I'm still trying to decide how I feel about Weezer's new video. Appropriating nearly every large-scale Internet phenomenon of the last five years is a bit of a land grab, but since they've been borrowing liberally from popular culture for some years now it doesn't feel quite as disingenuous as if it had been, say, Fall Out Boy. They've used music videos to create homages to "Happy Days" and "The Muppet Show" before, but those felt like humble and loving tributes. This is straying dangerously into helium-filled flying pig territory.
Thoughts anyone?
Daniel Turman
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digital culture, this is viral
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I found this amusing, but then again I generally find internet humor more amusing the more widespread it becomes. I think I find the idea of this little (or in this specific case, these little) internet things becoming more famous and spreading ridiculous and that's what amuses me.
Like prior to April Fools of this year, while I understood Rickrolling, it wasn't anything too amusing to me. Just this thing people did online. But as it spread online, and even to places offline, it just doubled and tripled in it's humor. The content of it hadn't changed, but the ridiculousness of this little meme spreading as far as it had made it more amusing.
Posted by Kaziel | May 23, 2008 6:03 PM
Posted on May 23, 2008 18:03
I think it's clever. The fact that I recognize nearly all of the depictions is a little disconcerting to me, personally. I say good for them. The fact that I just watched this video online while recalling seeing those clips online, is sort of strange to me. Regardless of our opinion about the video itself, by watching it online, did we lend more justification and credibility to what they've done? I'm confused. I'm going to go look at the reflection of one mirror in another.
Posted by ken | May 23, 2008 10:45 PM
Posted on May 23, 2008 22:45
The video is very weezer and totally enjoyable.
So yeah, they commandeered bits of popular culture for a video and gave those characters a tip of the hat.
One thing I was thinking about was... wow... i bet weezer had to pay those people to 'act' in their video - something that probably never happened on YouTube. Even if they didn't get paid, I liked how the characters got to tell a bit more of their story... like the backflipping numb-chuck guy gets to beat up banana ninjas and the misspoken beauty queen throws down that she is hot and doesn't care if she misspoke.
Not sure what you mean by helium-filled flying pig territory - but if this is an example I'm down.
Posted by Mason Poe | May 23, 2008 10:59 PM
Posted on May 23, 2008 22:59
Pink Floyd's flying pigs are (depending on who you ask) either a symbol of rock and roll excess or a genius symbol of self promotion. Especially the part where the pig broke free and shut down all flights going in and out of Heathrow in the name of the album-cover shoot for "Animals."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_Floyd_pigs
Posted by Daniel Turman | May 27, 2008 5:41 PM
Posted on May 27, 2008 17:41