VIDEOLYMPICS : PIE FIGHTS, RASPBERRY DELIGHTS

There’s seldom much agreement among the VideOlympics panel when it comes to rating the latest music videos--and never more so than this month, when I often found myself on one side of the fence, and Richard Cromelin, Dennis Hunt, Connie Johnson, Craig Lee and Chris Willman on the other. Oh well, c’est la video. Most of us could agree, though, that Talking Heads and Prince have once again come up with little gems.

Ratings system: 80-100, don’t miss; 60-79, recommended; 40-59, watchable; 20-39, weak; 0-19, wretched.

TUNE IN:

78”ROAD TO NOWHERE.” Talking Heads. Directors: David Byrne, Stephen Johnson. Life may be a road to nowhere, but the trip is still an amazingly eventful one worth the taking, David Byrne (pictured at right) and pals seem to be saying in this colorful, imaginative video. The slight bleakness behind the bright imagery is about as dark as the trimly upbeat new album gets. This “Road” is lined with the sort of flashy new-wave effects one would expect, but--unlike many such hi-tech clips--reason and meaning lies behind every video trick, and spacious, contemplative moments counterpoint the kaleidoscopic segments. Life’s like that, you know. RC 95, CL 95, CW 90, TA 80, CJ 79, DH 30.

77”RASPBERRY BERET.” Prince. Director: Price. The neo-psychedelia in rock that you may have been hearing about finds its best visual expression thus far in this vivid clip, which combines swirling animation with a bouncy lip-sync performance. The light-hearted (if basically kinda stupid) song, the deftly executed technique and the enthusiasm of the band and some friends make this irresistible fun. But Prince, don’t you think you should take something for that cough? CW 92, RC 90, TA 88, CJ 87, CL 60, DH 45.

68”FREEWAY OF LOVE.” Aretha Franklin. Director: Brian Grant. The song isn’t as clever with auto-erotic imagery as the Gamble and Huff classic “Expressway to Your Heart,” but still provides a nice new vehicle for Lady Soul. The video, too, doesn’t make as much imaginative use of cars and freeways and the Detroit setting as it might have; it runs smoothly but without much get-up-and-go. Franklin looks and sounds just fine. (See Record Rack, Page 76.) CJ 90, DH 80, CL 75, RC 70, CW 58, TA 35.

43”CENTERFIELD.” John Fogerty. Director: John Beug. This joyous salute to both baseball and the resilience of the human spirit is entirely illustrated, quite appropriately, with footage from baseball archives. Except for a few good moments, though, the video doesn’t present very clever use of the material. TV sports shows do a better job of it every week. CW 66, TA 65, RC 50, CJ 30, DH 25, CL 20.

40”PIE JESU.” Andrew Lloyd Webber. Director: Steven Frears. This video version of an excerpt from Lloyd Webber’s “Requiem” LP cuts between a shot of the two sopranos (Sarah Brightman, the composer’s wife), a boy and scenes of what appear to be a bombed city where people search through rubble. I loved the music and found the somewhat abstract mood of this pie haunting; some people on the yawning panel would have liked to throw a pie of another type at the screen. TA 95, CW 52, DH 50, CL 35, RC 10, CJ 0.

TUNE OUT:

37”AKEA GUINEA,” Cocteau Twins. Director: John Scarlett-Davis. This Scottish group has fashioned one of the most beautifully ethereal sounds in pop. The video is deceptively simple, a flow of still and moving images in black-and-white and color of singer Elizabeth Fraser talking, laughing and singing in a large, sunlit room--all lithely in tune with the song’s gauzily atmospheric textures. Reminiscent of the films of Carl Dreyer and Chris Marker, this exquisitely photographed clip seemed to me not only to perfectly capture a great band’s essence, but also to be music video’s equivalent of the finest impressionist paintings. “Says nothing--like their music,” Lee thought, and the panel agreed. TA 100, RC 40, CW 35, CJ 30, CL 10, DH 8.

35”NEMESIS.” Shriekback. Director: Tony Vandenende. This English band was formed by ex-members of XTC and Gang of Four and fuses its eccentricities and deadpan vocals to a funky, propulsive beat in this song from the new “Oil and Gold” LP. The video was mildly liked by some who took its Greco-Roman mythological symbolism seriously and by others who thought it was a parody of Frankie Goes to Hollywood-style decadence. It was disliked by others for various reasons, including an oversimilarity to heavy-metal video fetishism. Rather ridiculous, but also somewhat intriguing. RC 65, TA 55, CL 50, CJ 17, CW 12, DH 10.

27”LIKE A SURGEON.” Weird Al Yankovic. Directors: Jay Levy, Robert Weiss. This parody of Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” is full of hospital jokes older than County General, as Yankovic plays a malpracticing doc. Many of these bits have even been in other music videos. At the end, when the Weird One starts imitating Madonna’s movements, right down to the bare midriff, the video finally becomes pretty funny--too late. (See Record Rack, Page 76.) CJ 45, DH 40, TA 35, CW 25, RC 10, CL 5.

23”HIGHWAYMAN.” Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson. Director: Jon Small. It’s a country-video updating of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse as these riders in the sky (Lee called it, “Willie in the Sky with Bandannas”) fictionally describe their deaths (as a construction worker, a bandit, a pilot and a sailor) and assert their immortality, even if it’s (as Cash sings) only as “a drop of rain.” This well-photographed black-and-white clip looks like a movie trailer and trips up on its aim at profundity. The panel found it mostly good for giggles. TA 55, DH 30, RC 25, CL 20, CJ 19, CW 0.