Top 10 Music Videos

Amazing idea...

Not content to just make another music video, Michael Jackson made a film. Complete with zombies, werewolves, mummies and a cast of finely choreographed horror-feature dance moves, Thriller was THE music video of the 1980s, and it positioned Michael Jackson as more than just another pop singer. This was the beginning of Michael the over-the-top man of extravaganza, but despite the increasing budgets over the following years he never made a video quite this amazing again.

Wot no Thriller? Yes, I know ‘Black Or White’ has a frankly disturbing scene of MacCaulay Culkin miming a rap but this one really is a true classic. Picture the scene: It’s 1991 and aside from Tony Hart, nobody knows what Morphing is. Suddenly, Jacko releases his latest epic and it’s all anyone can talk about. In a video which uses a sledgehammer to thump home the message of equality, that end sequence is certainly a high point. Could it be a meaningful, visual statement that we are truly all the same? Perhaps. Does it show the ultimate futility of racial disharmony? Probably. Is it just a really cool effect? Definitely.

This was the one that started it all. In the mid 1970s, while the style of the time was music videos simply featuring a band playing their instruments, Queen busted out with this extravagant video to accompany their outrageous and influential song. The music video as people knew it was to change forever as a result, and bands began to make clips that told a story. And if anyone had any doubt that Queen was a band that likes a bit of an extravaganza, this rock opera video would have put their misconceptions to rest.