Monday, February 25, 2008

Lone Justice

Another weekend down the tubes, and — bleaagh — here you are, staring into the gaping maw (paw even) of another week without a single leavening holiday, even of the St. Martin Luther King variety. You say you can't get started, your synapses are sputtering like spark plugs after 100,000 miles of duty, your energy is congealed?

Have I got a video for you.
You'll thank me for it. If this doesn't get your metabolism doing the mambo as quick as you like, then call me Ishmael. Here:



Oh. Wow.

An even wilder version, albeit with crummy video quality:



That was Lone Justice, fronted by the adorable Maria McKee, circa 1987.

I'll say this for YouTube. It may permit millions of dolts to stuff the bit plumbing with reprehensible garbage, but you can often find videos there that you never expected to see again.

Photobucket

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Rick,

A quality rule of my own in watching music videos:

"The music is not so good if it degrades when you close your eyes to listen; it is good music if it improves to the ear when you do the same."

The first video failed that test for me. I am a bit old fashioned, but check this example and yet another of Petula Clark's wonderful talent. Her songs were deceptively simple but for me she used the tools of the pop music toolbox to maximum implementation and expression. Her songs were simple, melodic and tended to build upward to a climax, ergo making them a tad sexy for all their pop simplicity. Because of these characteristics, I think they will stand as fine examples of pop music from the 1960's.

- BT

PS: The second performance used to be on YouTube until recently. I found the alternate copy but users might have to pass through an ad before getting to the video. The sound is as good as the YouTube version but the video is of lesser clarity than the YouTube version was.

Anonymous said...

One more offering in addition to my entry above on female performers...Anna Netrebko singing Mio Babbino Caro. I am not a fan of operatic music but the classics are beautiful and this is one of them. Check the YouTube comments where more than a few people are surprisingly critical. That's ok by me, as I've looked at many of the videos of this particular piece and hers sounds, looks and seems one of the best. Of course, this is only one person's opinion, I admit.

Anonymous said...

...and lastly -- a warm-hearted toast to Frank Sinatra who died ten years ago this year on May 14th. How could Frank have pinned it so presciently, so knowingly, so amazingly, so many years [35!] in advance in this recently discovered alternate take?

Rick Darby said...

I don't think I ever saw Petula Clark. She was just a voice on the radio, many years ago, to me.

She is enchantingly pretty, even with the dated early-'60s hairdos, but I can't honestly say either of these two videos does much for me.

Netrebko — stunning!

Sinatra — too bad he and a few of his less respectable associates weren't on those flights on September 11 …