David Bowie on Saturday Night Live with back-up singers Klaus Nomi and Joey Arias. Back when, you know, crazy shit like this was allowed to air on broadcast television.



"OK," you're saying, "a little weird maybe, but so what?" Ah, let's check out the second performance from that evening, shall we?



I know the Internet has largely supplanted TV as a format for weirdness and creativity, but it's so much more fragmented an experience I think something's really been lost.

Fun fact: composition of the song had stalled until Dr. Teeth came up with the bridge.

http://www.nathansmusclepage.com/collecting/musclearchive.aspx?menu=muscle

Fuck yes! I had a bucket of these as a kid. I loved how there were so many of them, you very rarely saw the same ones, even in your friends' collections. And the weird variant M.U.S.C.L.E.s and such. We all had our favorites.

( Some of my favorites: )


One of my greatest toy-related disappointments as a kid was when I bought the M.U.S.C.L.E. wrestling ring. I was SO pumped. Now we at last had a systematic way of determining which of our M.U.S.C.L.E.s was the best! (I've always been a sucker for systematization.) It was sort of like Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots, in that you had two M.U.S.C.L.E.s go at it until one got knocked out of the clip you put it in.

Problem was, the clips were non-adjustable, so only certain M.U.S.C.L.E.s could fit. And naturally one of favorites didn't. So I tried to wedge it in. And the cheap plastic clip broke clean in two. Crap merchandise!

Ah, but note the disclaimer:



If only I'd known how to read small print! Bastards.

The parts you always fast-forwarded past...

( Everyone still has their clothes on, don't worry )

Well. That was interesting. One minute I was working, the next minute, inspired by a discussion of how David Cook is a second-rate Daughtry, who is a second-rate Ed Kowalczyk of Live--Des and I had embarked on an odyssey of music video nostalgia, tripping through our teenage years. An hour and a half later, I find myself asking, "Where did the last 90 minutes go?" To the Nineties, that's where!

Along the way, I rediscovered my all-time, and I mean ALL MUTHAFUCKIN' TIME, favorite music video. You have no idea how much this video rocked my world the summer it came out. I would randomly turn on MTV in the hope that the video was about to come on. (That's how things worked before the internet, kids!) My mind was blown. To quote Bart Simpson, "This is so much like my dreams it's scary!" It's still mind-blowing today.

( So what's the video already? )

And for the bored and curious, here's a list of all the videos we watched:

( Today was the greatest day I've ever known )

You know, maybe this is because I was just achieving pubescence at the time, but watching these videos reminded me of how hot early 90s fashions were. Guys and gals alike. I'm talking the "alternative" look here, BTW. Combat boots and knee socks? Yes please! All this sack-cloth American Apparel/leg tights horse-shit can kiss my flannel'd ass.

::old codger mode activates::
You know, it's not just in fashion--I think we've gone backwards on quite a few fronts since those days. Things are so much more reactionary now. Gender roles are more sharply defined (I counted at least three guys in dresses over the course of the videos we watched). Apathy rules the day. No wonder the 80s are back.

ETA: Des and I just watched a couple more. And atomic_star, this one's for you:

( Someday you will ache like I ache )