Can I just say Medics Without Borders?
Medi-san.
S'in frontier.
Medi-san.
Can you just use this?
Just edit it instead of me.
Doctors Without Borders.
It means Doctors Without Borders.
Why not just call it Doctors Without Borders?
Because it's, I think, French is supposed to be more international than English.
English is hard.
It's technically all of our second languages.
It is true.
I mean, it's Scottish, me Irish, and Nelly.
They're thinking my third, because my second is German.
Oh, sure.
Hello and welcome to We Can't Rewind, We've Gone Too Far,
a podcast where Scotsman, an Irishman, and a Bulgarian
review the most terrible, silliest, and weirdest-as-fuck music videos.
Hi, I'm Dave.
Hi, I'm Neil.
Hi, I'm Neely. Today we will take a look at the creative endeavor of two giants of rock music, David Bowie and Mick Jagger.
I'm of course talking about their 1985 cover of Dancing in the Street.
This video is nowadays hailed as one of the dumbest music videos to come out of the 80s,
but was it actually that bad or was it just an underwhelming piece of creative energy?
It doesn't matter what you wear
Just as long as you are there
So come on, every guy
Grab a girl
Everywhere
Around the world
Now we're dancing
Dancing in the street
That's it for you
Originally recorded in 1964
by Martha and the Vandelas
Vandelas
Stevenson, Ivy Jo Hunter and The Marvin Gaye. Hailed as a Motown classic. The story goes
that Stevenson first came up with the idea while watching people cooling off using an open
fire hydrant. It later became a civil rights anthem played during demonstrations. It was
later covered by the likes of the Mamas and the Papas, the Kinks, Van Halen and of course
Boy and Jack. The background of the version is probably more interesting than the actual
video. So let's talk briefly about the life aid famine relief. In 2020 we're all aware
Christopher Coffigus surrounding the good intentions of the concerts, from Bob Geldof ignoring warnings from
Doctors Without Borders regarding the political situation in Ethiopia, to the general bitchiness of different performers, and the baffling, did they know it's Christmas?
Originally the pair were planning to contribute to Live Aid by performing a duet live via satellite link from the prospective tours.
However, technological limitations quickly put an end to this plan as they realised that delaying the link would make it impossible unless Boy and Jagger mimed.
Being the committed professional as they were, and are, this opinion was refused.
Thanks to this, we got one of the most brilliant, hilarious and ridiculous rock collaborations in history.
Directed by David Mallet, budget probably consisted of free alcohol and whatever drugs to make you bounce off the walls.
Also, whenever Jagger is taking a sip of halfway through the video.
This is one of the videos you really can't explain.
It just exists in its own continuum where you hear the names David Boyd Mick Jagger
and you expect the most mind-blowing rock experience of your life.
Instead, you get two guys goofing off at the now derelict turn-of-the-century
Flower Mill, Millennium Mills, next to London City Airport.
Compared to our last video that we discussed, November Rain,
this video was not just tame, it's full-out boring.
No diving through cakes, no random guitar souls on top of cliffs,
No Axel Rose taking a dump on graves.
We do, however, have David Boy and Mick Jagger in their most 80s outfits
and their most 80s dad moves,
dancing around the abandoned emergency fire escapes of the millenium mills buildings.
The video opens up with a shot of Jagger's feet running in place,
presumably a warm-up for the relentless dancing to come.
They dance around the flour mill for a bit
in the manner of the last two people still drunk and up for a party,
while everyone else falls asleep and considers kicking them out.
They decided that this post-apocalyptic party is too lame for them,
and they decided to take it to the streets.
Also, suspiciously empty, presumably everyone hiding,
or a dry run for the COVID outbreak.
I think we're going to remove the COVID references.
Yeah, I mean, it kind of works.
We don't want to remember this thing.
People always say dance like no one is watching.
Well, that's pretty much what happens here.
Except they're dancing around each other with the intensity of two people who have had a
bit too much magic powder.
Jagger stops to take a sip of a mysterious beverage to keep himself hydrated, which is
a sensible health and safety move when you're dancing with such intensity.
After trying to outdo each other during the scenery for a bit, they briefly gatecrush some
poor bastards flat to do synchronized doorway dancing like a funky Benny Hill sketch.
Then onward back into the streets, the sun rising from the biblical night of that dancing,
the cameras zooming into their respective rear ends and the song fades.
Just like Bowie and Jagger's memory of shooting this video.
So okay, we are all in a nationwide lockdown, okay?
And we are watching too rich guys not following government guidelines on social distancing and
endangering themselves for shits and giggles.
And, on top of that, they're promoting unsafe practices by rallying people to go out and
dance in the street.
It's amazing what you could get away with in the before time.
Yeah, especially when you're rich and white and popular.
And I guess handsome people find him handsome at some point, somehow?
It looks like they're finding each other handsome the whole way through the video.
Wasn't there?
Wasn't there like this whole story how they were found, uh, Bowie was found naked in Jagger's
bed or something?
Am I making this up?
There was definitely a story about Bowie allegedly shagging some other rock star, but I can't
remember if it was Jagger.
It could have been multiple, to be honest.
80s was a hell of a time. 70s, really.
They've known each other for a while, I think.
Yeah. I mean, you could go outside,
you could go to the shop.
Does anyone remember how this felt?
The sun on your skin,
dancing in the streets?
Dancing in the streets.
If anyone asks who hasn't experienced
dancing apart from the joy of 2020,
tell them that this is exactly
what life used to be like. Have you ever been
at the Glasgow School of Art,
degree show street parties when this still happens.
I don't think so.
Like they were literally that, but it wasn't two people.
It was like 500,000.
On evenings of drunkenness, I have literally danced in the street in a very similar way to
these guys.
Though with the addition of a kebab, surely.
Yeah.
Doing the leg kicks from a kebab shop.
A kebab and whatever tune from wherever I'm fucking falling out of is still going through
man.
Clearly blue the gun.
Oh man,
I haven't had a blue
in ages.
Does that still exist?
It does.
I think,
well,
it did.
Does it?
Until this week,
although the chip shop
next to my house
is still open,
so yeah.
Oh man,
hungry.
Sorry.
Sponsored by
Fish and Chips.
And Squarespace.
Hundreds of
designer templates.
Wix.com.
Q-Share.
Yeah,
I don't think we're
going to get around
the COVID thing.
no matter what we're gonna say we're just gonna go no i think it's kind of bound um okay so jokes
yeah jokes aside let's talk about actual video yeah i but the video personally i think the video
is fucking brilliant it's just they're just kicking around dancing like idiots yeah and it's like and
they and they clearly don't give a fuck it's right like i i i can stand i know that this video has
this horrible reputation.
And I understand
that it's not the best thing ever,
but at the same time,
they're bonding it up together
with stuff like Journey
and Bon Jovi videos.
And it's like,
what are you doing?
It's just two friends
having fun getting drunk
and getting fucking high of coke.
Are they drunk?
I think it's definitely
a powdered substance
because they're jumping
way too much to be drunk.
Well, I mean,
it depends what you drink.
If it's beer, maybe not.
No, I think that there's a telltale sign about one minute, five seconds into the video where Jigerda stares a Bowie in the eyes.
He's going to shank him with a Bowie knife.
And to me, that shows, oh, hold on, if you freeze frame it, that shows clear, clear intent to do damage.
I just want to point out these speculations.
We're not saying that Age of Dames is a cokehead.
Yeah, allegedly.
Allegedly.
This is 1980s coke or early 1990s.
The good shit.
Because there was a period where David Boy was in Berlin, I think.
He went to Berlin so he could try and get off heroin.
So was this before or after this?
Yeah, like five albums that are just based above Berlin.
I think the other aspect of the video is the fact that, once again,
unfortunately, we're going to wind up getting back to fucking COVID here.
But it's just the fact the place is totally empty.
yeah it's almost like everyone's in a quarantine and they're the only ones who are still out
because they're david bowie and mick jerry what i presume happened is they just need to slap something
up in like half an hour for yesterday and they were like okay this is this abandoned place in
central london let's just all go there and shoot it was probably them two like a camera person and
maybe a lighting person and that's it it does kind of feel like that because they were originally
they might have do it live then they realized that wasn't gonna happen so maybe this was just like
it let's just go shoot something and help the children you can well i mean i think it's a real
tell sign that there's what one interior location with two rooms and one external it's basically
following the student film rules of uh of locations yeah yeah but i do quite enjoy the camera work like
it's super clean like they're not trying to go to do anything crazy in artistic or whatever just like
high kicks behind doors and you're suddenly turning around and David Bowie jumping ahead
like on top of you it's kind of it's fun it's easy to watch and it makes me happy that's it
just makes me happy no the the camera works pretty good I mean considering that external shot you
cranes down it I think it feels a lot like first takes because the camera feels a little bit jumpy
and the cameraman who shoots it's like trying to reframe because he forgets it Jagger comes out at
a slightly higher angle than Bowie or whoever
comes out. Yeah, it looks like it's
all one take. Oh fuck, it's not one take.
But the thing is,
it's probably multiple takes, but because it was
Rush Beyond Belief, it just looks a bit janky.
That track shot at
one minute, 20 seconds in, where they're just dancing
around and there's no other crew, really
does, you know, show
that the budget was quite, quite small.
As we said, alcohol and coke.
Actually, yeah, Jagger does take a drink.
Yeah, he does take a drink.
Where did that come from? I wasn't there a second ago.
I had this theory. I never actually paused to see, to look at the can.
I think it might be Coke bottle or can.
Because I think Coke were one of the main sponsors of LifeAid.
If I'm not wrong, I might be wrong.
Because otherwise it's just a very random shot to be left in there.
I mean, the whole video is random as fuck, but it's still a very random shot.
It's entirely possible he just had that little beer or something with him and he just went fuck it.
But I do love the fact that after he takes a drink, he just stares intensely at David Boy for a minute
as he's going for it and he's like oh shit it's my bit
this is why the silent
video to it is just absolutely amazing
yeah because you just have
like noises they make because
like David Bowie 100% chatted
when he jumped off that
staircase
we can't go any further without mentioning
the absolute glory that is the silent
version of the video
where they've added in the sound effects
and a little bit of singing and stuff
but taking out the music
and it is so good
to the point where every time I watch it
I'm going like, I wish I thought of this
I'm dancing in the street
Doesn't matter what you wear
Just as long as you are there
Come on, every guy
Grab a girl
Everywhere
They'll be dancing
If you do, you spin me right around
Like the original video
You just hear like some swooshing noises
I was reading through reviews
And I was trying to find what people thought about it
But all they said was, oh it's dumb
Because to be rock stars
I mean, come on, it's the fucking 80s
Have you seen the videos that they had at the time?
I prefer it to November
Yeah, November was pretentious
This one is just, we have no money
But we have a hell of a lot of coke
some beer let's shoot a video do you think they actually choreographed the dances i think they
must have because there's a little bit of synchronizing going on i don't know i feel like
it's probably like oh mic mic it would be really funny if you do that thing and then just like
rehearse it for like three and a half minutes and then like record it they just done the first thing
that came to their heads there's no thought put into that look at the way they move i don't know i
think it could be a situation where it's like really choreographed it's choreographed in such
a way that it looks like shit.
Probably not. I don't think neither of them were
dancers, so maybe not. Well, at least I don't
think they were dancers. They both had the move.
One had the move like Jagger, literally.
Well, that's true.
No, by the way, speaking of
I completely forgot his movie was tricked.
He's actually done a hell of
a lot of things, both Bowie
and the Rolling Stones. He did Radio
Gaga, which is
pretty decent.
I want to break free is fucking brilliant.
how much of all is good,
like, his videos, ACDC.
So it's like, he clearly knows what he's doing.
So maybe he actually made a point,
had a point of just making it look so junky.
So it doesn't look like they've spent money on it
because it's all supposed to be a, like,
famine relief video, whatever.
It could be the situation where it was a production disaster
and they were just like, fuck it, just do it.
But however, they got three geniuses in a room together
and, oh well, the streets together
and just went fucking have at it.
According to the songfacts.com,
it said that Bowie and Jagger recorded the song
in just four hours.
And in 2017, Jagger was quoted by Rolling Stone
saying, we banged it out in just two takes.
It was an interesting exercise
on how you can do something without worrying too much.
So is that about the video of the song itself?
That is the video.
Oh, well, that makes a lot of sense then, doesn't it?
Two takes looks about right.
Two takes, I mean, that's twice more than I thought they'd done.
it's got that going for it
okay so everyone's favourite
part of the video
if anyone has this
it's between the synchronised door dancing
that's just comedic but I do enjoy the bit where he just
takes a sip of beer at the can because
it looks like that wasn't planned he just thought
I fancy a bit of beer and now I'm going to stare
at David Bowie intently for a few moments
which is a perfectly natural thing
I think the highlight
was probably the slow motion dive
by David, it's totally
unnecessarily. Could have caused
them lots of harm and damage but
it was interesting that he'd done it nonetheless.
It was pointless too. I mean
why jump into the scene like that?
In slow motion? I mean it's like
jumping off the second step of your
staircase. It doesn't really prove any
point. It looks cool. It looks badass.
That's definitely my favourite part
from the no music version
just because of the scream
they put in. It was very good.
Definitely my favourite part
is the synchronised door dancing.
it's just like those those leg kicks are amazing just keep just keep out them i can have like 10
hours of just leg kicks i think that i really get right the whole premise of the song is dancing in
the streets but why are they dancing in what looks like a crackdown and yeah the the bakery yard
you know in the central london why not like just go dancing in the streets because then they have to
actually pay people and like police maybe to call those streets could have just turned up somewhere
and just recorded and it would have been probably a lot more uh a lot more engaging and interesting
but considering what it is i mean it's it's it's not a bad music video but it is pretty shit
it's it's a so bad it's good situation yeah yeah that definitely for me it's really unoffensive
right i mean it doesn't annoy me um kind of the way i'm go west go west kind of confused the shit
out of anyone who watches it and november rain kind of you know you get more confused the longer
you're watching because you just question everything's
going on. But this you kind of
just accept the two as these two
these two middle-aged men
just dad dancing like
a wedding. And you can't really
fault them for it. Did we do bits that
we didn't like last time? I can't remember.
We did, but not sure there's anything that
you can say I really hate about this video because it's all
Yeah, there's nothing I actually
dislike about it. I think the only bit
that's a minor nitpick is the slow
motion where it zooms into their arse at the end is a bit
jumpy but that's just a probably just a technological limitation at the time so i can't really well i
guess you just didn't know how to finish it because like the song itself kind of just fizzes out and
how do you finish this when you have only two takes for the footage i feel sorry for the guys
you had to edit the thing together like what else we got and they're like that's it
the choice is very limited one thing i'd i'd forgotten about is the fact that by the end of
the video it looks like the sun's coming up so it does seem like they were literally filming this
all night oh yeah yeah you're right because it goes from like really dark to kind of blue i mean
there was probably a lot of drinking there so yeah there's some point they're like okay let's just
finish this and go and get some art let's go take some heroin no did you care oh david okay okay just
nice family friendly cooking so what are your final thoughts on this guys uh it's a knife for me
yeah it's a knife for me definitely a knife for me as well it's it's totally unoffensive
still very confusing but nonetheless an entertaining watch we all agree then yay well done
well done one does exist so what are we doing next then oh god uh let me open the
sheets open up the spreadsheet spreadsheet um do you guys want to do 90s now because we were kind of
like stuck in 80s slash period in 90s?
Do you feel like 80s?
I'm up for some 90s.
Something with really ropey CG.
Not go-ass ropey, but you know.
Black Hole Sun.
Black Hole Sun's good, yeah.
Is it Soundgarden or...
Soundgarden.
Yeah, yeah.
I nearly said audio.
I think it's Nirvana or something.
One of those balls.
They're all the same.
Say goodbye, everyone.
Bye.
Don't forget to wash your hands.
Catch it.
Kill it.
in it.