Music Video #33 (Day 3 of 2008)

Today's music video is about traffic safety. It's a two and a half minute music video called Wrong Way by a band named Sublime.

Huh. For the second day in a row I say that, but for a much different reason.

We start with a guy spray painting a wall. The graffiti morphs into a home with a cheap looking fence. We see a teen on her knees cleaning the floor. Her name is Annie and the song says she's 12, but that's ridiculous. She wears a slutty dress and the song informs us that she'll be a whore in 2 years. Wow. Second line and the song has already kicked us in the face. In the background we see a clown that's suppose to be her father. By clown, I mean clownish hair and a big red nose that's obviously that way on purpose. The father is a bum who wears a tshirt, shorts, and smokes a cigar around the house. The song informs us that the daughter's upbringing is the wrong way, so I at least agree with the video on that.

Geez, the very next part of the song reinforces the prostitute part. What kind of song is this? I know they say it's the wrong way, but still. The song picks up pace (and admittedly gets catchy) when Annie walks out and runs into a blonde spikey hair guy who plays the part of the singer. The blonde guy runs into her while skateboarding. They run away from evil clown dad. He's going to make it hard for her to gain her freedom, though. I think that's what he just said. He's too busy staring at her chest to care about her crying. Meanwhile Annie has ditched her young look and now has short spikey orange hair and appears to be enjoying life at the moment. Still the wrong way. We see the band on various signs while our couple drives by.

The song gets even pervier by mentioning that her seven (mulicultural) brothers were all horny. Her dad is a drunk, which surprises nobody. Even worse, it's revealed that he was the one who made her a prostitute. Is the poin of this song to make me root for a guy who runs away with a 14 year old prostitute? Because I'm afraid I'm leaning towards that option given how bad her family is. I mean, yeeesh. Song still catchy, though.



After the song breaks so we can see the band, we see our (hmm, hero still doesn't seem right) protagonist in a convenience store picking up several bags of chip. Car trips are fun. He goes to Annie while some people run past them. Some shenanigans happen that I don't quite understand, but the results are Annie takes off in the car. Singer is mad but he did give her the option to run away in his song. Despite this he bitterly says that she always wanted the wrong way. Meanwhile Annie is getting gothy while her family is floating around the screen. Clearly she's going to mentally break down.

At the end of the song she's in a plain white (almost see-through) dress without the stupid spiked hair. Either she's decided to walk away from her old life and change it for the better, or she died and is walking to heaven. Heaven is a power line, by the way.


The song grew on me by the second or third go through. But the lyrics, yikes. I guess the song was less amoral than I thought after the first time I listened to it, but it's still about a teenager who sells her body early in her teenage years. I guess I'm just mister uptight because when I think of upbeat song I don't think about a guy rescuing a troubled teen for the sake of some fun and sex. There was nothing wrong with the music video visually except the scene with the naked father. Bleck.

The awesome part was the convenience store because it reminds me of road trips. But that's weak, so another awesome part is the final part because it appears that Annie will walk off and start her life anew, hopefully for the better. Maybe I'm just naive.