Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Backup Dancers From Hell: Darius Rucker - “Come Back Song”

We start out coming over a hill to see a pretty view of Charleston, with the sun shining and flowers growing and crime currently not happening. (Wow, there’s a lot of church steeples in this town.) Oh look, there’s Darius standing in the middle of a field, waiting for the part where he gets to sing.

But it’s not quite time for that, since we still need to see a very cool bridge, some fishing boats, several old but nicely restored houses and a lack of Confederate flags. Back to Darius in the field, finally getting the signal that it’s okay to warble. So he does. Based on the words, his morning completely sucked. This doesn’t explain why he’s standing in the middle of a field, but we’ll let that go for now.

Now he’s walking down a narrow street, or maybe a really tidy alley, not sure. He strolls along, and we can see that things grow very well in this climate, with greenery everywhere. We don’t know where he’s going, but that doesn’t seem to be important, and Darius is in no hurry to get wherever it is. People take their time in the South, probably because they lost that Big War back in the day, and they’re resting up to make sure they win the next one.

Quick shot of the field again, where Darius is patting himself down. Perhaps he’s making a self-arrest for something he’s done, I don’t know. Then he’s on another street, where we can see that some folks have lovely courtyards for their homes, and that Darius is wearing some fancy boots with really pointy toes. He’s still singing, and the note at 1:30 apparently gave him a gas bubble. He eventually poses in front of a nice iron fence, with stairs leading somewhere, probably to a relaxing, shaded area where you can drink alcohol. Because that’s always a good place for steps to take you.

Next we have a nice montage of all the places that Darius has been walking, along with more shots of the pretty, restored houses that probably cost a fortune and people have to die before you can get one. (Right at that moment we see a graveyard, so the cinematographer is thinking the same thing.) At one point, Darius, just sits down, because singing AND walking can wear a person out.

Now we’re on a boat, sailing about in the harbor. (I’m assuming it’s a harbor. Old cities on the coast always have one.) Darius sings while we get shots of things on the boat like life preservers, coiled rope, and the fancy pointy boots. It’s very calming, but we still don’t know where Darius is going. It must be a hard place to find, because he’s been looking for it throughout the whole video.

Cut to Darius on a balcony thing, with the harbor in the background and, presumably, people with lots of disposable income floating around in sailboats. Darius keeps singing, of course, but he does take time to admire the view. Right at 2:46 Darius claps his hands excitedly, so something special happened, we just didn’t see it. At 2:53, he does a cute little dance move, so I’m going to guess that the gas bubble has found it’s way home even if Darius hasn’t.

And now we have a very long montage, re-visiting all the nice, sunny places that we’ve been. It really is a beautiful city, so I don’t mind the review, and then it hits me: Why haven’t we seen any other people? Sure, somebody must be piloting those sailboats, but we haven’t seen any actual proof. And those narrow streets should be crowded with folks looking for the perfect antique spittoon. Something is seriously wrong.

But I guess Darius likes the solitude and doesn’t really care that the local population has mysteriously vanished. He keeps singing and smiling, he and his boots having a swell time as they traipse about. In fact, he’s so giddy that he no longer even tries to remember the words to the song, instead bursting out with a round of “na-na-na-na’s” while a light breeze blows his shirt around and other people continue to not exist.

We eventually wrap it up after another montage, and Darius wanders out of frame. Now the town is completely empty. This is probably the point where the alien spaceship shows up, their evil forced-evacuation mission complete so they can move into the fancy houses without having to pay for them. But we don’t actually get to see this part.

Great song, though.

 

Click Here to Watch the Video on YouTube.

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