So continuing the 50th anniversary celebration of All Things Must Pass, a new official video for “My Sweet Lord” was released today. And I don’t know what to think. It’s a parade of random celebrities and “celebrities,” loosely connected by a weird Men-In-Black storyline. Is it supposed to be funny? It features Fred Armisen, Weird Al Yankovic, Vanessa Bayer, Jon Hamm, Mark Hamill, and that dude from Workaholics, as well as George’s old bandmates Ringo Starr and Jeff Lynne. Strange mix.
Here it is, and again, I just don’t know what to think of this thing. The video doesn’t seem to work with the theme of the song.
Disclaimer: I’m a big George Harrison fan, and I was eager to see this new video, which I’d heard about on Facebook a few days ago.
I agree, it’s a weird video, seems to not have anything to do with the song (one of my favorites), and seems to be more an excuse to have a bunch of cameos. I’m not sure what to make of it, either.
A few years ago, Olivia and Dhani Harrison (George’s wife and son) held a competition for filmmakers to create a new “official” video for another of his songs, “What Is Life”; the winning video, too, is quirky, but I think it’s still a better video, and a better fit with its song.
When the first scene was in an old library, I immediately thought it was a tie-in to the new Ghostbusters movie. I mean, there was arched book stacking. No human would stack books like that.
But then that went nowhere. This feels to me like a lot of famous people really wanted to be in a George Harrison video, but no one really knew what to do. So it seemed to be essentially a mechanism for showing lots of hollywood peoole, and not much else. There was no point to it other than that.
You might have gotten whooshed there; Sam was, I believe, quoting from the original Ghostbusters, from the scene where they encounter their first actual ghost, in a library.
Indeed. George certainly was not averse to featuring his friends and celebrities in his videos, some of which were quirky and offbeat (see “Crackerbox Palace” and “When We Was Fab,” among others). And, generally, I’ve felt that Olivia and Dhani have done a really good job of nurturing and protecting his legacy. But, this one feels like a miss.
I thought the intent of the video was to parallel a quest for the mysterious beyond of Hindu mysticism with a real-world counterpart, but nah, the director said in a statement quoted in many places:
Making this was one of the most fulfilling experiences of my life. The approach was to represent the song visually while these agents and inspectors kept missing the metaphysical wonder around them. Images are choreographed to the sounds of vocal melodies, guitar strums, drum patterns, chord changes.
George threaded a sense of humor through all of his videos, so we kept that spirit and filled the cast with friends and admirers of his music, many coming from the current comedy landscape. I tracked down vintage prime lenses from some of the films George’s HandMade Films had produced, and I hope that viewers can feel a sense of wonder and searching while they watch it, and that the song continues to add to all of our lives.
But, I’ve never liked his videos. The Crackerbox Palace one is especially grating. That goofy look on his face being pushed in a baby carriage. I get it, he was trying to follow some of the earlier silliness but he and his music had matured, it just didn’t fit anymore. I’m not sure Olivia and Dhani are doing his legacy any favors.
Even if it was meant as an excuse, it’s incredibly badly conceived. They clearly wanted there to be a story to it, but it’s impossible to figure out what it is. Is it a play on Men in Black? Or Ghostbusters? What’s the significance of the movie theatre?
Even as he recorded more serious music (and became more involved in humanitarian work and Eastern religion), George still always kept one foot in his quirky sense of humor. He was a huge fan of Monty Python (and financed Life of Brian), and “Crackerbox Palace” was an homage to an offbeat comedian, Lord Buckley, whom Harrison had admired (and the song is named after Buckley’s home in Los Angeles).
(But, FWIW, I find that video, and George’s grin in it, unsettling.)