Behind closed doors
by Matt Worley
One of the stranger hybrids of entertainment is starting to leak into the mainstream. During the last few weeks daily newspapers, National Public Radio and MTV, among others, have been talking about the mysterious connections between Pink Floyd's "Dark Side Of The Moon" and the classic children's film, "Wizard Of Oz." I thought I'd go ahead and throw my two cents in about the strange habit many people my age have of watching something on TV, but listening to a different audio source. Many older people may wonder why anyone would want to have different sound while watching a television program. As always, what the parents don't know, the kids they understand.
The whole thing began in the late 80s as children who grew up on MTV rushed their way through adolescence and went into full on alcohol-consuming abandon (i.e.--these kids came of age). As most of them were used to having a musical soundtrack to random, if not spasmodic, visuals, changing the audio source was not a large evolutionary leap to take.
This had been done, to various degrees, during the rock concerts of the late 60s and 70s. Bands would make strange art films to show on a large back screen as they played. Psychedelic bands (especially the Doors and Pink Floyd) thought a large lava lamp-type visual would keep their drug-addled concert goers in a good mood as their music took many twists and turns. MTV, however, pushed this experience into every child's home. The psychedelic films became promotional videos. As the cost of TVs went down (a 19" color TV--many times with stereo sound--costs around $150 today), bars began to use them as decoration. Large banks of TVs that sometimes worked in sync with each other, but also separately became a fixture on the club scene. The clubs would play their own style of music while sports, animated shows, movies and music videos played silently. Obviously, people wanted this eclectic audio/visual experience in their own homes. With advent of better audio systems connected to TVs and VCRs, this is even easier than way back when I began serious study in this area of entertainment.
A few years ago, my roommates and I came up with a great party idea. Show the animated classic, "Fantasia," on the TV while different music played from our portable CD player (stationed right next to the TV). After one miss (ska, more specifically, the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, unfortunately was too fast for the gently pulsing flick), we came upon quite a big hit. The Frank Zappa combined CD (now available separately for your spending pleasure) "Apostrophe'/Overnight Sensation" was selected. Party goers were entranced. Many asked where we got such a cool version of "Fantasia." We explained our trick, as we're not stuck up magicians. This became an obsession for a while, which led to many wasted nights of trying different combinations of music and movies--quite a few to less-than-perfect success.
Here is the secret to having a good movie/music experience: Pick a movie based around music. Like "Fantasia" and "The Wizard Of Oz," music is central to the movie. Children's animated shows and musicals are usually the best. The animated classic, "Heavy Metal," has had mixed results in this area. In music oriented films, everyone on the screen bops around to the beat, which is very nice to look at. We thought for a while that special effects extravaganzas might be good as well--wrong. We also thought that any music genre could be used--also wrong. Fast music does not work as well, which leaves out punk, ska, techno, Metallica and Mariah Carey. The only other almost perfect match we found for "Fantasia" was Dread Zeppelin's "Hot And Spicy Beanburger." As with the Zappa CD, one needs to fast-forward through the beginning part with the musicians in silhouette and begin as the animation begins to imitate sound waves. There is one part with a saucy fish coinciding with Dread Zeppelin's version of "Kashmir" which is quite cool.
So as the rest of the world begins to understand that there are many different things to do with children's movies after the viewers are no longer children, we who have known for quite a while revel in the knowledge we were part of the phenomenon's refining process. And yes, the coincidences that occur when watching "The Wizard Of Oz" while listening to "Dark Side Of The Moon" are quite amusing. We checked it out a few weeks ago. And if you want another nice thrill ride, try watching "Mary Poppins" while listening to Tricky's "Pre-Millennium Tension," Beck's "Mellow Gold" and Sublime's "40 Ounces Of Freedom."
Matt Worley loves to manipulate media for his own devices. Anyone who has any other happy coincidences should e-mail "Shut Up, I'm Talking..." with suggestions.
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