Music Video #53 (Day 23 of 2008)

Today's video is from an album I got from Lita. It's Short Skirt/Long Jacket by CAKE.


I'm sure I've seen this video before. I'm also sure the big reason why anybody remembers this video is because of Robert L. Clark. He just loves this song.


I'll start with the lyrics because the video is about people sampling the song. Basically singer describes his ideal girl. She's a girl with a hard head, knows what's right, and is very sharp. As the song goes on you realize he wants a super gal, who's perfect at everything, can support herself, and can even do all this stuff without much sleep. I'm sure that the song doesn't take itself too seriously because otherwise I'd say, "Good luck, buddy!"

That's it for the song. I was going to go into it in more detailed but realized I didn't need to. The important part of this video is that several people are asked to listen to the song and they give commentary as the song plays. Several people put on headphones and bob their head to the music. If it was me, I would have stayed perfectly still and not made eye contact with the camera.

Robert L. Clark immediately loves the song and demands to know who it is. He doesn't catch their name but is totally into it. We see other people including a high school student that gives up on it almost immediately. She thinks the singer has a scratchy voice. We return to Robert who makes us laugh when he wonders aloud if the song ended during the refrain. I miss the Robert Clark late night show.

We see other people. Some retired guy predicts that this song won't make it on the charts. Meanwhile Robert says he wants to copies of the song. Everybody else in this video should bow down to him. We see more people including a guy who remembers the good old days of the forties. He gives the song two beards down. A psychologist tries to look important by implying his silly degree to the video. Don't look at me like that. If it's not silly, than why do I have to remember it as P-SI-Chologist just so I can spell it right?

Some cartoonist really doesn't like the nananana part. We next see some hippy who doesn't sound like a hippy. I'm not sure if he's a real hippy. Maybe just a burned out one. We get two women who disagree over how they feel about the lyrics. Next is a tattooed guy who shares how badly his marriage went and says that if his woman was like CAKE's ideal woman, he would have stayed. Very courageous of you, sir. We get a German tourist who thinks the song rocks but complains about the rising action. We end with a woman accusing the band of being a one-hit wonder. Ouch. Funny way to end the video though.


Good song, and a funny idea for a video. The comments distract from the song a little bit but not too much. The song is fun and clearly doesn't take itself seriously.

The awesome thing is obviously Robert L. Clark. I love how his hoodie popped up the moment he fell in love with the song.