The day everything changed...

Many people speculate as to what date in MTV history is the most significant. Some like to bring up the ever popular date when the fist music video was aired in 1981, namely the highly symbolic "Video killed the radio star" by The Buggles. Others point to when Thriller was released in 1983. The point is that there are a plethora of dates and events that comprise this thing we call "MTV", and it is hard to select one that is the most significant. For the sake of argument, lets say that the most significant date was August 1, 1981, the day MTV was founded. What does this date mean?

Since the 1960's, ideas for music-video were being conceived, from Richard Lester's early music videos of the Beatles and the UK's Top of the Pops, to Mason Williams' proposal to CBS to put music to slide shows of art and air the work (this idea was shot down). Then in 1981, a man named Gary Van Haas had the idea to have a channel of music videos in music stores as a form of advertising. Before long, this channel had expanded its audience to cable television, and thus MTV was launched.

This channel was filled to the brim with musical elements. The impact this must've had on music culture can't really be measured, especially after hip hip music was aired. Now music is no longer a story told in the back of a music store; it is an epic televised for the world to see every night at 8.

In light of this fact, one of the most important dates in MTV history is February 8, 2010, when the company dropped the subtitle "Music television" from its logo. From here on out, it would be a compilation of random shows that reflects a almost hedonistic culture, shows such as Jersey Shore, Catfish, Ridiculousness and more.

This is an important date because MTV was no longer about music, and thus no longer had any sort of impact on music culture. That mantle was taken up by VH1. That date is the day that ratings killed the video star.

Lets Break it Down!

Here below is a chart made to break down the video posted in the previous post, I fought Piranhas,  and hold the various aspects of the video accountable for their impact on the overall performance on the video/listening experience. 

 

I include this image to emphasize the concept of "How do we understood what Jack White is trying to say?" One does not simply listen and infer everything there is to know about a music video, which is why we have charts like the one above. Things like context, history, visuals, and more all play a role in how we understand music videos. 

"Music? What's that?"

During the year of 1999, several artists are progressing in their career. Britney spears has just released her new album “Hit me baby, one more time”, Prince releases his new song “1999”, Red Hot Chili Peppers releases Californication . Billy Joel does his last pop tour before devoting himself entirely to classical music, and the list goes on.

Amidst all of this are the White Stripes, who’ve just released their self-titled album, which was notably dedicated to the deceased Blues musician Son House. If you know anything about Son House, or for that matter, Blues music, you know that the music was not very musical. It is easy forget that blues was born of African music and a culture of pain, and is by no means easy to listen to. In its origins, it is rough sounding, the lyrics are brutal; it is recorded on the front porch with broken guitars and haggard voices. Its almost as if the music wasn't about the music at all.

In the same way, when I watch "I Fought Piranhas" on its own, it sounds terrible; however, when I look at in the context of all the other contemporary music, I am blown away by what this video is, and what it is saying. I discuss this so that you can understand the significance of what the White Stripes are doing with their song "I Fought Piranhas".

For this writing I am using a video excerpt from the film It Might Get Loud where Jack White is playing the song on a front porch of a farmhouse.

To discuss the visual aspect of the video, one has to look beyond what is obviously going on. If you watch the video, all that is going on is that Jack White is playing a piece of junk. He then starts playing a beat up guitar through a old amplifier, the same basic riffs as before, except for where the visual switches to some cows on the other side of the fence. This is so significant because these days, music videos are about glam and show. Just to give a perfect example of what music videos have become, watch Anaconda by Nicki Minaj. Music videos are often about advertising, how many overdubs we can have in a single verse, and so on. And in the middle of this is Jack White, throwing it all back in the music industry’s face.

The musical aspect is even more audacious. Here in this video was have a broken guitar, some old tube amplifiers and a simple microphone set up. The vocals are distorted, and the guitar is over driven. The transitions from verse to verse are rough and unmusical. All of this simply translates to me as, “wow, it is just like, this guy versus the world. He isn’t trying to be musical; it’s a statement that is like a spot of orange of a sea of white that is the music business.

Lastly, the lyrics: the main refrain of the song goes like this: "I fought Piranhas, I fought the cold. There was no one with me. I was all alone" Does that sound sad, or depressing, even? Good. Jack White did what he meant to do. It is hard to say with certainty if White is referring to specific event in his life, or something he sees in the world, but we can be sure that he did not sing this to please; he sang this to speak.

So this all totals to what? In some cases, the statement behind the music is more relevant than anything else. Maybe the point of the music isn't to entertain, but to point you to something else. In this case, Jack White exemplifies this by showing us a video of music that essentially says, "watch this!" to all the other musicians, and goes in a completely opposite direction.