“City of Crime”

Tom Hanks and Dan Aykroyd – Dragnet

There was a time when Tom Hanks was one of our most reliable comedic actors, starring in Bachelor Party, The Burbs, Big, The Money Pit, and Joe Versus the Volcano (shut your stupid face, that movie is amazing). Dragnet isn’t on par with those films, but its accompanying music video, “City of Crime”, shows Hanks rapping and dancing at and with a collection of men wearing goat skin pants and pagan masks; completely letting go of all of his inhibitions.

It would be anarchy to say that, in this video, you can see the seeds of Hanks’ later, more award-worthy work, but his ability to fully give himself over to a role surely helped him commit to more serious performances in Philadelphia, Captain Phillips, and, of course, The Thompson Twins’ “Nothing in Common” music video. I went a long way for that joke, I hope you liked it.

Getting back to the “City of Crime” video: this isn’t, you know, a good rap song. This is the thing that you get when people see The Beastie Boys’ “(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)” and Run DMC’s “Walk this Way” videos in heavy rotation and want to join in on the fun without fully understanding the point. Rap was, at the time, still in a bit of a formative state as it pertained to the mainstream in the mid ’80s, and thus, it was an exotic new toy for Hollywood to play with and completely misunderstand. Like in the early aughts when every other sitcom character was a blogger with a fabulous Manhattan apartment.

I do not have a fabulous Manhattan apartment.

“Ninja Rap”

Vanilla Ice – Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze

Vanilla Ice’s “Ninja Rap” is the Ecto-Cooler of hip hop songs. You wacky kids still seem to have an eternal soft spot in your hearts for it, though, so it makes the list because I am a man of the people.

Personally, I prefer “Turtle Power” by Partners in Kryme for its commitment to exposition, lyrics like “Pizza’s the food that’s sure to please, these ninja’s are here for pepperoni and cheese” and life lessons like “Evil moves fast, but good moves faster”, but I think that I’m fighting a losing battle to knock “Ninja Rap” out of the top spot on your TMNT charts. I imagine that the same can be said of Wiz Khalifa, Juicy J, and Ty Dolla $ign with the latest Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle rap anthem, “Shellshocked”.

It’s not that “Shellshocked” is a bad song, it’s that, according to Vanilla Ice:

“It feels a little artificial—what I mean by that is that it sounds like a bunch of executives in the corporate world put it together. It really does not fit the theme of the Ninja Turtles legend. I think you have to understand, and be a true Ninja, to possess the Magic to really pull off the secret sound.”

Now, that may sound like sour grapes (I think we all expected Ice to drop “Ninja Rap 2.0” on us when the new film came out, and I don’t mean by way of a Macaroni and Cheese commercial), but I trust that Ice is coming from a place of care for turtle fans. I also know that his knowledge of what it takes to be a true ninja soundsmith was inborn and on full display at the end of the “Ninja Rap” video as Vanilla Ice breaks down the process of breathing ninja life into the “Ninja Rap”:

“They told me to write and make it Ice! So I did. I hyped it up, put the funky beats behind it and made it Ice!”

So, why does “Shellshocked” pale in comparison to “Ninja Rap?” In my opinion, it lacks the personnel to “make it Ice”, and that’s the real secret of the ooze, right there.

Wrap Up:

There are enough of these where we could do a list twice this size, but for now, these videos represent a nice assortment of the rare cultural jewels that were created in an era when, perhaps, people weren’t as cynical and self conscious and our pop culture didn’t take itself so seriously.

I hope we get back there and I think we might. Over these last few years, we’ve seen music and celebrity silliness permeate our culture. Every commercial has a jingle, musicals are back(ish), candy coated pop songs are at the top of the charts, late night hosts like Jimmy Fallon get actors to engage in Lip Sync Battles and Funny or Die has freed more dour actors to get a little weird.

Is this indicative of a societal shift toward more frothy and less thought provoking distractions due to the increasing severity of this world? I don’t know, I just hope it means that we get to see more movie theme music videos because I really think we all deserve the chance to see Bradley Cooper wearing a raccoon suit while lip-synching Blue Swede’s “Hooked on a Feeling” in a music video.

You can also kick back and watch ’em all right here!

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