Of all the innumerable transgressions MTV has committed in the last decade, the marginalization of music videos is perhaps the most unfortunate, especially since every once in a while a well known pop band will decide to dislodge its head from its ass and make something worthwhile. Fall Out Boy teamed up with the non-profit organization Invisible Children to make the video for their new single “Me and You” and come out smelling like roses, unlike certain other rock bands who attempt to make a statement via music video.
The video follows a young love story in the Gulu Township of Norther Uganda interrupted by warfare and forced child soldiering. It’s incredibly sad–like, make-you-renew-your-Amnesty-International-membership-sad–but almost surprisingly tasteful. The tone is a cut above “Aw, look at the poor Africans” Oprah territory, and far less self-righteous than a Bono outing. It’s a little strange to associate the–let’s be honest–frivolity of Fall Out Boy with such a weighty issue, but they stay in the background for the most part, and are seemingly pretty sincere about using their celebrity to raise awareness. Plus the song itself is damn decent. Unfortunately MTV will be too busy counting down Aly & AJ’s favorite episodes of My Super Sweet 16 to notice.
Video Premiere: Fall Out Boy, “Me & You” [PopEater]
oh, after reading that headline, i was hoping the story was going to be that they agreed to stop making music and sucking the cool out of every room they walk into.
Yeah, but it’s hard to pay attention to the video when you’re wretching from the music. On a more serious note, “Beasts of No Nation” and “A Long Way Gone” are both good, albeit depressing, reads (one fiction, one non-fiction) regarding the plight of the young in some African nations.
I don’t feel like the video was especially effective. I like that they tried to bring a different perspective to a struggle, i.e. through the eyes of two young lovers, but honestly the video needed a larger scope to support the message that appears at the end. I realize that a song called “Me and You” wouldn’t make much sense with this video unless it was about two specific people, and nothing in the FOB catalog really would serve the purpose any better, but well….maybe FOB should write a song with some gravitas if they actually have something to say about things other than girls and the music scene.
@LAKingsin2008: I’m sorry you’re not much of an FOB fan [and I'm not enough of a scenester to say anything stronger], but I must disagree with your comment about the song. “Me & You” is a gorgeous song-and-record and one of the best tracks on what I think is one of the year’s top albums. That is probably due to the fact that it was produced by Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds, and I hope everyone who hangs out around here knows who he is.
Bonus fact: The full album-title of this song is “I’m Like A Lawyer With The Way I’m Always Trying To Get You Off (Me & You)”. I’m glad they dropped the FOB-ness of that when they attached it to this cause.
Additional bonus fact: Babyface also produced “Thnks Fr Th Mmrs”
@SomeSound-MostlyFury: Yeah, but all things considered, this isn’t a bad attempt for an otherwise sugary pop punk band.
When I first heard they were making a video about Africa for this song, I was a bit concerned, since the song doesn’t really lend itself to this sort of thing. It could easily have been a shallow attempt to seem charitable, but they actually pulled it off reasonably well.
And Re: The song, this is one of their songs that Babyface produced. So if you inexplicably like it, that might be why.
Ah, blast, DHMBIB beat me to the Babyface tidbit. Oh well.
“The tone is a cut above “Aw, look at the poor Africans” Oprah territory”
Oprah territory? Really? How? By building schools for hard-working, high-achieving, but under-resourced Africa long since underdeveloped by the West. Reads more like one viewer/blogger’s territory. Oprah is not bulletproof but this lazy, unevidenced, and unnecessary shot is way off.
@jb: I did dash this off pretty quickly, I will admit. I probably should have gone with “adopt-an-orphan infomercial” rather than Oprah, but I didn’t think too hard about it. I was just going on instinct, and my instinct told me that every time I see Oprah talking about Africans I automatically enter the “aw, look at the poor Africans” mindset. Just the way she approaches it does that for me. But all of this is not to say that she doesn’t do great and charitable things.
And in the spirit of funding hard-working Africans, I’ll take this opportunity to pimp Kiva: [kiva.org]
crap.