| Beck---Sexx Laws | Ben Harper--- Burn To Shine |
| MosDef---Miss Fat Booty | Iggy Pop ---Corruption |
---Reviewed by John Kane
Illustrating the party
vibe of his latest record, Midnite Vultures, Beck's latest video
is a chaotic, deeply silly, nonstop good time. Starting off with four losers
at something called "Vision Warrior Men's Circle" getting attacked
by a bunch of football players the video quickly jumps from one weird, surreal
scene to another, all loosely tied together by a sexual component. We're
shown kitchen appliances getting it on, canned foods grinding away, robots
humping, what might be a dance troupe spraying each other with paint, and
plenty of other strange people and things. Eventually everyone from the
video winds up dancing away as Beck and his band perform in mock soul brother
style. In a video filled with hilarity, the funniest thing by far is Beck's
James Brown impression. When he goes down on one knee and breaks out the
falsetto voice even the most jaded viewer should be giggling. While one
could argue the video might be trying to make some point about sex and transgression,
it seems unlikely. At the most what Beck's going for here is a celebration
of letting things go, getting with whoever, dancing around, having fun.
In other words, partying. And as party videos go this one definitely gets
the job done. 
---Reviewed by Blackstar 7
Miss
Fat Booty depicts a familiar scene that we've all seen in today's club
scene: boy steps to girl, girl disses boy, girl has a change of heart when
she encounters boy in the V.I.P. lounge. After a brief stint with doubt,
they click and a relationship begins. Now an unusual twist: he falls for
her, hard. He's talking about 3 months, 6 months, and out to 9 months of
needing (more of) her. In a strange lyrical twist at the end, it turns out
she was too good to be real, but the song isn't as transient as the lady.
By the end of the song, as your bobbin' your head to the fierce bass line
and a loop of Aretha Franklin's classic One Step providing the hook
, you're probably flashing back on your own Miss Fat Booty stories.
For there is something about the song that grabs you: maybe it's MOs Def
and his paint brush lyrics, maybe it's the soul-filled chorus that pulls
you in, but maybe it's that small piece of you that wishes you may one day
find a Miss Fat Booty of your own. ---Reviewed by John Kane
For
me, Ben Harper has never registered at all. It's not that he's terrible,
it's just that his music has always struck me as bland and unremarkable.
While this video doesn't change my opinion of his music, I have to admit
that I did get a kick out of it. Taking the video-doesn't-have-to-have-any-connection-with-what-the-song's-about
approach we are presented with Ben and his cronies animated in spaghetti
western style. We got shots of Ben in jail, cigar chomping, spinning US
marshal badges, a devil woman standing in front of a noose, the gang riding
off into the sunset. If you ever saw the animated credits to any of the
Sergio Leone westerns (Fistful of Dollars, The Good, The Bad, and the
Ugly) then you'll recognize who the video director is stealing from.
Overall the video doesn't really add up to anything, but it's fun for three
or so minutes which is all that's necessary. Now if only Ben Harper could
write something as good as Ennio Morricone. ---Reviewed by John Kane
Two suburban
kids, of the jaded snot-nose variety, are doing that holiest of suburban
acts: zoning out in front of the TV set. Channel surfing away the kids get
an eyeful of what I suppose are examples of corruption---violent
news footage, world leaders (Boris Yeltsin, Bill and Monica), silicone-enhanced
bikini-clad women, cigarette ads, that Heaven's Gate guy, and of course
the latest Iggy Pop video. Things that if I were I still a kid I would consider
fun and cool. For these kids though, it's just more of the same, not enough
to even make them blink. It's the standard corrupt world de-sensitizing
the young line, to which all I can say is blah. What's always been
exciting about Iggy Pop is that he's never seemed to give a damn about the
world and what's going on in it. His anger is more internally based, at
the risk of sounding pretentious I'd even use the word existential. Anyone
out there remember his song 1969 where instead of caring about the
social changes and struggles of the time he just sees it as another year
with nothing to do? Maybe it was a self-centered viewpoint, nihilistic,
but at least it was vital, passionate. Which this video isn't. One thing
I was impressed with---Iggy's muscled out physique. At fifty plus it has
to be said the man's in great shape.