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  • First Look: U2’s Get On Your Boots

    Fire. Broken glass. Giant women with sexy legs. No, this site has not been taken over by a horny 14-year old, but that’s what you see in U2’s new video for “Get On Your Boots”. What would otherwise be a pretty routine performance clip gets jazzed up by these special effects.

    The video’s pretty cool. As for the song itself, I’m still not 100% sold. Even though “Boots” is certainly not the first time that U2 has plagiarized itself, this song sounds just a bit too close to “Vertigo” for my tastes. It’s not bad, it’s just not great, and it certainly lessens my anticipation for “No Line on the Horizon”. Hopefully it won’t be a mess of “Pop” or “Zooropa” proportions.

    Ah well, I’ll be buying it regardless. Let us know what you think of the video.

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  • Infatueighties #52: Down Under

    downunderAustralia has always had sort of a romantic appeal to me (and I’d love to be there right now, considering it’s summer), and I have Men at Work to thank for it. The delightfully goofy band won my six year old heart, first with “Who Can it Be Now” and then with “Down Under”. How can you resist the story of a man who meets a woman who made him breakfast when you’re a little kid? All it would have taken for a kidnapper to have lured me away back then was the promise of pancakes.

    Of course, there’s more than just the first verse. There’s the addictive flute-sounding hook. There’s a remarkably catchy chorus, which sticks in the head even though you have no idea what Men at Work are talking about unless you’re Australian or know one. There’s Colin Hay’s delightfully droll delivery. Put it all together? Certified classic. The song’s lived through a Best New Artist Grammy, commercials for the Australian tourist board, “Crocodile Dundee” and an acoustic performance on “Scrubs” and is still a joy to listen to and sing along with.

    And of course, there’s the “vegemite sandwich” line. Have you ever SEEN what Vegemite looks like? Green barf. Australians eat this. They’re better people than I’ll ever be.

  • Friday Throwback – Whatzupwitu

    Everyone knows Party All The Time right? Well, Eddie Murphy came back to the scene with an album in 1993. It was interesting because it had a pretty stellar cast at the time. He was able to get a ton of artists to sing one word on the song Yeah like MC Hammer, Stevie Wonder, Luther Vandross, and Janet and Michael Jackson. He had Shabba Ranks on lead single I Was A King which was terrible and then Michael Jackson again on Whatzupwitu, which was bad as well, but still fun at the same time.

    – Why is Ed in a wife beater? Probably to show off his new physique. Though I wasn’t really impressed with that double bicep shot.

    – I couldn’t really see Mike’s lipstick in black and white, but when the picture went color, bam, it hit me right in the face.

    – Why is Ed singing into Mike’s ear?

    – I actually like the song without the video, but the video is so bad that I’m starting to hate this song.

    – For the last half of that video I had so many things to say, but my fingers just couldn’t type them.

    If I see Ed and Mike in the same room again, I’d ask them, “Whatzupwitu?”