MTV Book Club: Hello, Whip It, and Land of Confusion

Kristin Nilsen 0:00

So now the three of them, the lead singer, the little person dressed as a jester, and the lady, high on Angel Dust, all skip through a renaissance era village while a whole family of little people, many, many families dance in the forest nearby.

Speaker 1 0:13

Hello world, it's a song that we're singing. Come on, get happy. A whole lot of love in this world. We'll be bringing it will make you happy.

Michelle Newman 0:28

Welcome to the pop culture Preservation Society, the podcast for people born in the big wheel generation who have forgotten every phone number except 18675309, 5309,

Carolyn Cochrane 0:44

we believe our Gen X childhoods gave us unforgettable songs, stories, characters and images, and if we don't talk about them, they'll disappear, like Marshall will and Holly on a routine expedition.

Kristin Nilsen 0:54

And today, we'll be saving the three minute long stories unique to our generation, because they appeared only on MTV. Today is the first meeting of our MTV book

Carolyn Cochrane 1:05

club. I'm Carolyn, I'm

Michelle Newman 1:07

Kristin, and I'm Michelle, and we are your pop culture preservationists. You

Kristin Nilsen 1:25

This episode is inspired by a game we play in my house called the premises. If you ever watch live TV, you might have some random channels way down at the bottom that broadcast old school music videos, MTV era music videos. And one time, my son, Liam, was sitting next to me on the couch when one of these channels popped up. I wish I could remember what the video was. I have no idea, but it was bonkers. It was so nonsensical. And Liam was like, you guys, what is going on?

Michelle Newman 1:56

I mean, throw a dart could be yes.

Kristin Nilsen 1:59

Yeah, anything. And so then this started a game in which we tried to explain what was going on in the nonsensical video by pretending that we were the directors in a pitch meeting, like trying to sell the concept to the music execs. And we'd say So the premise is and then you would basically say what was happening on the screen. So for instance, if you were watching the safety dance, which we've talked about on this podcast before, oh yeah, you would say so. The premise is the lead singer and a little person dressed like a jester are skipping through a field of waving wheat. They're very excited. They're skipping, and that's when they come upon a blonde lady who is high on Angel Dust and looks like she might jump out of a plate glass window, except there are no plate glass windows, because these are jester times, not modern times. So now the three of them, the lead singer, the little person dressed as a jester, and the lady high on Angel Dust, all skip through a renaissance era village while a whole family of little people, many, many families dance in the forest nearby. That's how you play the premises. And you do it through the whole video. You just can't describing what you

Michelle Newman 3:05

see on the screen. What if there was and just like, go with me here. Everyone a maypole. Yeah, in that may pole. I get it. Okay, I get it. I get the gap. This is gonna be fun,

Kristin Nilsen 3:19

the premises. So in the early days of MTV, this was not yet an art form, it was an emerging art form. There were no standards yet. There were no techniques. Everybody was just trying to keep up. It was like they couldn't get out in front of what was happening, and that's why so many of the early videos are just concert footage or faux concert footage with like, you know, 10 people in front, but they come in real close. And when people wanted to break out of that trap of faux concert footage and get more creative, they really had no template to follow. It was something akin to the shows we used to make up for our parents and their dinner party. That's essentially what it is nightmare. It's the same thing. So it took a while, but eventually music videos started to do some storytelling with characters and plots and scenes. But that does not mean that they were good. Sometimes they were complete gibberish, but the medium was evolving, and that gives us a lot to talk about today. So today's episode was inspired by my own 2025 viewing of a video I used to love, but in 2025 I was like, Oh, my God, that is not okay. And I so wanted to do book club about it. So I asked Carolyn and Michelle to each pick a video, video they wanted to bring to book club, and I've got my wackadoo pick. And voila, we have our first meeting of the MTV book club. Yeah?

Michelle Newman 4:48

This will be a fun ongoing series, I think,

Carolyn Cochrane 4:50

yes, yeah. Well, yes, that, and, like I say a lot during this podcast, going back and watching some of these, I. Um, things, TV shows, whatever, or listening to music that I haven't really revisited since I first watched it when it was out. Oh my gosh, like it's you can see it through totally different eyes. And so that was fun for me, because I wasn't as highbrow back in the day that I'm happy now.

Kristin Nilsen 5:18

Nonsensical was fine. You didn't expect to to understand everything. And sometimes you're bringing 2025 eyes, like, oh, we can't do that anymore. And sometimes you're just bringing your adult eyes, like, you guys get your shit together, right? It's just different. It's just different. So let's launch into our book club. I'm gonna, I'm gonna bring my pick to the table. So I was watching one of these video stations recently when the video for Hello by Lionel Richie popped up. I've been

Speaker 2 5:59

alone with you inside my mind and in my dreams, I've kissed your lips 1000 times. I sometimes see you pass outside my door. Hello.

Kristin Nilsen 6:21

I have seen this video a million times, but this time was different. This time, it was the year 2025, and I was 57 years old, and it was like, I had never seen it before. I was, I was like, what the actual f is this? Is this a creeper video? Yeah, shame. So everybody's nodding their

Michelle Newman 6:39

head like I didn't know if I was supposed to, like, call the cops, yes, right? Like, is there a retro, like, a retroactive, like, Is there, like, a time limit on when I should have called the cops on this

Kristin Nilsen 6:51

statute of limited limitations, like stalking? So I went online to see if anyone else had had woken up recently and said, Oh my god, is this even legal? And as usual, Reddit really delivered for me. There is a Reddit thread called, does anyone else think the video for Hello was weird? And there is also, by the way, an article in the Dallas Observer called Lionel Richie's video for hello is the most confusing video of all time. So I'm going to be sharing from both of these because their comments are so, so funny. The first commenter on Reddit says, and I will, and I will preface this comment by saying So the premise is, Lionel Richie is a lecturer in like a fame school, and pervs over some blind girl then calls her when she's in bed and says, Hello. So the blind girl makes a sculpture of his face that brings on nightmares that's

Michelle Newman 7:43

why, why

Carolyn Cochrane 7:47

you're gonna solve these mysteries for us? Kristin, yeah,

Kristin Nilsen 7:51

this is the mystery most people. I love the fact that he mentions the sculpture of his face being nightmarish, because most people are horrified by the sculpture of Lionel Richie's head at the end of the video. It's huge and scary and the color of clay, and it absolutely does not look like Lionel Richie at all. And Lionel Richie was actually super upset about this, the fact that this is not right.

Michelle Newman 8:21

Like, really good representation for you for being blind.

Kristin Nilsen 8:27

Never touched the man before. There's this meme out there that is so not funny, not funny, and it's Lionel Richie looking at the sculpture with the blind girl sitting there smiling. And he goes, What are you blind? This doesn't look like me. It's so bad. Bad. So he was super upset about he's like, dude, this does not look like me to the director. And the director was said, Wow, we just have the one, and we let the sculpture.

Michelle Newman 8:53

We spent like 20 grand on that two line,

Kristin Nilsen 8:56

so we're just going with it. And I think the first time I saw the video, I didn't even get that that sculpture was supposed to be Lionel Richie. I was like, I thought he was the acting teacher. Why is he so into this sculpture? Like, I didn't get the connection at all. I

Michelle Newman 9:12

think it looks a lot like him. You do. Oh, I was guys. I literally it took me to put it together.

Kristin Nilsen 9:22

Like, Oh, I get it. It's Lionel Richie. Some people

Michelle Newman 9:25

says at the end, this is how I see you. At the very end, she's like, I hope you like it. This is how I see you. Yeah, yes.

Kristin Nilsen 9:35

Some people have said that the sculpture looks like a chia pet, which,

Michelle Newman 9:40

oh, my God, yes, yes. If you just like, got those seeds wet and smooshed it all around the top of his clay head, grass would grow.

Kristin Nilsen 9:50

So I guess the point of her making the Lionel Richie head is to and I didn't get this either when I was watching it the first time around. Yeah, the point of her making the Lionel Richie head is to demonstrate that she reciprocates his feelings like, See, all this time that you've been stalking me, I've been wishing you were stalking me, and I love you. You know, True Love Blooms so upon watching it this time, it is truly pervy the images of him following her after class through the hallways of what we can only imagine as a high school. It doesn't look like college. It's a high school, and he's hovering just over her shoulder, unbeknownst to her, and because she's blind, she doesn't know it is generally agreed upon that he appears to be stalking her, and again, mostly because she cannot see. It's a twist, like you said, they didn't have, they didn't need this twist, but it dials up the creep factor totally and she's she's vulnerable because she can't see him coming. Why? Director? Why?

Michelle Newman 10:59

Also the drama like not only does she not see him slowly walking down the locker Hall, neither did any of the other students. Nobody else seems to think it's weird that Mr. Richie, the drama teacher, is just walking, walking and singing as he's walking right up and just, I mean, laser focused on her.

Kristin Nilsen 11:22

Yes, that always one of the Reddit Yeah, always very creepy. And one of the Reddit commenters said, I cannot believe no one stopped the production. The production to be like, we cannot film this,

Carolyn Cochrane 11:34

right? Why not? Nobody thought it was weird. And then think about people that are in, not only behind the scenes, but are in the video. Yeah, like, right? Two of them,

Kristin Nilsen 11:46

nobody. There's so many people in this video, and nobody said, Dude, you're a creeper. What

Michelle Newman 11:51

year is this again? Is it 1984

Kristin Nilsen 11:55

either 83 or 84 Okay?

Michelle Newman 11:56

Because not too many years before that, nobody thought it was weird. I know we referenced this a lot, but it's sort of our barometer of what was acceptable and what we looked didn't, you know, look twice at nobody stopped the filming. Or the script writer of ice castles saying she's 16, he is already like a well established sports guy on the news. Let's have them not only fall like have an affair or, you know, have a love like a relationship, but let's have them kiss in front of the entire crowd of people, like nobody, clandestine. Nobody thinks there's anything wrong with this. You're creepy. So that's

Kristin Nilsen 12:39

the Dallas Observer. The Dallas Observer. This is a cheeky This is a cheeky review. It is so freaking funny, and they said they describe this video like this. It's like a warm bath in a room that smells of lavender, only you're being stalked by Lionel Richie and you have no fucking clue. He's just standing there staring at you because you're blind. Also, there is a reason Van Halen didn't write a song called hot for student, and that reason is felonies. Yes, yeah. There is another particularly disturbing scene when he sings, I long to see the sunlight in your hair. I long

Unknown Speaker 13:19

to see the sunlight and tell you time and time again how much I care.

Kristin Nilsen 13:32

And He's creeping up behind her while she's sitting there eating lunch, and he reaches out his hand, and when her friends approach, he jumps back, and he pulls his hand back, and the Dallas Observer says, holy shit. We just got we just got footage of a predator about to prance. Why can't I say it pounce? It's not just you. Carolyn, yes, we just got footage of a predator about to pounce. So Laura's friends are just going to ignore the fact that when they walked up to sit with their blind friend at lunch, a teacher with a bushy mustache was a few inches away from running his fingers through her hair. Okay, but still, it gets worse. It just keeps ramping up. Every scene gets worse and worse. So here's the most horrifying scene. This is straight out of a horror movie. Is when she is at home in bed, and it's sort of insinuated that he's watching her, and he calls her on the telephone, and he just breathes into the phone for like the whole guitar solo, and finally he says, Hello, is it me you're looking for? And then hangs up.

Michelle Newman 14:37

It's so creepy. It's so creepy,

Kristin Nilsen 14:42

she like smiles. Oh, she smiles so and this is what a guy on red said. So he's stalking a blind girl who looks like she's reading erotic Braille in bed. If someone called me and saying, Hello, is it me you're looking for and hung up, I would be terrified. Yeah, that's when you called.

Carolyn Cochrane 15:00

911, not to mention, is it me? You're looking for

Michelle Newman 15:03

you can't see.

Kristin Nilsen 15:08

I just think, like, No,

Michelle Newman 15:12

exactly the lyrics of this song. Like, when, when the writers of the video were like, Okay, here's the song we need to write. We need to create a video for it. This is what they came up with. I feel like that's where we need to look, yeah, like the creeps, right? Yes, because, yep, there's a million ways you could do a video to this song. It's actually a beautiful song, right? Is that? Is it me you're looking for? Yeah, cuz you're I can see it in your eyes. I can feel it in your smile, or whatever. I just feel like for them to go the premises. I know high school girl, creepy teacher, but guess what? Plot twist, it's going to turn out she loves him too,

Carolyn Cochrane 15:53

and she's blind.

Kristin Nilsen 15:56

Oh, by the way, she's blind. Yeah, she can't see him coming ever. She can't see him coming.

Carolyn Cochrane 16:01

So please, Kristen, tell me you found some in for intel on the background of this. No, oh, okay,

Kristin Nilsen 16:08

there's no background. So we don't know why. No, we don't know why. She has to be blind, and apparently they even filmed this got cut. This, I can't even believe it, this got cut. Apparently, they filmed a scene of her in the shower before she goes into bed, where her naked body is shown in silhouette in the shower curtain. And again, they're insinuating that he's watching her. And Okay, number one, stop it. And number two, have you not seen psycho? You just be waiting for someone to, like, yank the shower curtain back and like, read, read, but no, somebody, thank God, finally spoke up and said, You goodness, that's gross. That's gross.

Carolyn Cochrane 16:49

I have a question, yeah, and I don't know if you'll know the answer, but is she really blind? No, she's not. I looked that okay. Oh,

Kristin Nilsen 16:58

okay, here's the here's the scoop, here's the scoop. So the blind girl is played by an actress named Laura Carrington, who went on to star on General Hospital from 1987 to 89 and apparently she studied at an LA School for the Blind to prepare for this role, because, no, she is not blind. And after the filming, she became quite the Lionel Richie fan, and she followed his concert tours all over the country, and people would recognize her and treat her as if she was really blind

Michelle Newman 17:31

or his true friend. No, no, no, yeah. I thought watching it again this week, I felt like she looked a lot like the girl in the thriller video. I had to Google that, and I was like, Is this the same girl? Not the same girl? And that's where I found out she is not blind or the girl from the Thriller video.

Kristin Nilsen 17:52

And the end of the video is really interesting too, because this is when we we are doing some storytelling. They're trying to tell a story, and so they take the story beyond the song. So the song ends, but the story continues. And the student comes running into Lionel Richie's classroom and he says, Mr. Reynolds, I don't know why they had to change his name, but whatever. Mr. Reynolds, there's something going on in sculpture class. I think you should see it. So the Dallas Observer says, and Mr. Reynolds, better be the school psychologist, because there's a student who just hand sculpted a bust of her teacher. But no, it turns out that the thing that this student was so urgent about was an impossibly bad rendition of Lionel, quote, unquote, Reynolds, face with a chin that could be used to bludgeon wildlife to death. And it's true, the chin is enormous. Go and look at the chin of this sculpture. It sticks out like way beyond the face. It's bad. And then this, like we brought this up at the end. This is how they end their article. The Dallas Observer says, wait, wait, wait, how does she know what his face looks like. How?

Michelle Newman 19:02

Well. Usually people see people's faces by touching them, by feeling them right, putting their hands all over them. So when she says, This is how I see you, I was like, oh, so she's clearly felt his face enough to make that.

Kristin Nilsen 19:17

I don't know or but then she does touch my face be trying to this is what I'm reading into it. When at the end of the video, when she says that statement, and then she touches his face, I'm feeling like this is the first time she's touched his face. It's sort of like the first time they've had sex, or it's their first kiss, the first time I've touched his face. So it doesn't I'm holding my hands, I'm touching your face. It doesn't make sense, because is she just making out? I don't know. I have no idea. Okay, this is so funny, though, because this is a really good point, and I wonder if Lionel Richie has been dealing with this for his entire career. The final, final thing that the Dallas Observer says is, how much do you think Lionel Richie is hate? Having to answer the phone for the last 30 years. If I knew Lionel Richie every time he answered the phone with a friendly hello, I would say, is it me? Yeah, that's so funny. And coincidentally, this is apropos of nothing. I just think it's interesting the director of this video is the same guy who directed the Pepsi commercial with Michael Jackson where his hair caught on fire. Oh, my God. So I encourage everybody go and watch the Hello video for the first time in 40 years and go, Oh, I get it.

Michelle Newman 20:37

Yeah, you're gonna need to take a shower after though everyone so

Kristin Nilsen 20:40

high school teacher stalking a student. I mean, she even goes to her locker, you guys, well,

Michelle Newman 20:46

she's eating lunch in the cafeteria with her friends. It's not like it's on a college campus at all. It's High

Kristin Nilsen 20:51

School. Hello. He calls his what would you do if one of your high school teachers called you at home, if he didn't even go hello and then hang up if he just called you at home and be like, hey, Michelle, I just thought I'd say hi. I would my mom would be so creeped out.

Michelle Newman 21:09

Yeah, I'd be so creeped out. Oh my god, yeah. Love the song.

Unknown Speaker 21:20

I haven't got a clue. But let me start by saying I love you.

Michelle Newman 21:44

So I'm going to take us way back. We'll everybody getting our way back machine, or getting the way back of your of your station wagon, and we're going to go back to 1980 and I want you to stay with me now, so I'm going to be like the producer for this new video. Okay, so you guys are in the meeting room, okay, the whole time, because I've got, I've got an idea. Okay, it's a big one. Okay, we're wheeling and dealing. Yeah, we are. And remember, this is 1980 Okay, so this is even pre MTV, okay, all right, everyone, so I've got a great idea for whip it.

Speaker 2 22:20

You. Get.

Michelle Newman 22:43

Exactly. The premise is whip tease, but it's a, but it's a misogynistic, rapey western theme, right? Oh, I love it. Yeah. Now let's dress the band in, in the red collapsible cup, looking hats, obviously the Solo cup. Yeah, black shorts, black socks and black sleeveless turtlenecks. But, and here's where the look becomes quirky. They're gonna pull the turtleneck up over their mouths and play their instruments in a hog pen in front of a cardboard cabin. Don't worry. Don't worry, we're gonna throw in some hay bales out front to class it up. And what if? What if we have a middle aged mother figure standing at the window cut out, staring expressionless straight ahead? Oh, sometimes we're gonna have her hold a pie. Sometimes it's gonna be a whipping bowl of cream, and in the other window cutout will be a girl. No, no, I've got it. A cross eyed girl is a sharpshooter. She's eventually going to be raped, but we're going to get to that in a minute now. And maybe, maybe the through line of the video could be and I'm just spitballing here. You guys. Okay, we will have lead singer Mark Mothersbaugh whipping around an actual bull whip. But instead of a bull, it's a random mannequin, like woman, and every time he cracks that whip, another piece of her clothing rips off until she's left. Get this in just her corset.

Kristin Nilsen 24:19

I like this, okay. Could we? Could we, like, Wait, sure. Could we make that mannequin like a real woman, like a human

Michelle Newman 24:24

woman? Yeah, she's just mannequin looking that would be just mannequin. I love that. Yeah. Okay, good. Because here's the premise of the B storyline. What? Why don't what? Watching all of this unfold, are going to be two real shiny and smiley guys and girls in cowboy and cowboy garb, and don't worry all about the budget, we can just get all that at Mervyn's, and they look like they walked straight out of a magazine ad for whatever beers they're cracking open, and they're going to cheer and toast every time that whip cracks off another piece of the mannequin lady's clothing before. One of the guys gets mad at one of the girls and grabs her in anger. But wait, hold on, she'll laugh, because assault is funny. Assault is funny.

Kristin Nilsen 25:10

It cracks me. It does. It does.

Michelle Newman 25:11

I know, I know, I know. I've been reading the room. I've been reading the room. Well, then the cross eyed girl in the cabin, how about we have her shoot the can out of one of those fake cowboys hand at first, let's, let's have it amaze him. But then I think it should lead him to stalk into the cabin, grab her and rape her, as the one of the other shiny cowgirls yells, ride him, cowboy. And wait even better. We're gonna put that on the screen. We're gonna put that text right on the screen to really town that home, right

Kristin Nilsen 25:44

in case they don't know what they're doing. Then I will make it very clear. I think

Michelle Newman 25:48

this really is gonna get the message across that whipping women is fun. It is a good time. And bonus, you can dance to it.

Kristin Nilsen 25:57

You really can. I think this is taking the good like, the BOP of the year, yeah, I really like it. I love the addition of the mother, because what that does is it balances out the, yeah, you know, like the bobby nature of it, and then the real gold drums nature of it. She's like a she's just gonna balance the whole,

Michelle Newman 26:15

you know, she makes she Thank you. I'm glad you saw that, because my intent was for her to really bring a little bit more wholesomeness to this video. Yeah, what do you

Kristin Nilsen 26:26

guys? That's a really great because it is somewhat wholesome. Yeah,

Michelle Newman 26:29

you guys, I, if you haven't seen the video for whip it in a hot second. That's, that's it. That is, that's literal. That is a play by play. And when I say cross eyed woman, I'm not kidding. They make her cross. They make her look cross eyed as she shoots, because then the guy's holding the can, and it's like all like the can is like double vision. Double vision. How does she see it? Okay. This song whip, it was released. It is called whip tease. If you catch it, it is a split second. But at the very beginning of the video, it is a split second. Open your Weekly Reader this Friday, and you'll see it. It comes flying in. You know those really cool graphics they had in 1980 it comes flying in, and it's written in, like a rope. It's like a graphic. And it says, whip tease. It like striptease so brilliant. There is a lot of backstory to this that thank God I read, because I was like, Holy hell, this is disturbing. Like I said. It's very misogynistic and rapey 100%

Kristin Nilsen 27:36

and we're recognizing all of you out there. We all loved this video. Oh, I loved it.

Michelle Newman 27:46

Wow. You know the song whip. It was released in 1980 which is a full year before MTV. But in 1981 once MTV started, they played it a lot, as we all remember, and it kind of revived the song. The song was kind of already going downhill. I didn't know that, like, which comes first the video or the song. In this case, the song did and so did the video, because when whip it started to receive radio airplay. And you guys, I'm getting this straight from, you know, the trusted source, Wikipedia, so let's just take this as you want to but when it did start to receive airplay in 80 before MTV, the record company, was like, Hey, why don't you guys make a video for whip it. We're gonna give you $15,000 which actually kind of shocks me, because I want to go back to 1980 I feel like $15,000 was a nice little chunk of change. That's kind of a lot of money. What's with the cardboard? It's truly, like made of cardboard. The it's like a front of a cabin, and then some, I always say, haze of Bale, bales of hay,

Kristin Nilsen 28:51

and then, like, Devil's Tower. It's like Close Encounters of the Third Kind, behind them, but cardboard, but

Michelle Newman 28:57

it's painted on a I thought

Carolyn Cochrane 28:59

they were trying to give us some kind of vibe of vibe of that, like, yeah, it was purposeful. I don't know why, but

Michelle Newman 29:05

apparently, this whole idea, this whole plot, the whole premise, did not just they didn't just pull it out of thin air. It came from an article in a 1962 issue of a magazine called The dude. And the article was about a former stuntman who marries a stripper and moves to a dude ranch in Arizona. And for entertainment, the man would use his whip to remove the clothes from his wife. She would remain unhurt, though he could, just like, snap them off of her right well, devo, the band, has said that's the kind of stuff that fed us creatively. It was just so stupid and so low and yet just so great. You know, I think they were going into this with with a sense of humor. Now we also have to remember the time right now we're like, that's always raping. A rapine as funny. Like, how is this funny? It's 1980 they were like, This just seems. They were truly like, this seems so horrible, right? And because he says it was so low and so dumb, and we're like, let's make a

Kristin Nilsen 30:13

video. So that's like a current day thing where he acknowledged the rapine, I

Michelle Newman 30:17

don't know how current, but yes, current or current that he says it was so stupid and so low and felt so great. So they also say that it was partially a reaction to President Reagan's previous career as an actor. Diva wanted to make a video that satirized both the cowboy mythos, I think I'm saying that right, I don't know, and right wing racist values. So they truly made this and they were like, this is sort of our representation of of kind of making fun of the people that think this is okay, and all this skewering they were skewering. Well That backfired on them just a little bit, because the claims of misogyny increased when Devo was cut from a live performance on an episode of the Midnight Special, the show that was hosted by Lily Tomlin. She saw the video Lily Tomlin, and she refused to host the show unless Devo was cut from from the lineup that night. Also, there have been claims that MTV banned the video, but they that's kind of been proven false, because that's how we saw it. We remember it all the time, right? I felt a little bit better after reading that. They kind of were doing this tongue in cheek, like, you know, like you would do in 1980 now, yeah, you don't do it, just that kind of blase. Let's make a video about it. But in 1980 you could but like I said, I think it kind of backfired on them, because they got a lot of flack for it well.

Kristin Nilsen 31:48

And you know that these guys are way up here, right? Like their intellect is way above ours, and they, maybe they their expectations of us were much higher than what we could actually perceive. I certainly didn't know what satire was when I was in seventh grade, but now I see it, now that you've explained it to me, I can see the contrast between these new wave guys with their turtlenecks over their mouths and their solo cups on their heads, contrasted with the misogynistic cowboys and Their cowboy girlfriends, I guess they're called cowgirls. I can see that that's a contrast, and they're making fun of them, and they're making me look dumb. There is one difficulty, though, in that, I think the rapey part, yes, they're skewering those guys and how they treat women, but I think one reason we were allowed to get away with showing rapey things is because there was in the backs of people's minds this idea that women really wanted it, that there people had rape fantasies. And a rape fantasy is different from reality, right? But that women really wanted it. And so when this guy is raping her, there is a point where she he pulls away, and she grabs his T shirt that is true collar and pulls him back down to her, because, you know, they really want

Michelle Newman 33:04

it. I was about to say, we don't know for sure that it was, that it was very insinuated, too, because he's he goes storming in there, and he grabs her, and then you just see them disappear, like he pushes her down

Kristin Nilsen 33:15

and holds her leg up, like, you know, yeah, it was, it's pretty graphic, yeah, yeah.

Michelle Newman 33:21

But let's go back to our 1980 selves. And I loved the song, and I just thought the video was funny. I don't have, I know, I had seen it. I don't have, you know, I have certain videos that I can pretty much recite the whole storyline, you know, in verbatim. And it's a video I haven't seen in decades. This one, I couldn't have done it. I had to rewatch it several times over the past few days. But, of course, I saw it. How would you not have seen it in 1981 8283, when you're watching MTV? So, so yeah, we'll put that one in the Weekly Reader too. It's problematic, but, but, you know, it's,

Kristin Nilsen 33:59

that's, that's what they had to have something to say about it.

Michelle Newman 34:03

And basically, the lyrics of the song are completely nonsensical, and they admit that, yes, it's not a story song by any means. So how do you really make a video? They were like, I don't know. Let's just throw some shit at the wall and see what sticks. Basically, what if

Kristin Nilsen 34:14

they had, what if they were able to give their commentary and say all of those things that could have made a difference, but if you don't, yeah, they could have said it's kind of easy

Carolyn Cochrane 34:24

to retrofit a story. I mean, you know, fence, maybe you can try to make it not seem as awful as some people might have thought. Like Lily Tomlin,

Kristin Nilsen 34:34

yeah, I'm trying to make a statement here. But Lily didn't know that. It just looks horrible. I've always, I think, to the woman, well, two things, the the mom, isn't she really one of their moms? I don't know. I think it is one, and she's just deadpan, holding it, holding a pie. You're not sure why she's there. I also don't know why the woman has to be cross eyed. Why the

Carolyn Cochrane 34:57

other shooter? I mean, I. Maybe two.

Kristin Nilsen 35:03

All right, all right, yeah, irony, yes, I get it, yeah, irony, but see, we're really smart people, and we're not picking up on this.

Carolyn Cochrane 35:10

I think this needs to be like a graduate level film, you know, class, or at least, you know, let's dissect this video and what all this could mean

Kristin Nilsen 35:22

their children, to their children, and they're not very good at this. So it's like they submitted this for their for their project, and they're probably going to get a C

Michelle Newman 35:30

minus on it the when he cracks the whip and the clothes just go flying off. It's like they're on they were tied on with fishing wire, because he cracks the whip, and he doesn't really crack it anywhere that close to her, but then you'll just see her face, and the hat just goes flying straight up off her head, or, like, you know, like they just had it attached to wires, and they just pulled it like a pulley in the thing,

Carolyn Cochrane 35:55

probably, yeah, oh gosh, That was really good. Michelle, Oh, My cheeks hurt. I know, man, you can sell me oceanfront property in Arizona based on the premise, like, stay with me here. Yeah, very convincing.

Kristin Nilsen 36:14

But the point of the premise is, like, how did Divo walk in and sell that premise to somebody? And somebody had to rubber stamp

Michelle Newman 36:21

it. This is how, when I was watching it, I kept watching it over typing. And then this is what I'm getting, you know, because it was really fun to write, because you could imagine how absurd it had to have been, and it has to be not quite, not very far from how I write it probably,

Kristin Nilsen 36:38

no, I think you're probably right on. Shape it up. Get straight, go

Unknown Speaker 36:47

forward, move ahead.

Carolyn Cochrane 36:56

Okay, you guys, let's hop in a time machine back to 1986 when MTV was basically babysitting us, okay, and we would be watching that. And I guess I shouldn't say babysitting a lot of Gen X. I was in college, and I loved anything that had Phil Collins or Genesis, primarily because my boyfriend at the time, now, my husband Andy, loved anything that had Phil Collins and Genesis. So automatically, I'm gonna love the song. Love the song the video, okay, so let's talk about it. Everybody,

Michelle Newman 37:29

this, this video, it's the song. You didn't say the song yet. Oh,

Carolyn Cochrane 37:33

sorry, sorry, yes. Stay with me here, everybody, our song is land of confusion, which could not be more of an appropriate title for this music video because I was so confused.

Carolyn Cochrane 38:00

Them moving into the street. And I asked Andy this, I think that Andy was probably poo pooing this a little bit, because for a lot of Og Genesis fans, especially if you even go back to Peter Gabriel, and then you go to when Phil Collins came, they were in a different lane. So this is them kind of crossing over into pop and kind of becoming a little silly. And so I think that was playing in my head as well. Andy saying, like, what on earth? They're just trying to whatever. And we didn't really understand the whole the depth of this song and what it really meant, yeah. And I wonder really, I guess adults probably did, but I can't imagine a whole lot of high schoolers and Gen X kids. No, really saying, Oh, I get it. That's what's happening. No, right? I think, I

Kristin Nilsen 38:49

think I got that they were saying something, but you couldn't get everything that they were saying because they were saying too much.

Carolyn Cochrane 38:56

Yeah, right. They were saying too much. And they were saying, In this video, they were saying too much in a very weird way. So

Kristin Nilsen 39:03

weird, yes, obstacle to us. It was an obstacle to understanding. So

Carolyn Cochrane 39:07

we're going to start with the fact that, as the director, or I think this is I can say, as Phil Collins, he envisioned this, okay, the creators, he said, This is what we're going to do. I want puppets. I want this to basically be a puppet show. And we're not talking like kuch LA, Fran and Ollie puppets. We're talking like Madam, you know, the ugly madam

Kristin Nilsen 39:30

puppets, weird lady Elaine rap out of us like scary puppets.

Carolyn Cochrane 39:34

We're the lady Elaine puppets. Their characteristics, like their noses and their chins, are all really over exaggerated

Kristin Nilsen 39:41

and red and wrinkly.

Carolyn Cochrane 39:43

Yes, wrinkly. It's almost like Madame and Lady Elaine are melting, but also like getting a lot bigger at the same time. So if you can imagine really big, their heads are really big, yeah, and they're very frightening. So this is in 1986 and this. What? And this is what Phil Collins is presenting. And he thinks this is a great idea. And much to his credit, there was a very popular show in Britain at the time called spitting image that was used these puppets. So the creators of that show are actually the creators and the designers of these puppets. So he concocted this idea. There were 60 puppets in this video. Okay, I just want to give you a little idea. So he said, I'm gonna need at least a $600,000 budget, because each puppet costs $10,000 to make. Are you kidding me? No, I am not kidding you. Yes. And you guys, as we will soon find out, this is very, this is a very star studded music video, okay, probably more so than even we are the world. So here we go. I'm going to give you kind of a scene by scene breakdown, and hopefully you'll find it amusing. We will go from there. Okay, ironically, we are going to be in a nightmare that Ronald Reagan is having that could

Kristin Nilsen 41:00

be the end that? Yeah, I know the end. Yeah, that says it all. I mean, if I had known that in the beginning, that would have helped me tremendously, that this was Ronald Reagan's nightmare. I because I didn't even guess,

Carolyn Cochrane 41:11

right? I think that's exactly the case. So I'm going to tell you what exactly was happening on our screens, although we might not have realized this at the time when we were watching it okay? Because we start, it's bedtime. It's bedtime for Nancy and Ronald Reagan. And time for that. You got it because we have a Bonzo, we have a chimp right in the middle.

Michelle Newman 41:31

It's my favorite part of the whole video is also

Carolyn Cochrane 41:35

like life size. It's not like a little chimp. It is lazy, yeah, it is right in the middle of Nancy and Ronald, okay, so here we go. They go to sleep, and Ronald Reagan begins to have what all of us had watching this video. He started have a nightmare. Okay, we realize when you're, you know, you got a lot on your plate, like I do right now, you have, you're a lot of anxiety. Your dreams are weird. This is going to be a crazy nightmare. It is like the Cold War has become the Muppet Show, or vice versa. I don't even know, totally insane. Okay, so Reagan is asleep. He's tossing and turning. The chimp is snoring beside him, and all of a sudden we hear the iconic we hear the drums, and there's Phil Collins puppet. He jumps on the screen scarier than the chimp around Reagan, or Nancy Reagan, I think is Phil Collins Puppy, puppy puppet. He's sweaty, he's bug eyed. He just looks like the world's kind of weirdest bobblehead. It's just this head, yeah. And then also they look kind of rubbery, and they have hands which are like, Oh yeah, kind of human like it that are kind of holding the microphone. It's very it's very strange.

Kristin Nilsen 42:44

And it's like, and it's not like, well kept Phil Collins, he's like, bald on top, but long, stringy hair, like grandpa Phil Collins, if he, like, lost his job.

Michelle Newman 42:54

Yeah, it's kind of that era Phil Collins, though. Yeah, they did a pretty good job.

Carolyn Cochrane 42:58

Okay, so Phil has hopped on and we see a few other little pieces of Mike Rutherford and whatever the other guy's name is in Genesis, either guy? No, yeah, the other guy. And meanwhile, we're going to cut back to Reagan is in bed, and He is thrashing around. He is dreaming about chaos. Because Little do we know, back when we didn't have a care in the world except our hair getting bigger with hairspray, is that there's a lot of Cold War stuff going on, and that is happening in his dream. It's transpiring his dreams. We see tanks rolling. We see Rockets Launching, and then we see these world leaders popping up just their heads out of the ground. Okay, so we see these giant like army boots marching through a swamp. I don't know what it is, and then all of a sudden, like, Gorbachev's head pops up, kind of cockeyed, you guys, yeah, right, yeah. And remember, they're these awful puppets, and, you know, the Ayatollah and I, again, I don't think I realized that when I had no idea, I didn't know I was just singing and maybe not even paying attention, because it was that crazy and wild. I mean, Margaret Thatcher is in there. Oh, I did recognize that one. Yeah, yes. It is like a cartoon, Saturday morning cartoon from hell. It is just,

Kristin Nilsen 44:13

it's like cops, Super Show for world leaders. Yes, 100%

Carolyn Cochrane 44:17

I would say that's a great, great analogy. All right? So we've got that weird swamp scene, and then suddenly we have Reagan trying to put on a Superman suit, okay? And he is, like, on a couch, and they look like under roots, remember, under kind of tights or tights that he's trying to put on? But he's also got that kind of he's lying down like we would do to try to zip our jeans Exactly, yeah, like, get them on. And again, he's looking really scary. So this rubbery creature trying to put all of that on. Okay? And then we get to the chorus again, and this is Genesis, rocking out, except their faces are, their faces are just kind of stuck. They're not really moving. Moving, and Phil is yelling, this is the world we live in, and their faces are just freaky, and it is like the world we live in is melting, face to

Unknown Speaker 45:20

and start.

Carolyn Cochrane 45:27

And then you guys, it turns into what probably could be described as the strangest celebrity cameo party in the history of cameos, of parties, of music videos, maybe a little bit of a spoof on We are the world, but the oddest collection of people. I mean, there's world leaders, there's the Pope, there's Prince, there's even, like a Kermit the Frog shows up, all of these things I want to read to you. I'm not even going to include every name, because I don't even know who some of these people are, but I am going to read to you just a handful of some of the people that appear in this video. And I guess, in a way, it could be as time capsule as puppets. Yeah, all these are puppets. Remember, we have 60 puppets at $10,000 a pop. And they could have saved some money because some of these people, I don't even know why you needed to put them in, except that this is indeed, like I said, just said, it kind of a snapshot, time capsule of who was who in the 80s. Okay, so we obviously have the band members, and we have Nancy, and we have Ronald, we've said Margaret Thatcher, there's Jimmy Carter, there's Henry Kissinger, there's Brezhnev, there's Mussolini, there's the Ayatollah, there's Gorbachev, there's Gaddafi. I don't know who Ian Paisley is, but he's there. Walter Cronkite, Helmut Cole Richard Nixon, okay, here we go. Michael Jackson, Madonna,

Kristin Nilsen 46:48

oh, that was Michael Jackson. Why was Michael Jackson putting ketchup on his tongue? No,

Carolyn Cochrane 46:53

that was not Michael Jackson. That was, that was next. Yes, Michael Jackson appears later in his like, you know probably what he was wearing in the We Are the World video. It's more

Kristin Nilsen 47:05

like that back. Okay, so why was Prince putting ketchup on I

Carolyn Cochrane 47:07

do not know. And know, I don't even know that there isn't, there is reason I didn't find one in any of my research. But yes, that strange scene where, because, evidently, Prince has a really long tongue, is he know he's known for that, like Gene Simmons, there you go. Pete Townsend, Tina Turner, Prince Charles, Princess Diana. Meryl Streep, Marlon, Brando, Leonard, Nimoy, Bob Hoskins, Johnny Carson, Ed McMahon, Bob Hope, Sylvester, Stallone, Bob Dylan, Mick Jagger, Jim Baker, Tammy Faye Baker, Robert Maxwell, Steve Davis, I don't know who these people are. Cliff Richard Eastwood, Bruce Springsteen, Queen Elizabeth the Second. Prince Philip Bette Midler, Hulk Hogan, Prince Edward. Sarah Ferguson, Bill Cosby, Yoko Ono sting, Mr. T Dolly Parton, Pope John Paul the second. Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Grace Jones, Barbra Streisand, David Bowie and Elton. John

Kristin Nilsen 47:54

$10,000 a piece. What

Michelle Newman 47:56

do you think happened to those puppets? I mean, that's a lot of time they're in

Kristin Nilsen 48:01

the garbage somebody, I mean,

Carolyn Cochrane 48:03

set them on fire, yeah,

Kristin Nilsen 48:05

but that would be toxic if you burn those things. That is so self indulgent, that is, that is MTV and the record label and Phil Collins being so full of themselves that they are just throwing money at things and thinking somehow they're going to recoup that? Well, they could have cut that by three quarters. I don't think you could start by cutting Prince putting ketchup on his tongue.

Carolyn Cochrane 48:28

They could have but then I would ask the question, would they have won the short lived Grammy Award for Best concept music video during the 30th Annual Grammy Awards, if they had cut that much out of it? Unbelievable. Wow, wow. We're gonna go back to the video, because we haven't finished yet. Okay, so we have this this crazy scene of all of these celebrities, and they're singing. It's just all over the place. It's crazy. It's obviously been this incredible nightmare for Ronald Reagan, and he is sweating profusely, so much, like underwater and Nancy as a snorkel. Because, I mean, the whole place

Michelle Newman 49:08

is most of my nights. Yeah, no,

Carolyn Cochrane 49:10

I could as a, you know, 60 year old now moving halfway across the country, this has been my dreams. I can totally relate that if you're joining the President in the during the Cold War, you are drowning. And when you go to sleep at night, these are the faces that probably run through your run through your mind, and they probably look just as

Kristin Nilsen 49:31

scary. This is why we need book club, because I didn't realize he was drowning in his own sweat. I just thought there was water in his bed.

Michelle Newman 49:38

Yeah. No, his water his water bed sprung a leak,

Carolyn Cochrane 49:44

and exactly but here we go. The irony to all of this is he wakes up, it's the morning, and he says to Nancy, you know, good morning. The puppets say that to each other, and he grabs for a glass of water that's next to his bed. And he tosses it, and it gets it hits Nancy, and luckily, she has a mask on and a snorkel, so it doesn't really affect her that much. And he decides he needs another glass of water. And there's a little remote control kind of button thing on his wall next to him, and one of the buttons says Nuke, and the other says nurse. And he says to Nancy. Oh, I need another glass of water. I'm basically, I'm going to be get asking the nurse. And so he pushes a button, accidentally pushes nuke and not nurse. And then one of the mushroom crowd clouds erupts. And there we go. That is the end of our the bright

Kristin Nilsen 50:34

red buttons there. It's like the red

Michelle Newman 50:37

button, the red button, brilliant. It's pretty brilliant. I for sure, pretty brilliant commentary. I didn't get it at all. I know when I watched it, I just thought it was like sort of a fantastical, bizarre, acid dream puppet show like

Carolyn Cochrane 50:51

The Devo video. It was just exactly bizarre, and it didn't make sense. And again, I don't think I recognized half of those puppets, but let's talk a little bit about maybe what this meant, and I'm going to share some of the lyrics. Okay, okay. Because, you know, again, you guys, we lived at a scary time, but we didn't know. Maybe we didn't even how scary it was, just because we didn't have news 24/7, and people, you know, exposing us we were, we were of a certain age, and we also just didn't have access to that information, yeah, probably just as well, because I probably would have been having those same kind of dreams that he was having, like, this is the end of the world, and there were so many players. I mean, that was the other thing. If you just think about this puppet video, all of the different you know, now we can say there's Putin and there's some other people, but back then, I mean, we had a lot more players and trying to appease people. And Yi, okay, so the lyrics are so profound. Again, I would have never gotten this totally lost on me, like this whole song needs to be reintroduced now, because it makes perfect sense right now. I must have dreamed 1000 dreams, been haunted by a million screams. This fits perfectly. Now, when you know the lyrics and you know what the video is doing, but I can hear the marching feet. They're moving into the street. Now, did you hear the news today? They say the danger has gone away, but I can see the fire still alight. They're burning into the night. And again, it's like we were being told everything's fine, kind of like we're probably being told that a little bit, I think we're getting it's a little bit gaslighting. Too many men, too many people making too many problems ready and not much love to go around. Can't you see, this is the land of confusion. I mean, are we not living in the land of confusion right now?

Kristin Nilsen 52:41

Like purposeful confusion, exactly is the name of the game, right? And guess what?

Carolyn Cochrane 52:49

This is the world we live in, and these are the hands that were given. So you guys, let's use them, and let's start trying to make it a place worth living in. Amen, Hallelujah, preach, Phil preach.

Kristin Nilsen 53:04

And now I understand that what I what confused me so much was the chaos and the and the the sleight of hand, like, just keep showing them stuff. Keep showing them stuff. Move it fast, move it right. Move it, move it and that way, yes, confuse them so that they can't make a decision and they don't understand. So I didn't understand that video, and so it made me irritated, and it made me look away. That's exactly the same. Throw so much information at them that they just disengage. How many people do you know who have said you've got to unplug from the news? You just have to ignore it and walk away. There's nothing that you can't control it. There's nothing that you can do that might be the plan 100%

Carolyn Cochrane 53:49

Yeah, and I love this next verse that we could even dissect a little bit, because, you know, you find people that think one person Superman. Where are you now? Where they think there's the one person? Hmm, I wonder who that might be, who can come and fix it all. But everything's gone wrong. Somehow, the men of steel, the men of power, are losing control by the hour, and so as they lose control, then they're trying to make us all the more confused. And yet we go to our chorus, this is the world we live in, and throw the hands we're given.

Kristin Nilsen 54:20

He wanted it to be dark. He wanted those puppets to be scary. He wanted us to be confused,

Carolyn Cochrane 54:25

for sure. Obviously, not whole whole lot has changed, except I think it even comes at us faster than it did in this video, where it was pretty frenetic too, but obviously in real life, where we're living in it right now, and there's a verse that says, my generation is going to put this right. We're not just going to make promises. He remembers this other time. We're going to Gen X, you know what? We're going to make this right? Yeah, we know that we can, we do, make a difference. I'm sorry this has taken a deep, dark turn, seeing these videos and listening these songs. As an older person, having lived a life, I see it differently, and that video made perfect sense to me as I was watching it and following along with the lyrics and yeah, and it's still one we remember. I mean, that's the other thing is, it's one of the most well remembered. It lost Video of the Year that year, coincidentally to Peter Gabriel sledgehammer,

Kristin Nilsen 55:27

which club written all over it too,

Carolyn Cochrane 55:30

yes. And so that was, that was a really good year. But yeah, so it's one that people always will refer to, probably, if you say, what are your top five? I think that this one will always come in, and maybe not just because of the puppets and how weird it was

Kristin Nilsen 55:45

well. And I think it's, I think the irony could be like, if you asked me, What is one of your least favorite videos, I would probably say, land of confusion. And Phil Collins might say, Good, yeah. Like, that's I meant to make you uncomfortable, make you disturbed. Yeah, good on you. Phil Collins, good job you.

Kristin Nilsen 56:34

Go, this is so great, you guys. I've been dying to do MTV book club for so long. Thank you to our members and the selections they brought to discuss today. This is surely the first of many meetings where we celebrate the uniquely unhinged and unformed and sometimes unintelligible, sometimes un what's the word I'm looking for? Like beyond me. I wish there was an unword be the beyond me. Concepts incomprehensible form the art form of the early 1980s known as the music video. Thank you for listening today, and we will see you next time.

Michelle Newman 57:07

And a huge thank you to all of our incredible patrons. Your support means the world to us and directly fills up the tanks we need to keep on trucking. Because of your generosity, big or small, we're able to keep bringing you new episodes. Invest in equipment and the subscriptions we need to produce this podcast to keep bringing you quality content. Today, we're giving a special thank you to these patrons, Carolyn, Jen, Cindy, Collette, Sharon, Susan, Barbara, Helene, Christina, Heather Jill and Elizabeth, and if you enjoy the show and want to help us grow, consider becoming a patron yourself. You can find out more about the different tiers of support and the exclusive perks each offer by visiting our Patreon page@patreon.com

Kristin Nilsen 57:56

thank you, everybody for sticking with us today through the from the dark and disturbing to the ridiculous and chaotic to the inappropriate, and all of the above. I just this has been such a roller coaster, I'm having trouble closing out the episode, because the highs and the lows are so high and so

Michelle Newman 58:14

low. We need a pallet cleanser, because puppets are now in my

Kristin Nilsen 58:17

head. It's true, the puppets are in my head, and I have a lot of things to worry about right now. We just

Carolyn Cochrane 58:22

do Addicted to Love as our sign out or something bizarre, but another one with a big why memory?

Kristin Nilsen 58:32

Oh, thank you so much to Lionel Richie and Phil Collins and Mark Mothersbaugh. In the meantime, let's raise our glasses for a toast courtesy of the cast of Threes Company, two good times,

Carolyn Cochrane 58:44

two Happy Days, Two Little House on the Prairie. Cheers, cheers, cheers.

Kristin Nilsen 58:49

The information, opinions and comments expressed on the pop culture Preservation Society podcast belongs solely to Carolyn the crushologist and hello Newman. And are in no way representative of our employers or affiliates. And though we truly believe we are always right, there is always a first time the PCPs is written, produced and recorded in Minneapolis, Minnesota, home of the fictional wjm studios and our beloved Mary Richards, Nanu. Nanu, keep on truckin and May the Force Be With You. You.