Thursday, June 7, 2012

Fun, Janelle Monae - “We Are Young”



  We start out with a close-up of lead singer Nate not looking all that impressed with life, as he and the band prepare for a gig in a vague nightclub. Perhaps his dissatisfaction has something to do with the fact that everybody up in this grill is moving in slow-motion for no apparent reason. Or maybe he doesn’t care for his choice of hair product this evening, because there’s something seriously jacked up with what’s happening on his head. Who knows. Musicians are moody people.

  We cut to the bar area (why is the bar so high that people have to reach over their heads to get a beer?) where more slow-ass people are milling about. We see one guy approaching a woman who appears to be texting (because some people these days can’t go on living unless they are texting or appearing in a reality-TV show). We get a close up of her phone (because we’re nosy) and we see that someone has asked her “when?” and she has responded “NOW”.

  Are they talking about when this video got confusing?

  Cut to another part of the bar with people that we don’t know, where it looks like one guy might be about to start a fight with another dude. (Or maybe the kids these days greet one another by walking up and shoving each other off balance, I’m out of the loop.) Cut back to Text Gurl who suddenly hauls off and throws her phone across the room. Clearly she has anger-management issues, probably inspired by her unflattering plaid dress.

  We watch the phone sail through the air (wait, she still has 3 unanswered texts, she’s so going to regret getting projectile with that thing), but before we can see what happens to the phone we see some guy pick up a bottle and break it on Text Gurl’s head. (Good. Don’t be throwing crap around in here, people just want to have a good time and possibly participate in sex that they will regret in the morning.) Text Gurl seems surprised  by this negative business with getting her head bashed, so she was probably raised in one of those trendy family relationships where parental figures never say “no” to the whims of their children.

  Then we up the crazy a notch or two. Suddenly, people are running all over the bar (well, running in slow-mo) and everybody seems to not care for anybody else, with more of the shoving and wearing of grunge clothing. Things that I can only describe as ice-water bombs start exploding all over the place, drenching the couture and expensive haircuts. But the band keeps playing, because they have bills to pay and stuff.

  The mayhem goes on for a while.

  For those who require gratuitous gore in their visual entertainment, we get a nice face-punching bit where someone’s tooth comes flying at the camera. We also have a catfight where a supermodel gets to flip her hair all over the screen while pretending to be violated. And some fool who obviously suffers from low self-esteem is thundering around the bar while wearing Christmas lights.

  The band continues to keep playing, despite things crashing to the stage around them, like toilet paper, disco balls, and a zucchini. (To be fair, there is one intriguing bit with two shirtless guys possibly doing some Greco-Roman wrestling, which is nice, but they disappear quickly and we leave the rest of that avenue unexplored.) And people all over the bar are completely losing their minds, clawing and pushing and hitting and definitely not giving peace a chance.

  Oh wait, there’s one gender-unclear couple who appear to be making out while covered in popcorn and strawberry cake, so not everyone is bitter. But most of the patrons are dissatisfied with life, and we progress to images of people throwing each other across the room, because simple vandalism is not enough for these people. This is what happens to society when you watch too many movies where people blow stuff up instead of having an actual script or plot development.

  Then Janelle Monae shows up, looking very Janet Jackson during the Rhythm Nation period, although I’m not sure that was the intention. Janelle starts belting her part of the song and somehow she and her hair manage to remain un-mussed despite the human projectiles, exploding bean-bag chairs and airborne corn plants. Meanwhile, the band members are still troopers, playing away despite the Jerry Springer antics.

  But eventually even sociopaths need some downtime, so after Janelle finishes her bit and goes off to decide which Jackson she would like to impersonate next, we start to wind things down, with lots of the folks apparently leaving for an after-hours party at the local roller derby. As Nate finishes up and the video ends, we get a glimpse of Phone-Throwing Gurl as she slips away, alone, into the night. I’m assuming she’s headed to T-Mobile to stock up for tomorrow night’s Fun…


Click Here to Watch this Video on YouTube.


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