"Tell them they can laugh at me"

 

On this first anniversary of the passing of David Bowie, a loss still felt profoundly by all of us here at Night Flight, we’re taking an opportunity to reflect on his underappreciated capacity for self-deprecation and comedy.

David Bowie constantly tried new things, resisted coasting on familiar credits, and earned enormous respect that continues in his absence. He took his artistic process very seriously.

What he rarely took seriously was himself. In his music videos, in movie cameos, and in the media, he exercised comic gifts that delivered big laughs, often at his own expense.

In the formative years of his career, Bowie compensated for his intense shyness by disappearing into his stage personas and substance abuse. He spent a long sojourn in Berlin to kick his addictions and find perspective, and emerged in the ‘80s with a more positive demeanor.

A key incident that shaped this philosophical turn took place as he was making the video for “Ashes to Ashes” in 1980 with director David Mallet. Bowie recounted the story to technician Michael Dignum during a break in filming for the “Miracle Goodnight” video from Blackstar:

“[I] had quite the attitude as a young pop star, it’s easy to get caught up in the hype. It changes you. So I was on the set [of] ‘Ashes to Ashes’… I’m dressed from head to toe in a clown suit…I hear playback and the music starts. So off I go, I start singing and walking, but as soon as I do this old geezer with an old dog walks right between me and the camera…knowing this is gonna take a while I walked past the old guy and sat next to camera in my full costume waiting for him to pass. As he is walking by camera, the director said, ‘Excuse me, [sir] do you know who this is?’ The old guy looks at me from bottom to top and looks back to the director and said, ‘Of course I do! It’s some cunt in a clown suit.’ That was a huge moment for me, it put me back in my place and made me realize, yes, I’m just a cunt in a clown suit. I think about that old guy all the time.”

Bowie proceeded to engage in what the British call “taking the piss out” of himself for years thereafter.

With director Julien Temple, he conceived a twenty minute short, Jazzin’ for Blue Jean, where he played both a hapless pickup artist trying to woo a resistant girl, and her favorite rock star, “Screaming Lord Byron,” a stand-in for himself.

There are frequent jokes about Bowie’s real-life bad behavior, and in one instance, the would-be suitor insults Byron with, “Your record sleeves are better than your songs!” The video won a Grammy for Best Short Form Video in 1985.

That same year, Bowie played a sleazy hitman in John Landis’ comic mystery Into the Night. In the film, he has a knock-down fight with a bodyguard played by rockabilly pioneer Carl Perkins, a sequence that surely amused him since, as a teenager, he had been inspired to be a musician by listening to 45s by Perkins and his contemporaries.

Bowie’s aforementioned need for artistic freshness became a subject of his mordant humor.

During his 1990 “Sound+Vision” tour, he declared that he was retiring his previous hit catalog from then on, vowing only to do new material in future shows. After the disappointing reception for his band Tin Machine and the solo albums that followed, he began to walk back that promise.

In a promo spot for their joint appearance on the season premiere of “Saturday Night Live” on October 2, 1999, Bowie’s about-face was referenced in an exchange of barbs between himself and host Jerry Seinfeld on their mutual reliance on the tried-and-true.

It wouldn’t be the only time he fired his wit at another target.

In 2006, he played himself on Ricky Gervais’ “Extras,” where, after being annoyed by the self-aggrandizing behavior of Andy Millman, he composes a song on the spot to cut him down to size.

When making the talk show rounds, Bowie was always an urbane and gracious guest, and often participated in sketches.

Here he is sharing a bevy of ludicrous revelations for “Late Night with Conan O’Brien”:

And, in this clip from a 1999 interview on the French Canadian MusiquePlus channel, he shared his love of early internet celebrity Mahir “I Kiss You” Çağrı:

Just before the end of 2016, Bowie’s son Duncan Jones posted a screencap from this interview, calling it his favorite photo of his father.

Having a laugh was also important to Bowie in his private moments.

He released a list of his “Top 100 Reads” in 2013 as part of the touring exhibition “David Bowie Is,” which showcased cherished items from his life.

Amid highbrow fare such as political non-fiction and classics like In Cold Blood, he included the British humor periodical Viz, a Mad-magazine style parody of UK tabloid and music press with a punk rock bent.

While the creators were grateful for his fandom, Bowie himself was not immune from their scathing jokes, as shown in this full-page lampoon from the early ‘90s:

In one of his earliest compositions, “When I Live My Dream,” he wrote, “Tell them they can laugh at me / But don’t forget your date with me / When I live my dream.”

Over five decades after that song emerged, it can be said he lived his dream to the fullest and happiest, and we got to enjoy it with him.

So today, though we’re sad he’s not around, let’s put on one of his immortal songs, and have our own Zoolander & Hansel-style walk-off, and imagine that he’s watching us and smiling at it all.

Night Flight’s video profile of David Bowie from December 4th, 1987, features “Ashes to Ashes” and other dynamic videos from three decades of his career, and is available to watch as part of our special David Bowie collection at Night Flight Plus.

(This essay was originally written for Night Flight Plus. It has been recreated in the style it was presented in at the site, and matched to its original date of publication. Tremendous thanks to Stuart Shapiro and Bryan Thomas for the platform.)

There's Just a Song for All the Movies and the Rife

 

Night Flight’s video profile of Dire Straits — originally airing on August 15, 1986, and now available on Night Flight Plus — offers a look at both the UK and the US videos for “Walk of Life,” a song which was not only one of the band’s biggest hits, but which one nervy editor suggests can improve the ending of any movie!

Dire Straits had earned plenty of critical and commercial respect for their first four records, with songs like “Sultans of Swing” and “Industrial Disease” becoming album rock radio staples.

The release of Brothers in Arms in the spring of 1985, however, catapulted the band to their biggest level of success.

The album debuted at #1 on the UK charts, spent nine weeks at #1 on the US Billboard chart, and even set a Guinness World Record for being the first album in the nascent CD format to sell a million copies.

Its lead US single, “Money for Nothing,” was the band’s first #1 Top 40 hit, won a Grammy for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, and its accompanying music video won Video of the Year at the third MTV Video Music Awards.

In this profile, broadcast after the band’s two Grammy wins, you will be treated to many unique videos created for the band’s songs, along with exclusive interview footage with Knopfler, where he addressed some of his feelings about the art form.

In one segment, he stated that he would leave directors alone to dramatize his music as they liked, since they should be accorded the same artistic freedom as filmmakers that he enjoyed as a musician.

The three videos from the Making Movies album directed by photographer and commercial artist Lester Bookbinder — “Romeo and Juliet,” “Tunnel of Love,” and “Skateaway” — are a prime example of this cooperative mindset. This trio was packaged into a twenty minute short that played in theaters and was an early home video success.

However, upon the release of Brothers in Arms, Knopfler had soured on the process.

Where he had been an active dramatic participant in clips for “Tunnel of Love” and “Private Investigations,” for the singles from Brothers, he chose only to appear in performance footage or occasional candid moments.

Steve Barron, who directed two videos for the album, said,

“The problem was that Mark Knopfler was very anti-videos. All he wanted to do was perform, and he thought that videos would destroy the purity of songwriters and performers.”

“Walk of Life” was the first video offered to American television outlets, though it was not the first single released from the album.

Filmed in the tunnel that runs under the Thames from London Docklands to Greenwich, it depicted a young busker portrayed by Tom Jennings, dressed as Knopfler often dressed in concert, playing the iconic 1937 silver steel guitar from the cover of the album, performing for change from London commuters, with some cutaways to a daylight concert by the band.

After the smash success of “Money for Nothing,” “Walk of Life” was earmarked as the followup single, but record executives requested another video to be made for the song, feeling the first version wasn’t clicking. A recent USC Film School graduate, Stephen R. Johnson, got the assignment.

The new clip featured another performance of the band, this time intercut with dozens of moments from American sporting events.

In the book I Want My MTV, Johnson described how the incongruous concept came from Knopfler himself:

“I went on tour with them to shoot live footage, and Mark Knopfler told me he wanted the video to have sports in it. So I wrangled all this funny sports footage, with bloopers and the like. Mark’s other edict was that he didn’t want to be photographed from the side, because he didn’t like the fact he had a prominent proboscis. Everyone in the crew was running into each other, trying to avoid that angle.”

The new video proved very effective. “Walk of Life” became the band’s biggest UK hit, reaching #2 on their singles chart, and peaking respectably at #7 on the US singles chart.

The original busker video for “Walk” was not included in the band’s home video anthology; Johnson’s sports-themed video has effectively become the default version.

This episode of “Night Flight” offers fans a rare opportunity to watch them back to back and decide for themselves which they prefer. The two videos are a study in contrasts.

The first narrative clip uses the song for poignance, as its hard-working protagonist is often ignored by travelers, barely gets any money, and ends up being forced by cops to pack up and leave.

The second clip uses the song for lighthearted buoyance, at first underscoring missed plays and embarrassing moments, then ending with moments of triumphant victories.

One curious detail both videos share in common though are prominent shots of replacement guitarist Jack Sonni’s bare feet.

Each video ultimately suits the song well, since its message is that Johnny’s struggle is our struggle.

As sports blogger “CJ” observed, “[While] Mark Knopfler’s lyrics are clearly about a street musician busking in subway stations, his working class platitudes are general enough that we can easily apply them to an athlete doggedly pursuing his dreams, on and off the field. Indeed, even the title hints at something greater…Listening to the song feels like receiving one giant ‘attaboy’ from your radio.”

It was that spirit of universality that drove freelance editor Peter Salamone this past March to create The Walk of Life Project, asserting that the song was perfect for the ending of any movie.

Through 52 different examples, running multiple decades and genres, all available to view at his website, Salamone demonstrated his point. His playful exercise received widespread media coverage, inspiring dozens of fans and imitators to continue the experiment.

Here is one of the recent fan-made responses we particularly enjoyed, with the maxim applied to Point Break:

Mark Knopfler dismantled Dire Straits and went his own way a long time ago, and newer generations may derisively refer to the band as “dad rock” today.

However, when those first few organ notes waft into your ears, whether you’re recalling those videos from before, or maybe living the movie of your life right now, we’re sure you’ll think the moment plays better with that great song underneath.

See both “Walk of Life” interpretations, along with other classic Dire Straits videos and exclusive interview footage with Mark Knopfler, right now on Night Flight Plus!

(This essay was originally written for Night Flight Plus. It has been recreated in the style it was presented in at the site, and matched to its original date of publication. Tremendous thanks to Stuart Shapiro and Bryan Thomas for the platform.)

"Let's get into trouble, baby!"

Now available for streaming on Night Flight Plus is a special behind-the-scenes episode — originally airing on October 15, 1988 — prepared by music video director and “Night Flight” contributor Bill Fishman to promote his feature film debut Tapeheads, a rock ‘n’ roll comedy which still delivers a lot of savvy laughs about the music business for any comedy fan looking to get into trouble.

Bill Fishman once summarized his motivation to direct music videos by quipping, “I couldn’t do much worse.”

In the mid 1980s, the self-deprecating director in fact delivered a streak of memorable videos for the Ramones, Hank Williams Jr., and George Clinton.

In the course of attempting to get more money to shoot his initial breakout hit — “Institutionalized” for thrash pioneers Suicidal Tendencies — he befriended producers Michael Nesmith and Peter McCarthy, whose recently-finished film Repo Man had featured the song.

McCarthy was drawn to an idea Fishman had been developing about the wild environment of making videos. Together, they scripted Tapeheads, about two friends, guileless Josh and conniving Ivan, who stumble into success and political intrigue through their scrappy productions.

Former Monkee Nesmith — who won a Grammy for his musical sketch video Elephant Parts — and NBC president Brandon Tartikoff — who had expanded into films after launching hit sitcoms and TV’s “Miami Vice” — loved the final script, and eagerly agreed to back the film. McCarthy said it was the fastest greenlight he ever received.

The script found its way to John Cusack and Tim Robbins, who were doing a play together at Robbins’ longtime L.A. theatre company The Actors’ Gang. The friends wrangled an audition, and improvised at length as the characters. The filmmakers were knocked out, and hired them in short order.

Cusack modeled his performance as sleazy but charming Ivan on snatches of Tony Curtis in Sweet Smell of Success and Robert DeNiro in The King of Comedy, using buzzwords from self-help books to flesh his character’s drive. Much film dialogue came from actual encounters Fishman had with industry folk, repurposed into different situations, including the movie’s catchphrase “Let’s get into trouble, baby.”

The diverse supporting cast featured Clu Gulager as smarmy Presidential hopeful Norman Mart, “Arrested Development” star Jessica Walter as his wife Kay, “Soul Train” creator Don Cornelius as a record executive, and Mary Crosby from “Dallas” as an opportunistic journalist.

The cameo appearances were even crazier: sprinkled in for flashes of screentime were Bobcat Goldthwait (using his normal speaking voice for the first time publicly), Courtney Love, Doug E. Fresh, Fishbone, Lords of the New Church singer Stiv Bators and his then-girlfriend, VJ Martha Quinn, Ted Nugent, “Weird Al” Yankovic, Jello Biafra, and producer Nesmith himself.

The bright and unmistakably eighties production design was by Catherine Hardwicke, who would move up to big-budget pictures like Tank Girl and Three Kings before directing the massive hit Twilight.

Musical aspects were treated very seriously, as the plot involved our heroes trying to revive a downtrodden R&B act, the Swanky Modes. Fishman traveled the country looking at many beloved soul artists trying to determine who should play them, before picking Sam Moore (of Sam & Dave) and Junior Walker. Blondie bassist Nigel Harrison was the film’s music supervisor, choosing tracks to feature among the original songs created for the Modes. In the press kit for the film, a complete fictional “history” for the band was helpfully provided.

In a commentary recorded for the 2001 DVD release, Nesmith and Fishman noted how well Moore and Walker clicked as the duo. During shooting for the climactic concert sequence, they saw the recruited audience, initially unfamiliar with either singer’s legacy, become legitimately enthusiastic for their performance of “Ordinary Man.”

Besides the antics of Cusack and Robbins, what most fans remember fondly from Tapeheads is the bizarre, hilarious arc of Clu Gulager’s would-be Commander-in-Chief. This press conference exchange is a favorite, scarily predicting the modern day obsession of media and candidates alike with genitalia size!

Though its creation went smoothly, the release of Tapeheads met with assorted problems.

DeLaurentiis Entertainment Group, who originally financed the film, was having severe money troubles; as the production went on, Fishman recalled seeing staff and office furniture disappear. DEG went under, and the film was tied up in bankruptcy proceedings for months.

Once freed from creditors, small arthouse distributor Avenue Pictures agreed to service the film in the fall of 1988, but even after a well-received screening at the Toronto International Film Festival, they failed to get it shown in New York or Los Angeles during the short-lived run.

Cusack and Robbins both did promotional interviews, but often behaved as if they were still their characters, giving irreverent answers and irritating the press. An interview they taped with Joan Lunden for “Good Morning America” was even shelved due to what ABC called their “unprofessional” behavior.

Fishman had a history with “Night Flight” — appearing on the program in 1986, as well as having many of his videos showcased — so to spread awareness of Tapeheads, Fishman created this custom episode, featuring farcical vignettes about him spending the day shopping for mansions and yachts, to celebrate his big time director status, interspersed with two of his music videos (“Institutionalized” and “I Wanna Be Sedated”) and exclusive outtakes of the cast goofing around, footage never made available on any subsequent home video release.

In one segment, Fishman shows how he staged the film’s infamous “Baby Doll” video, where a pretty-boy synth band is assaulted with paint, glitter, and feathers in a single take, decades before OK Go would pull a similar trick in their “This Too Shall Pass” video.

Fishman cautions the band actors to keep performing regardless of what happens, and their shocked reactions are very real.

Tapeheads got a second chance when, in early 1989, it finally opened in Boston, to coincide with its soundtrack release. Nesmith suggested to CNN that the city was a good luck charm.

Fishman still directs music videos for his Fallout production company, with The Decemberists and Shirazee among his recent subjects.

Watch Bill Fishman’s special “Night Flight” episode, featuring behind-the-scenes material from Tapeheads unavailable anywhere else, right now on Night Flight Plus!

(This essay was originally written for Night Flight Plus. It has been recreated in the style it was presented in at the site, and matched to its original date of publication. Tremendous thanks to Stuart Shapiro and Bryan Thomas for the platform.)

"It's Good to be the King"

“Night Flight” viewers in early 1984 got a lot of laughs from watching the racy and politically incorrect music video for Mel Brooks’ “The Hitler Rap.” They may not have realized they were watching an historical trailblazer, as Brooks’ song was not only an unlikely hit single, it wasn’t even his first time as a rap star!

In late 1981, shortly after the release of his comedy History Of The World, Part I, Mel Brooks joined with producer/songwriter Pete Wingfield, and together, using the running catchphrase uttered by Brooks as Louis XVI in the film, they created the single “It’s Good to Be the King.”

In the persona of the monarch, Brooks raves about living large in the days before the French Revolution claimed his head.

The single was put out in 1982 by Philadelphia soul label WMOT Records, best remembered for releasing Frankie Smith’s “Double Dutch Bus.”

The song received heavy rotation on New York station WBLS, and, while it did not enter the Billboard Top 100, it reached #67 on the Billboard Dance music chart and #69 on Billboard’s R&B chart.

Thus, Brooks became the first white artist performing a full-fledged rap song to penetrate the R&B chart, a feat that would not be repeated until the Beastie Boys reached #55 with “Hold It Now, Hit It” in 1986.

In France, “It’s Good to Be the King” was an even bigger smash, selling 375,000 copies and going all the way to #2 on their equivalent SNEP chart.

Most strikingly, in the tradition of rap hits like UTFO’s “Roxanne Roxanne” and M.C. Shan’s “The Bridge,” Brooks’ surprise hit provoked an answer record, from the very woman who helped put hip-hop in the American consciousness.

Sylvia Robinson, founder of Sugarhill Records, the label that launched the Sugarhill Gang and their immortal “Rapper’s Delight,” recorded her own reworded version of the song called “It’s Good to Be the Queen,” which surpassed Brooks’ single on the Billboard R&B chart, reaching #53. Robinson also invited Brooks’ writer/producer Wingfield to collaborate with her, and together they wrote “The Lover in You” for the Sugarhill Gang, with Wingfield playing keyboard and singing back-up, which went to #55 on the R&B chart.

In 1983, to promote the film To Be or Not to Be, starring Brooks and his wife Anne Bancroft, and directed by his longtime choreographer Alan Johnson, Brooks and Wingfield reteamed to record “To Be or Not to Be” (the actual title for “The Hitler Rap”), using roughly the same melodic structure and comedic principle of Brooks in character bragging about the good life until history brought him down.

To promote both the film and the single, Brooks and his director/choreographer Alan Johnson made an accompanying video, featuring Brooks as Hitler, rapping and (through a body double) even breakdancing, while scantily clad dancers engaged in sexy moves designed by Johnson.

While some outlets chose not to air the clip due to its Nazi imagery and suggestive poses, the clip got substantial play on “Night Flight” as well as BET’s “Video Soul” program, and was screened in European cinemas as a short subject.

Chris Blackwell’s Island Records released the single worldwide, though in the U.S. it was handled by its independent subsidiary Antilles.

While only receiving a modicum of novelty success in America, “To Be or Not to Be” was a substantial hit in other English-speaking countries. The song went to #12 on the UK Singles chart, and all the way to #3 on the Australian Pop chart.

The video was later included in a Vestron Video Comedy Music Videos compilation tape alongside other frequent “Night Flight” favorites like Garry Trudeau’s “Rap Master Ronnie” and the Fat Boys’ “Jailhouse Rap.”

While Brooks, who recently marked his 90th birthday, long left hip-hop behind to concentrate on creating musical stage versions of his classics The Producers and Young Frankenstein, his brief sojourn continues to garner respect.

In an article on the history of white comedians’ use of rap, Brian Raftery of Vulture declared, “[What’s] most surprising about ‘Hitler Rap’ is that it’s not awful. Brooks has a decent enough flow, and he’s smart enough not to wink the joke to death.”

His earlier single received significant homage from the French mixed-race rap group Alliance Ethnik in their 1995 song “Respect”: the melodic background is a variation of the riff Wingfield created for “It’s Good to Be the King,” and the phrase is openly referenced at 3:13.

As such, history can safely say that by not only being a king of comedy, but also preceding Eminem and The Beastie Boys in earning the respect of the community that created rap music, it’s good to be Mel Brooks!

(This essay was originally written for Night Flight Plus. It has been recreated in the style it was presented in at the site, and matched to its original date of publication. Tremendous thanks to Stuart Shapiro and Bryan Thomas for the platform.)

When the First Lady Facepalms

Night Flight’s “Take Off to European Rock” — which originally aired on April 14, 1984, and is now streaming on Night Flight Plus — features the uncensored version of Golden Earring’s “When the Lady Smiles,” which also briefly aired in an edited form on MTV before being dropped by the network completely due to content. The song caused unexpected controversy again in 2008, when it was played at a Hillary Clinton campaign rally.

Dutch band Golden Earring only had a few hits in America in comparison to their larger following overseas, but when they had stateside success, they always made a big impression, along with raised eyebrows.

The cover for their 1973 breakout album Moontan, which featured their first U.S. chart hit “Candy’s Going Bad” and their smash followup “Radar Love,” originally featured a naked dancer on the front and a naked butt shot of lead singer Barry Hay interlocked with a similarly-posed model in a hazmat suit.

While this has remained the standard in all other countries, in the U.S. it was quickly withdrawn and replaced with a generic, less inflammatory cover.

In 1982, their album Cut delivered their biggest American hit, “Twilight Zone.” The song reached #10 on the singles chart, and #1 on the AOR tracks chart. Much of that success was credited to its compelling video, directed by Dick Maas, starring Hay as a spy beset by pursuing enemies and sexy inquisitors.

Though MTV put the video in heavy rotation, they also made edits to the content, optically cropping out a topless lady assassin, and removing frames of Hay being injected with a syringe and then reacting in pain.

Golden Earring reunited with Maas to make the video for their 1984 single “When the Lady Smiles,” from their subsequent album N.E.W.S. While the song was a hit in other parts of the world, reaching #1 in the Netherlands and #3 in Canada, it only reached #76 in America, and in a reversal of their previous fortune, the video was cited as the reason for the single’s lack of popularity in the U.S.

“When the Lady Smiles” portrays Hay as a disturbed man who hallucinates a beautiful redhead — played by model Sandra van Echten — inhabiting the bodies of ordinary women he meets in public.

In his delusional state, what he thinks are welcome passionate encounters with his fantasy woman are revealed to be unhinged attacks on terrified victims.

The man is put on trial and sentenced to a Grand Guignol-esque lobotomy, which features the return of the sultry dancers from “Twilight Zone” as nurses.

Founding member and bassist Rinus Gerritsen remembered the production for the band’s The Devil Made Us Do It DVD compilation (translated from Dutch):

“Here we pulled out all the stops with Dick Maas as far as the story goes; Acting, costume changes, Monty Python-style humor…The wife of our truck driver wanted to play the old nun who was molested in the train.”

Many were not amused by the video, especially MTV. Scenes of Echten as the nun having her habit ripped to reveal a red bra, of Hay’s brain matter being tossed to a hungry dog by a drunken doctor, and other violent images were ordered removed.

Even after cuts were made, the clip was only aired after midnight, and disappeared from the network shortly after.

The censored version of video that aired on MTV and other video shows

Decades later in 2008, at a New Year’s Day rally for Hillary Clinton in Cedar Falls, Iowa, the candidate was late for her appearance. Campaign staffers played music to placate the crowd as they waited. Among familiar hits like “I’m a Believer” and “9 to 5” was “When the Lady Smiles.”

Initially, most in attendance paid no notice, since it was not a well-known song to them. However, Ron Linker, a Dutch reporter at the rally, definitely remembered the song and the attendant notoriety, and in his coverage of the event, asked incredulously if anyone in Clinton’s organization had ever seen the video.

Netherlands media picked up the story, which led to lots of amused reactions.

Dutch humor website lachvandedag.com posted a photoshopped image in response to the story reading: “I have that Golden Earring clip and checked it once again, and indeed; the role of the nun … that was her …”

In weird timing, the incident happened just as the legendary porn film Deep Throat was about to be broadcast on Netherlands public television despite political objections, leading to wild tabloid coverage of both events.

De Pers covering “When The Lady Smiles” while DAG covers Deep Throat (photo courtesy of Jeroen Mirck)

The news reached English-language websites like Boing Boing and Daily Kos, who also mused about the Clinton camp’s lack of awareness of its checkered history.

When the band found out from a stateside fan about the song being played, they too were surprised, and their manager replied, “There’s been no contact between Clinton’s team and us. But no doubt we’ll receive royalties.”

While they have not since matched the highs of “Twilight Zone” or the shock value of “When the Lady Smiles,” both artists have enjoyed career longevity.

Golden Earring recent marked their 50th anniversary as a band, putting out their last album in 2012.

Dick Maas would be best known for directing the ‘80s killer elevator movie The Lift, as well as a 2001 English-language remake The Shaft, with Naomi Watts.

That being said, to the best of our knowledge, not a single candidate for public office of any political party has attempted to use Golden Earring’s music ever since. Nobody wants to go that deep into the Twilight Zone!

See the uncensored version of “When the Lady Smiles” along with rare videos from Nina Hagen, Yello, Chagrin D’Amour and more in Night Flight’s “Take Off to European Rock,” available now on Night Flight Plus!

(This essay was originally written for Night Flight Plus. It has been recreated in the style it was presented in at the site, and matched to its original date of publication. Tremendous thanks to Stuart Shapiro and Bryan Thomas for the platform.)