What the hell's a Feed?
Stick it in your email!
The BEST Best Music Video List
The period from the early 80’s to mid-90’s was an exceptional era in pop music. Coinciding with the broad penetration of cable and MTV in particular, suddenly there was a premium on how a song looked — style over substance, some complained. But also an unlimited palette provided to a generation of artists more varied than any seen before or since. The younger brothers and sisters of the 60’s generation took the liberties won by their siblings for granted and put them into practice. Powerful girls, perpetually angry and alienated boys and smoldering queers came out of the stylistically stagnant 70’s to face resurgent Conservatism, a culture of unbridled greed and AIDS. It was the end of a century and, like the fin de siècle period of the previous century, an opportunity to explore and exploit aesthetic excess. Punk, New Wave, New Romanticism, Hip Hop, Grunge all mixed together in an artistic abundance that cataloged the hope, despair and style of youth at the end of the 20th century. Here are 25 examples of the best of the lot.
Posted in Blather 07/21/07 | 
Email this | Comments (11)
Share/Save this: 
The New Order one in particular I remember because my brothers and I would look at the strange characters and wonder WTF? Great song though.
Take On Me is a real classic, too!
Comment by Webomatica — July 22, 2007 @ 9:53 pm
great list.
Comment by Aatom — July 23, 2007 @ 11:34 am
Very good list, but I think one of the last great videos ever produced and not included here was Sabotage by the Beastie Boys. Great song, complete irreverance.
Comment by Beardsly Catherwood — July 27, 2007 @ 4:08 pm
Beardsley,
There are a lot I could’ve added, but wanted to keep the list tight. Don’t kill, but I always thought of the Beasties as sort of a bar mitzvah band, or to be more accurate, impresarios of rap and hip hop — in the mold of Malcolm McLaren. Genius, but not quite authentic. I’m probably wrong.
I would’ve included [this] video — it’s brilliant and all about what (I think) they do best. But it came too late — 1999.
Apropos of nothing, a few months ago I was walking home from work through Chelsea and Yauch came flying by on his skateboard (the guy’s in his 40’s) and stopped at the corner to cruise this girl REALLY HARD. She just rolled her eyes and shook her head and he took off. It was funny.
Comment by SD — July 27, 2007 @ 5:26 pm
The Let Me Go video by Heaven 17 is one of my favorites ever….
Comment by wamylove — August 4, 2007 @ 1:19 pm
Wamylove! Haven’t seen you around here in forever. Glad you liked the post. I agree — Heaven 17 (along with Scritti Politti) were probably my favorites. So smart and such style…
Comment by SD — August 4, 2007 @ 1:30 pm
No Cloudbusting by Kate Bush?
Comment by Wolfie! — August 4, 2007 @ 9:03 pm
Wolfie — you read my mind. In fact, I wanted to post Utah Saints’ “Something Good”, which samples Cloudbusting. But I couldn’t find a good video online.
I’ll definitely add Cloudbusting.
Comment by SD — August 4, 2007 @ 9:15 pm
Oh, another you might like is Experiment IV by Kate, which features Dawn French as one of the scientists.
Comment by Wolfie! — August 5, 2007 @ 10:05 am
Excellent list!
Everyone has its own favorites, one of my favorite videos is “Sweet Dreams” from Eurythmics, really extra-ordinary.
Comment by Roland — November 7, 2007 @ 3:02 pm
Wonderwall by Oasis was classic. But overall I like the list, good stuff!
Watch Now!
Comment by Kit — December 21, 2007 @ 3:10 pm