Family of the Year – “St. Croix”

  We start off with a loving shot of some vixen’s rear as she high-tails it away from us and joins a bunch of her pals on a beach. (Was it something we said?) All of her little friends are sporting bathing couture from the 1960’s, and there are several surfboards around, shoved in the sand in that startlingly-phallic manner than shoved surfboards have. While credits splash on the screen, some of the folks are dancing about and performing those self-satisfied moves that have little to do with the actual rhythm of the song and more to do with the possible appearance of a rash in an uncomfortable location.

  We also get our first shot of a woman in a pink bathing suit with an excess of fringe, wiggling her hips with a frenzy. She may look innocent at the moment (although a bit over-accessorized), but we will soon start to fear her a little bit since she makes a number of increasingly-aggressive appearances as the video progresses. She clearly has a dark agenda of some kind, and no one is safe from her and her lethally-whipping fringe.

  Cut to the band members standing in a line in front of an old-timey car. They are wearing matching striped shirts, which is initially cute and wholesomely-nostalgic, but something about their body language gives off a slight “Children of the Corn” vibe, a foreboding that will grow along with our unease about Fringed Frieda and her pelvic gyrations. Oh, and one of those surfboards has joined the lineup, but since he doesn’t appear to know any of the lyrics or dance moves, his musical career might be a little shorter than the other four.

  And we’re back to Frieda (see, I told you, she eventually ends up everywhere, like bad shag carpeting), who does a hip solo, then we visit with her other little friends on the beach, with everyone trying to do white-people dances and appear festive. There’s also some mess with a hula hoop, but the person trying to do the hooping obviously watched the wrong instructional video, because that hoop is not doing what it should. But everyone is smiling and having a swell time, so the skill-set of some of the participants is really less important than, say, the complete lack of same-sex couples doing The Frug.

  Back to the foursome in front of the Ford, or whatever kind of car that is. They are very happy to finally be singing the lyrics of the song, after that extended intro where they didn’t get to do much other than stand there and be pretty. The camera pans down the line, so we can fully appreciate their individual happiness and very-fine dental work. (Why is that one guy playing a guitar the size of a sugar packet? Maybe I should save that for the Q&A session at the end of the video.)

  Oh wait, we’re suddenly getting some more title credits. I’m not sure why we need a second round, but maybe we’ll learn something. It seems that this video is starring Family of the Year, news that comes as a total shock, this being a Family of the Year video and all. Then we get some snippet cameos from the band members, with each of them waving about a prop with borderline manic glee, followed by a Brady Bunch-style intro to a gaggle of people known as “The Gang”. It’s not clear who these people are, but most of them are clutching vessels of fruity alcohol, so I’m sure we’ll get along just fine.

  There’s a quick series of vignettes, with the Pinstripe Quartet performing on a deck, some of the guys being very friendly with surfboards, the perusal of trashy pulp novels, and some business concerning a sandcastle with self-esteem issues. Then we’re back to more credits, because somebody up in this grill really has a fondness for fonts. We are introduced to three of the band members (at least I think they’re in the band, we really have a lot of people running around) who will be playing characters with odd names that usually only happen in the south of France or on California communes in 1967.

  We head back to the quartet on that deck thing, a gig that they must greatly enjoy because we spend a considerable amount of time there. Christina, the lone female in the otherwise testosterone-heavy lineup, appears to be very invested in doing an interpretive dance about an escaped convict not knowing which way to run.

  Then we kick off our little mini-story, one that initially involves “Lou Simpatico”, a mustached man who is selling a love-potion concoction at a little hut. As he stands there and makes us think of someone involved in cheap pornographic films (sorry, it’s that mustache), our other two featured starlets, “Rita Haricot Vers” and “Vince Schoenhauser”, come running up from wherever they were standing before the director hollered “Action!”. They each snatch a drink from Porno Lou, and then turn to gaze upon one another whilst they guzzle.

  This leads to a gauzy dream sequence where our two chemically-altered lovers make goo-goo eyes and smile dreamily, followed by the four band members also chugging the chupacabra juice. This makes the libation an official trending topic, and suddenly everyone on the entire set is racing to get them a glassful. Two seconds later, the inevitable dance-off begins, with people pumping their hands in the air and doing squat thrusts. The celebration is capped off by the band members trying out for the local cheerleading squad that doesn’t really exist.

  Now that hormone levels have been maximized, we proceed to a montage of several couples sucking face with a fierce determination. First we have the couples perched atop an odd fence, because nothing is more erotic than wooden supports poking at your butt, then we have the couples strewn about a pile of seaside rocks, like a bunch of seals at the height of mating season. We cap this section off with Vince and Rita, post-coupling, racing into the ocean waters to wash away their sins.

  Quick image of the band members running along the beach carrying a surfboard over their heads, then we cut to the members riding said board in a lovely tribute to the art of obvious trick photography, complete with mismatched film stock and over-acting. There’s also some mess with what appears to be a three-way taking place between a discreet set of surfboards, but we are only allowed to see body parts that are uninteresting, which lowers the titillation factor.

  The final part of this epic love story involves a voyeuristic lifeguard using binoculars to spy on Vince and Rita as they do that “beast with two backs” thing, wallering around on the sand. Well, apparently the lifeguard is a Republican, because he can’t stand it when other people are happy, so he blows on a whistle to make them stop. But instead of seeing a reaction shot from Vince and Rita as they pull away from each other with an audible pop, we cut to a fisherman snagging a bikini top with his pole. (Which sounds rather eye-opening, but isn’t quite what you think.)

  There’s some minimal choreography involving beach balls and a Busby Berkley tribute, and suddenly Fringed Frieda is back on the scene, standing front and center and ready to lacerate us with her dangly mini-whips. Luckily, the band members dance their way in between us and Certain Death, creating a life-saving barrier so that our last image on Earth isn’t a human weed whacker from hell.

  To celebrate the fact that everyone survived the video with only a bit of sunburn and some possible surprise pregnancies, we close things out with folks sitting around a charming bonfire as the day fades, people reflect, and libidos recharge. Then we roll into the closing credits, with more images of beautiful people being far more happy than reality and non-alcoholic beverages would normally allow…

Click Here to Watch this Video on YouTube.