"Superman, where are you now?"
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Thirty years ago, the prog-rock band Genesis (which had morphed into pop-rock in the 1980’s under the brilliant leadership of musical genius Phil Collins) had just finished recording their biggest album yet – Invisible Touch – an album which sold six million copies in the United States alone and spawned five top five singles, including my favorite, "Land of Confusion."
And perhaps because this is the 30th anniversary of the release of Invisible Touch that I have been playing it a lot in the car recently. And "Land of Confusion" – a song that resonates as much today as it did in 1986 – is by far my favorite track. (I mention it in another Dust Devil Dreams piece "Been haunted by a million screams").
So, driving along the other day I was thinking back to the brilliant video (which lost to former Genesis lead singer Peter Gabriel’s "Sledgehammer" for best music video that year) for "Land of Confusion," which was created by the folks behind the British puppetry show Spitting Image, which was known for caricatured celebrities. And in the "Land of Confusion" video, the caricatures are everywhere, from star Ronald Reagan to all of the Genesis band members to politicians (Margaret Thatcher) to dictators like Muammar al-Gaddafi and Italian fascist Benito Mussolini! (whose name - here in 2016, folks - has been coming up a lot in relation to Donald Trump as well as Gaddafi’s name in relation to Hillary Clinton, whose destructive actions as U.S. Secretary of State led to Libya becoming a completely failed state).
Yes, 1986 is reflecting 2016 and vice-versa. So, the scene in the "Land of Confusion" video that caught my attention the most was during the bridge where Collins (who is expected to make a big comeback this year), sings: "I won’t be coming home tonight / My generation will put it right / We’re not just making promises / That we know, we’ll never keep."
It is during this scene where Collins is answering a telephone that had morphed from a bone (2001: A Space Odyssey-style) as Prince puts ketchup and mustard on his long tongue and wraps his own tongue in a bun and begins to eat it – as if he is eating his own words!
© reddirtreport, by Andrew W. Griffin