warhol touched up a Norman Rockwell painting).

Dio waves his hands over the ball, and we see that the boy has happily found his bedroom, which contains a messy twin bed covered in clothing and crap, a pile of albums, clothes, and so on on the floor, and a bulletin board with lots of posters, flyers, and a paper skeleton. He sits down on the bed, happy to find that in this weird, wooden universe he apparently hasn't sold the guitar. Just as he picks it up, a thuggish older man in a wifebeater and jeans enters and shoves him, hard. He recoils and the man yells at him (inaubibly), tears one of his posters off of the bulletin board and shreds it up, then begins taking off his belt. The boy takes off and we see him running down different wooden hallways.

Next we see the girl running (and I see now she has black bandannas tied around her legs -- clearly the costume person on this video had a big Punky Brewster fetish). She sees a white door with a man wearing black pants, a white dress shirt, and a bowtie standing beside it, and tries to run through it. He holds the door closed with one hand and with the other, grabs her and pulls her aside. He then opens the door for two blonde girls (one of whom is wearing a really strange hat not unlike the one the boy had at the beginning of the video), who look at the girl in disgust before walking through. The girl tries to go as well, while the door is open, but the man grabs her by the ear and pulls her back the other way.

We see another shot of the whole wooden maze from above as the boy runs through the center room, then we see the girl enter a classroom where several girls in white shirts, socks, and blue plaid skirts sit at desks and another girl writes on a chalkboard, and a man in a suit passes out papers. The girl, confused, carefully sits down at a desk, and as the man comes to her gestures to herself. He holds out her paper, tears it into tiny pieces, and throws the pieces in her face, and the girls at the other desks laugh at her. She shoves the books off of her desk, stands up slowly, then runs away.

Next we see the boy run up to a windowed door, pressing his hands against it. A closer shot reveals a handwritten "help wanted" sign in the window, and an older man with glasses wearing a white coat approaches the door from the inside, sees the boy, and jerks the sign away and pulls down the window shade. The boy whirls away.

The chorus is reprised as RJD waves his hands, and in the crystal ball we see the boy catch a basketball, toss it back to someone, and then catch it again as it is thrown at him with force. We then see him struggle for the ball against a gym teacher in green sweatpants while several other boys in green shorts jockey for position by the hoop, then the boy gets the ball away and makes a throwaway shot. Mercifully, they don't ask us to believe that he makes the shot, the ball simply goes away, and all of the guys yell after him as he runs off.

Dio waves at the crystal ball, and the girl stops running suddenly, surprised to see herself working on a motorcycle with two boys. One of the boys reaches over the bike and either simply shoves her or tries to grab her breast (hard to tell, but I'm leaning toward the latter -- making me love Dio even more for his sensitivity to sexism), and as she falls away we see both of the boys laughing and high-fiving each other in the crystal ball (assholes).



Next the boy is stopped short as he runs into a vision of himself having his long hair cut off by a slightly crazy looking barber. He turns and runs away, emerging in that main room again, where the girl has just shown up as well. They approach each other cautiously, and she puts out her hands and touches him to make sure it's really her. Realizing they've found each other again, they embrace, and he lifts her off of the ground. Suddenly they break apart, and realize they're surrounded by all of the people from all of the different scenarios -- the scary dad, the creepy guy, the laughing girls, the barber, the teacher, and they yell and circle around them until Dio picks up his crystal ball and smashes it against the ground.

This breaks the spell (or whatever), and the boy and girl run out of the wardrobe, which is still full of light and fog. They leave the shop, and emerge (somehow the boy has recovered his shopping bag). There's someone else standing outside the window but apparently it's not the guy from before. They grab each other and kiss, and we see Dio inside waving his arms to show that he's actually been wearing sort of a poet blouse (or whatever they call those things) and a cape the whole time. As the girl and boy embrace, the boy reaches behind her and drops the shopping bag into the garbage bin. They turn and walk up the street, and she grabs his ass (lucky). We see a close up of the outside of the curio shop's door, and from inside Dio's hand reaches up to raise the shade and change the sign from "closed" back to "open" -- ready for business, or at least, to teach some more rock n roll children a life lesson.

THE VERDICT I'm quite enamored of this video, even though I find it a bit discomforting to watch (it's the same thing as videos like "18 and Life", I always feel bad for the people). Anyway. My main revelation in writing about the video, and more importantly, in finding the complete video, is that having the entire prologue explains some mysteries but creates others.

First, it makes the girl more sympathetic. In the edited version, it just seems like she wants the boy to be there for her and (it is implied) become a rock star and take her with him. Its only in getting all of the dialogue that we find out that the guitar was a joint purchase, so it no longer seems that she's just being belligerent about his getting the job.

Adding in the whole exchange with the creepy guy helps to explain why, once inside the curio shop, they run and hide. Though the video always includes them seeing the guy and the cop outside the window, without the prologue there's no reason for them to run and hide, unless they're a lot sketchier than they had seemed (they're not doing anything illegal just by being in the store). Though it's still unclear what pretext the creepy guy brought the cop over on, it at least serves to not just make the kids seem unjustly paranoid. (As Dio might say, "it's always a mystery").

The one part really still unexplained is why, even after realizing that they do truly only have each other, the boy still throws out the valet uniform at the end. The prologue makes him slightly less sympathetic (after all, he pawned the guitar they both owned) but at the same time more so (in the usual edit, we just hear him say, "I could be making 200 bucks a week," making him indeed sound like a sellout, but in its entirety he prefaces that statement with, "Look, I could pay for the guitar in a couple of weeks," implying that he's at least made a plan to get it back). However, as they make their jaunty exit, uniform in the garbage, now he not only doesn't have the means to keep his job, he also by extension has thrown away their shot at getting the guitar back. D'oh! Clearly, after their reconciliation, when the girl figures this out she's going to kick his ass.

This video reminds me a lot of the Stephen King book Needful Things, only instead of trapping its victims in their nostalgic fantasies, keeping them from living in their crappy realities, it instead traps its victims in their crappy realities, later releasing them and encouraging them to return to living a nostalgic fantasy. This video is often criticized for being Dio's label's desperate attempt to put a youthful, attractive face on his music (since he was basically neither), but I do like it because it really embodies the almost uplifting message that Dio is constantly trying to put forward to his true believers -- that you don't have to be youthful, attractive, or embraced by mainstream society to find community in music. What can I say, it's Dio! He is seriously the nicest guy ever. How can I be snarky? I'll save it for "Rainbow in the Dark."

P.S. Giant new photos added in memory of Ronnie James Dio, 5/16/10.