November and Classic Black & White Music Videos

Ever since I posted P!nk's "I Don't Believe You" video a few days back, I've been gradually obsessing over B&W music videos, which is something that happens about once a year. As much as I love color, there's just something about B&W images that elevates the artistic merits of a video and it sort of really puts the focus on whatever subject, vision its creators are dealing with/were going for. The lack of color somehow makes it more powerful.

Also, we are in November which is one of my fave months of the year and in a weird way, a sort of reflective, melancholic month for me (I'll have to consult with Freud about that one). I haven't seen the sun in almost a week (that's not a complain) and it has been drizzling on and off for two days which can't help but add to the mood, which means there was no coincidence that I was drawn to P!nk's newest video.

On that spirit, I decided to go looking for other B&W music videos-I could only think of a few and thought, well there aren't many-and I ended up finding a ton of them. Curious fact: most B&W videos I found were for rap artists. Who would have thought they had a bit more of an artistic sensibility to color? LL Cool J, Ghostface, Notorious BIG, even Puff Daddy have done B&W videos.

One I complete forgot about, which is funny since I highlighted as *video of the week* some months ago, was Smashing Pumpkins' "Stand Inside Your Love" which is an amazing video. There's No Doubt's fun in the high seas "Hella Good," K.D Lang's yearnings on "Constant Craving," Madonna's stylish "Vogue," and steamy "Justify My Love," Red Hot Chilli Peppers' body paint shenanigans on "Give It Away," Jay Z's gritty "99 Problems," and an honorable mention goes to Aha's "Take On Me" which isn't completely B&W but the drawing panels sequences are just amazing.

To stay with the melancholic mood of November though, I'm sticking to highlighting only ballads about emotional turmoil.

Smashing Pumpkins "Disarm" proved early on that the band really was trying to convey something other than commercial advertisement for their newest single. The tone of the song, the larger than life images of a flying Billy, D'Arcy and James, the instruments, the windows, the rooftops…… there was this sense of escape, flying away and also of vanishing into the ether.

Duffy's "Rockferry" isn't the most amazing video but it is pretty effective. The song-tittle track of her album-is one hell of a alt-country stormer and Duffy sings it with such force, her voice laced in pain and resentment. She's leaving, she's finally walking away from a relationship that has done nothing but bring her pain and though she's leaving parts of her behind, she's determine to make a new home for her somewhere else with the parts of her that did survive. As the camera moves from her stern expression and then lingers on the train tracks, the station, the little shops, the streets, it gives us a sense that even though she's leaving, she can't help but look back because amongst all the pain there's still some bit of love alive in there somewhere.

Amy Winehouse's "Back To Black" is a contender for video of the freaking decade, just as much as the album is a contender for album of the decade! The song is the high point in an album that's chockfull of them. Beautifully shot in full gothic imagery, the video depicts a funeral: the death of love and therefore the death of a heart-the heart of Amy. Friends and family (fans?) wait listlessly around for her to summon the courage to go on. I know this his highly personal stuff and she wasn't so much acting as just channeling her feelings, but the look on her face through out, specially the moment she holds her breath as the coffin is placed into the grave, then walks over to toss a single white rose and a handful of soil on top of the coffin? Absolutely brilliant and just devastating. The whole video is technically flawless from editing to cinematography, and emotionally stirring. A modern classic. The director, Phil Griffin, should be making movies.

And speaking of technically flawless, beautifully shot videos and directors that should be making movies, Madonna's "Oh Father" is arguably her best video ever or at the very least in her top five. Directed by the master David Fincher during the peak of their collaborative run ("Express Yourself" "Vogue" "Bad Girl") "Oh Father" the video packs all the punch of an emotional drama into four minutes of unforgettable black and white exorcism. For there's little doubt that Madonna used the song and video to exorcise demons of her past: from her mother's death, to her strained relationship with her dad, to the ghost of a still fresh abusive relationship, culminating with her making an effort to reconcile her past, present and future and move on. This is epic stuff. Her other collaborations with David Fincher may seem to have garnered more recognition through the years-and deservedly so-but "Oh Father" is hands down their highest achievement in the music video medium. Had it been a movie? It would have won the best picture oscar in 1990. That's how good it is. A classic.