Classic Music Video of the Week: Whitesnake, "Here I Go Again"

I must admit, there were many videos back in the day that I didn't really care for musically, but nevertheless did not change the channel when they came on.  This is one of those videos.

Whitesnake might be the stupidest name for a band ever.  Their music is paint-by-numbers hair metal fronted by the over-the-hill singer of the second incarnation of Deep Purple.  These things are true, but when you bring in the raw, untamed beautiful lioness Tawny Kitaen in her prime, a young adolescent boy simply cannot avert his eyes.

Like a lot of classic MTV vids, this one's pretty simple: a lot of fast cuts between the band "performing" with maximum drumstick twirling and grimacing for the camera interspersed with Tawny Kitaen's auburn locks flowing as she hangs out of moving car or, better yet, somersaults and does the splits in a flowy white dress on the hood of a car.  It makes no logical sense, but it is a heat-seeking missile straight to the crotch of teenage boys everywhere.  The images of this video have burned themselves on the back of my brain, and will probably never go away.

Back in MTV's glory days, there were several acts that had hits simply because they had put together a really cool video.  Norwegian snyth-poppers A-Ha would never have made it big in the states without their groundbreaking, tear-jerking video for "Take on Me" that ladies of a certain generation still swoon over.  Dire Straits would've stayed a mid-list act if not for "Money For Nothing" and its then revolutionary computer graphics and meta-commentary on videos themselves.  Blind Melon's "bee girl" vid for "No Rain" elevated that song out of college radio onto the charts.  Those videos had a certain level of artfulness about them, but all Whitesnake needed was Tawny Kitaen and the hood of a car.  Pretty impressive, when you think about it.