Rob Masters

I fully expect that many some a couple at least one of my readers have been waiting for this iconic 80s video to make an appearance. Featuring a blend of hand-drawn pencil animation and live-action footage, this video was an instant classic, and made the song a 1985 number one hit in the USA, and one of the best selling singles of all time. But this is not the original - the original version (by the same band, from 1984) had a far less popular response, and a far more boring video. It was a flop outside of Norway.  Remixed and re-released a year later, it soared to remarkable heights, and has stayed there year after year, and is one of only five songs on YouTube to exceed one beeelion views. So here you have it, Aha's 1985 release of "Take On Me", as remastered from the original 35mm film in 2019.

The lockdown due to The Nineteen does have a few benefits. One of the ones of working from home is that I get to spend a bit more time in the garden, and appreciating it more. Today, I was treated to this lovely sight:

This one took a little more hunting than usual to find. I first saw this at JAFWA back in 1995, and it is one of those videos that stays with you. Created by the inimitable Hayao Miyazaki, with music by pop duo Chage & Aska, this is not so much a music video as a short movie with a musical soundtrack. I won't say much about this one, so sit back and enjoy "On Your Mark", by Chage & Aska, as interpreted by the master of anime, Miyazaki.

Duran Duran are a band we shall revisit in the future. Today, we're going to look at a spin-off project - Arcadia, and their hit "Election Day". Full of all the excesses and fetishes of the 1980s New Romantic movement, this is, to my mind, the quintessential video of the genre - beating out Spandau Ballet's "Vienna" by a carefully mussed whisker. But is it genre? This is one of several videos I've had to consider carefully, and, in the end, it just  falls on the SFF side of the fence. Throughout the video there is a sense of odd - little things, like the game being played (and the implied effects of said game). There are other hints as well - for example there are the horse-men, who appear to be tightly bound by some unbreakable force that they are in a constant struggle against. On top of that is a certain desperation to all the sensuality - an impending doom of some kind. (I'll conveniently skip over the fact that it was made at the height of...

What follows is a discussion of mental health and stress from someone who is, overall, in a good place. None of this is advice of any sort, but is just some personal observations, and some interesting research. Unless you have somehow managed to live under several miles of rock for the past six months, you know that we are living in very strange world today. The personal impacts of a global pandemic are many and varied, from the physical isolation, to the impacts on work, loss of jobs, the fear of illness - the list goes on. Any of these can cause stress, and the combination of all, or even just some, of them creates even more stress. The idea of the stress that these can cause, will, in itself, cause stress. So what to do about it? We are seeing many families start down a self-sufficiency kick to try and gain some stability in food supply (something, incidentally, that we saw in the Great Depression of the 1930s), an increase in interest in exercise (not seen in the 1930s, but...

It will come as no surprise to folks that I tend to acquire a variety of cooking devices - some of them traditional, some of them on the bleeding edge of technology. What I do avoid are devices with one purpose - unless they happen to do it extraordinarily well, and take minimal space. My pear corer, for example, or the peach pitter. Everything else serves multiple uses. A rice cooker, for example will also cook many other rice-based dishes, and will serve as a steamer as well. Today four of these devices met in in the creation of a simple dish, but made so much simpler and tastier as a result. The first two tools were actually used nearly four months ago. Our Fowlers Vacola preserving system, and our tomato mill. These were used together to produce two of today's ingredients - a bottle of preserved tomatoes, and a bottle of passata. The Fowlers Vacola domestic kit. The Fowlers preserving system has been around since the 1880's, and the Australian company since the ...

The force of musical chaos that is Ex Hex has created a couple of genre-based clips. This is from their first album, and is simple chaos-spreading fun with a solid rock theme. Nothing more to say here, except for "Stand up and rock out" to "Waterfall" from the album Rips by Ex Hex.

So we've had a couple of rather sombre weeks, let's pick up the pace with a track that we first encountered via the game Just Dance. This one had quite an energetic set of moves, making it great for an aerobic workout, the visuals were (ahem) cool. In fact, before we go on, here they are: The song itself is rather good, too. Intriguing lyrics, Sia's amazing voice, and a compelling dance beat. So we went looking for the original video, and what a treat it is. Let's open with some Bronze-age hunters, proto-Vikings perhaps, chasing a wolf across the ice. A great visual statement, hints of the wolf having already been wounded, and a full-team dog sled in full flight to round out the imagery. So, very cool, but not especially SFFish. Right up until the chase hits the rocks, and the hunters think they've got the wolf cornered. Because then something weird happens. With with music beat becoming visualised in the rocks and ice, you'd think that it was just...

In amongst all the SFF music videos out there, there's always a group of videos that are not going to make the cut. They might have a genre sensibility, but are not actually genre themselves. Quite a few of these are thoroughly excellent videos in themselves, and so I'm going to share a few of them tonight. First up is Marian Call's "Good Morning Moon". I had to think long and hard about this one, but ultimately it is all about something real, not fiction. So here is her ode to the ISS. Next up we have one of Lindsay Stirling's many collaborations, this one with The Piano Guys. An homage to, and cover of Mission Impossible, it still does not quite transition across into SFF. But it is amazing to watch, and the music is wonderful! Moving on we get La Roux, and "In for the Kill", which despite a deep Bladerunner aesthetic never quite tips over the edge. Next is another one I had to think very hard about which side of the fence it was ...

Billie Eilish is a remarkable person. Musically gifted in ways that alter the musical landscape, and having a fierce independence that defies the music industry norms, she hit the music scene like a bomb. This track from 2019 is a fantastic reflection of that - confronting climate change head-on, and pulling no punches in any way, she also manages to create a superbly Dantesque visual story in just under four minutes. So, with no further ado, here is Billie Eilish and "all the good girls go to hell".

It could be argued that the least popular minister in Australia is our Minister for Home Affairs, the Honourable Peter Dutton. So when the word broke yesterday that he had tested positive for NCovid-19, it was inevitable that there would be some sort of fallout. Sure enough, minutes later, a co-worker of mine (a recent immigrant) visited Wikipedia to read up on him, and encountered the following. Now it was reverted within 2-3 minutes, but he managed to grab a screenshot at my request.

One of the modern musical greats this time around - and from a work released just two days before his death. I am, of course talking about David Robert Jones. Better known to  the world as David Bowie. This is the title track from his last album, Blackstar. And what a ride it is. Surreal in ways that cannot be adequately put into words, the video features a cat-tailed woman, living scarecrows, religious ecstasies, a dead astronaut, and a button-eyed Bowie. The music meanwhile most strongly fits experimental jazz in style, and the lyrics are similarly surreal.  Debate about various elements of this video abound - mostly around the identity of the astronaut (Major Tom?), but also about various other things. For example, what is with the lovecraftian creature at the end? So have a look at Blackstar, and tell me what you think it all means! I'll cheerfully admit I'm way out of my depth.

Advances in CGI in the 90s led to a spate of CGI-based SFF-inspired videos. Combine this with boy bands and house music and you get things like this offering of Eiffel 65. Musically it is ... well let's be honest and say that it is not exactly Mike Oldfield, and the lyrics are not Bob Dylan. It is, however annoyingly catching, and extremely danceable. The video, meantime, is odd, to say the least. One part alien kidnapping, one part arcade fighting game, and one part concert video, it really is something of a creation of its time.