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Cyndi Lauper - True Colors

Video- *
Song- *****

"FREAK FREAK!!!"

Is this video for real? Hold on, I'll come back to that. I'll cover the song first.
I don't think there's a lot of people who haven't heard this song before. I mean that really literally: it's been covered by a whole lot of bands like that geek Phil Collins plus it was like the official song of the Olympics and Kodak. The album "True Colors" sold more than 12 million copies worldwide, and went 4x Platinum in the U.S. Alongside "Time After Time" and the more upbeat "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun", the song will go down in musical history and will surely be remembered for years to come.
The VIDEO, on the other hand, is a waste of videotape. They should have filmed some garbage. Literally, they should have just taped 4 minutes of a garbage pile just sitting there. No, I'm kinda joking, I mean it's not that bad but I just think there's not enough keeping it together. Let me explain:
First she's with the drum, then there's this giant sandbox and then her (real) mom and a friend are on a boat. I suppose it's just a kind of dream she has and for that it's nice. But what's with the big headress? Do we really need to prance around- no not "like a rainbow" - but like a reinDEER? THEN she's on some sheets doing God knows what, then she's doing something with a guy but you can't tell what it is, then she's marching around moodily with a shredded newspaper dress. It's all just so sporadic. See, it's taken up a whole paragraph and yet I still have no clue what's going on. I'm as clueless as she appears to be in the first picture. There's a much better remake of the video here.

Grace Jones - Pull Up To The Bumper

Video- ***.75
Song- ***.5

Got A Long, Black Limousine? Well, You Know The Rest

When I was a kid and I heard this song, I thought it was an interesting tribute to automobiles, and that's about it, right? WRONG. I mean, did I really need to be hit over the head with a halibut to understand those utterly ridiculous lyrics? "Looking for a proper place... you'll fit into the space... pull up to my bumper, baby, in your long, black limousine. Pull up to my bumper, baby, drive it inbetween." Of course, I would have been only 3 in 1981, so I didn't hear this version, I heard the version by Patra (whose album "Scent of Attraction" is pretty good, by the way) which is just as NAS-TY!
So apparently, Grace started as a model and then made her name in music as well. She's obviously a strong character, but she's not like the character Strangè in the movie Boomerang which she plays. She's extremely deep, wise and thoughtful, which her wordy website reflects. This is a pretty good song (although I prefer Patra's version) but she has many others which are good, namely Slave To The Rhythm, Use Me, and this one: I've Seen That Face Before/Libertango is my favorite. It's a slightly spooky song but the bass just grabs you and doesn't let go until the song is over- I think it's a masterpiece.
The video is pretty cool, showing New York in the 80s and at a fast pace, perhaps it's the forerunner of Madonna's Ray Of Light video?

George Michael - Father Figure

Video- ****
Song- *****

He Could Be A Father Figure... If He Adopts!!!

Well, at least this is a marked improvement from his earlier endeavors. This is where his work started to get pretty good, if not his best. This album in particular was a masterpiece at the time, and remains quite a classic today. Men hadn't shown their sexuality as overtly before this. Justin Timberlake probably would have been more of a shock these days if it hadn't been for George Michael. I mean, it's not like he's all naked and dancing around or anything, but even so this is an incredibly sexual video, not to mention the song "I Want Your Sex" is on the same album. Also his fashion and his looks are a world away from his Wham! days.
Isn't it funny how if you're gay all you gotta do is hire a model and make a video with her and suddenly you're a straight sex symbol known the world over. I guess humanity is just like that sometimes, all wrapped up in the image while the reality is something just the opposite. Anyway, isn't the song cool?!?
It's kind of a ballad and as such, a ballad really needs to be special to get me interested. I'm pretty hooked and I have been since I heard the song. The way it starts slow and steady, but hip and slick at the same time, then picks itself up and becomes more upbeat is brilliant. A sample of it has been used in a brilliant song by P.M. Dawn, made when sampling was just starting to pop up in Pop.

ZZ Top - Legs

Video- ***.5
Song- ****

Yeah, She's Got Legs... And No Brain!

Are these guys in the Taliban or what? No, they appear to respect women who go around looking like they should be wearing garbage bags, so probably not. This has got some kinda lame-ass plot to it, but it's kinda cute. These rough-type people picking on the waitress and her nerdy stud- sorry, nerdy nerd. And in the end the geeks inherit the Earth- by learning to be trashy. I just love watching sluts... do... whatever it is they do...
The song shows what a classic band ZZ Top is. It's a great and dynamic song about a simple subject (no, not the concept of the empowering of the female in today's work-a-holic climate, despite lower wages in comparison to that given to men, and amidst the confusion of the exploitation of her overt sexuality versus her reserved intelligence which is seen by many to be a trend which may be taken over by a simple realization that women get pregnant and must take time out of their work while men do not, which itself is now under attack by the idea that men should also take time out to be fathers when their wives are pregnant, and by the way, "although it is a contemporary buzzword, the word 'empower' is not new, having arisen in the mid-17th century with the legalistic meaning 'to invest with authority, authorize.' Shortly thereafter it began to be used with an infinitive in a more general way meaning 'to enable or permit.' Both of these uses survive today but have been overpowered by the word's use in politics and pop psychology. Its modern use originated in the civil rights movement, which sought political empowerment for its followers. The word was then taken up by the women's movement, and its appeal has not flagged. Since people of all political persuasions have a need for a word that makes their constituents feel that they are or are about to become more in control of their destinies, empower has been adopted by conservatives as well as social reformers. It has even migrated out of the political arena into other fields. The Usage Panel has some misgivings about this recent broadening of usage. For the Panelists, the acceptability of the verb empower depends on the context. Eighty percent approve of the example 'We want to empower ordinary citizens.' But in contexts that are not political the Panel is markedly less enthusiastic. The sentence 'Hunger and greed and then sexual zeal are felt by some to be stages of experience that empower the individual,' garners approval from only 33 percent of the Panelists. The Panel may frown on this kind of psychological empowering because it resonates of the self-help movement, which is notorious for trendy coinages." [-empowering, from www.dictionary.com], no, no, the subject is just sexy women), and it (the damn ZZ Top song- pay attention!!!) is something that anybody can relate to and instantly understand. These are the kind of things that any 80's band wanted to capture. Furthermore, if you could get me along with the rest of pop culture going this much with such a guitar, Heavy Metal-ish sound, you deserve some credit. Not everybody was into Iron Maiden, but ZZ Top was a big hit.