Friday is my music video night on Rage. Not because I’m a music nut but purely because it’s on late and ABC TV is my choice of accompaniment as I wade thru the weekly backlog of unread news inserts - Media, IT, Motor, that sort of stuff.
First though I have to mute the insufferable Will Anderson and his tired old routine of political sniping. Hey Will, my advice to you mate is, start_drinking. Heavily.
Drinking. For the last few weeks on Rage they’ve run an incredible clip which captivates me as soon as I hear it. So mesmerising is the music and storyline I never seem to catch the artist’s name or song title.
It opens in the early evening. A young caucasian woman going home from work - it may be New York - stops at a liquor store. She’s middle class I guess and dressed as a regular looking young professional. Kind of pretty, made-up face yet nothing special.
Anyway, she proceeds to purchase two carry-bags of hard liquor and heads home to her walk-up apartment. Immediately upon entering she cracks open a can of beer, considers it briefly and downs it. Next she goes to the lounge room, sits down and flicks the top off a large bottle of vodka, or gin and starts chugaluging it. She’s on a mission.
Over the top of this a guy croons a slow groove ballad, hypnotic and ethereal with the chorus line, ‘I’ve been thinking about you baby..’.
Soon she’s on to her second bottle whilst slowly shedding items of clothing around the apartment. Next she’s sitting on the toilet chuggaluging another bottle of clear liquor before watching some television through bleary eyes, cradling a large cocktail glass. Just for a change I guess.
Staggering back to the kitchen wearing only briefs and a top, she’s greeted by a table bearing four large empty bottles. Slumping precariously onto a chair she struggles to comprehend it all, after bingeing through the lot with a calculated vengeance. Lost love is the theme with her misery now complete.
The music’s beautifully paced against the woman’s slow alcoholic destruction. The camera elicits a certain voyeuristic fascination, contrasting the apartment’s softly lit comforts with her fearless and breathtaking indulgence.
By now she’s absolutely shit-faced, barely conscious. Rising from the kitchen chair, she dresses and inexplicably goes back out into the night ! Stumbles across the road, staggers down the sidewalk, brushes off an accosting sleazebag before entering a dimly-lit park.
There she finds a bench and gingerly lays down on her back, staring off into the night sky with the stupid grin of a smashed drunk. Mission accomplished. The clip segues to her tumbling endlessly down a circular staircase with no bottom, then fades to black with Barber’s strings overlaid, or something similarly funereal.
It’s a beautifully balanced piece, with the protagonist’s role convincingly played by a professional who’s obviously done some serious character preparation on binge drinking. Scary yet enthralling.
So, I’m wondering if anyone knows this clip and can tell me who’s it by...
UPDATE : Doh ! Googling for Rage unearthed the tune. It's called Live With Me, Massive Attack's latest single. Full video or interruptus version.
UPDATE 2 : Reader Herman finds the actress, 'I wasn't acting, I was really drunk'.
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