xtcian

through being cool

1/23/13

I'm going to tell you right now, there's no way you're going to get through this whole video. I relaxed my brain into neutral and still couldn't do the entire thing. But if you want to dip into your own consciousness and pluck certain sensitive cilia deep in your cultural memory, I don't think there's anything quite like Smash TV's video "Memorex".

It plays like the random loops that used to be projected as background at raves, but it's more than that: it's falling into a vat of VHS and Betamax tapes from the 1980s, with images like this cropping up:

I was immediately arrested by that visual, wondering how on earth I'd remembered it - and after several Google reverse-image searches, I realized it was from one of most absurd, repellent, and addictive videos from early MTV, the Devo classic "Peek-A-Boo":

"Memorex" is filled with moments like that. From about 14:30 to 17:30 you have the reptilian hindbrain of every girl us guys ingested from middle school to graduation. From 39:30 to about 43:00, it's a cavalcade of '80s stars wandering around their commercials. Set aside a few minutes and drink in your past, which as Faulkner says, isn't even past:

Memorex from Smash TV on Vimeo.