Music Video #54 (Day 24 of 2008)

It seems like Lita gave me a repeat, but I'm tired so I won't tell her. It's Major Tom by Peter Schilling, which is probably his take on David Bowie's song.


Free night, you weren't to be. Or...whatever.

I mean, sure, it clearly takes a lot from David Bowie's song, but there's a lot more stuff, like the cheesy 80s stuff. Oh well, it wasn't called July's Don't Post Anything Like May Or June Month. We start with astronauts doing Right Stuff stuff like walking to the rocket. A synthesizer plays in the background, firmly putting this video in the eighties. Then we see various people wearing 80s fashions walking outside a junkyard. Inside some hobos look up at a pile of cars. Today's band is in one of the cars.

The song starts and Peter sings about the rocket. It's ready for ignition, even though there are some doubts. The computer says it's ok so countdown starts. During this first verse, the pile of cars is contrasted to a rocket. Uh oh? On a nerdy note, I can't help but agree with the nervousness. Back then I'm sure the computers were state of the art, but computers of the early 80s are primitive to what we have to day. Bill Gates once infamously said at the time that 640K are good enough for anybody to run an OS.

I'll shut up. We get more people in cars and bums looking up at them. Peter tells us that the crew believes that everything is ready and Major Tom cracks a joke. Oh, that cut up. The refrain starts as we see various clips of a rocket breaking free and taking off. The refrain talks about how it feels to be in space.

As we start the next part of the song, we get some goofy shots of an astronaut bouncing around the moon. Following this is various guys bouncing around the rocket. Peter sings that the rocket is in orbit and everything is going well. Major Tom is checking the equipment. Space aside, it must be boring. All you do is check computers over and over. Maybe that's why the public lost interest. Suddenly there's a problem on the rocket. We get an image of a flaming ball of wreckage to illustrate the poin. So subtle. We get to the part that's most like David's song where ground control calls for Major Tom about the problem. The refrain starts again and we see a rocket taking off with a halo surrounding its tip. Wink wink.

The third part (verse?) of the song starts with a woman onscreen who represents Major Tom's wife. She looks a little frantic and blows several kisses to the camera while speaking to a NASA microphone. The song informs us that Major Tom is lost. (Uh, why is that guy ironing in the background? The heck?) Peter reveals that the Major is still alive under the rocket. For some reason, we see the wife (I'm sure it's suppose to be her, but yeesh) is making out with the ironing board guy. What the heck? Major Tom is having a religious experience as he accepts his fate. The refrain plays a couple time. Major Tom's image of heaven (or whatever) has women skating around with food orders in their hands. The song ends with several pretty shots of earth from space. Also with Peter(?) standing in a blue background like he was in the opening credits from Quantum Leap.


It's funny that this song came after the great moon landings yet sounds more cheerful than the more relevant Bowie song. Despite the cheesy eightiesness of the video, it's still a good song and the video is good even if I don't think the junkyard cars match a rocket. I also don't get the wife immediately having an affair. That's as out of place as the ending to Bowie's original song. So "I like this song despite..."

The awesome thing is the video of people weightless. I want to get on one of those planes that drop quickly to earth to simulate weightlessness at least once. On an empty stomach, of course.