I’m angrier than a gamer with high latency, because the music video for this week isn’t a bigger hit than it should be. This week, I’ve picked the 1978 hit “Macho Man,” by The Village People. The song was moderately successful here in the USA. It reached #25 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and it hit #14 on the Disco Singles chart as well.
The music video is low-budget and cheaply produced, but it is amusing and entertaining. If you know what to look for, the video shows that it was shot in as few takes as possible. For example, at about 47 seconds, you can see the construction worker’s (David Hodo) hat fall off.
He bends down to pick it up and carries on as if nothing happened. The average viewer likely won’t even notice that, but I used to do this for a living and I was paid to pay attention to tiny details such as that.
The best part of the video comes in at 58 seconds, when the chorus kicks in. The choreography is simple but effective and it makes the video.
By today’s standards, the video is low-budget, of poor quality and obsolete, but 46 years ago, I’ll bet it was something hot. Of course, there was no MTV back then, so it’s impossible to know how well the video would be received.
The song itself was definitely well-loved, because they were invited to perform the song on the 1979 MDA Telethon, and unlike other performers, they sang live.
Yes, this week’s pick is, I think, one of my better selections. It would be nice to see a re-release and maybe a re-shoot of the video. But for now, all we can do is witness musical history.