100 GREATEST MUSIC VIDEOS
To celebrate the launch of NME Video - a new standalone site dedicated to the best music videos - we're counting down the greatest examples of the artform.
Released: 1982
Director: Steve Barron
Just because; the moonwalk is still ruddy amazing nearly 30 years after the fact. SHA-MO!
Best bit: The little dance he does on the steps which light up.
Released: 2007
Director: Ace Norton
Seemingly your typical tits and ass dance video, and then it turns into something much more sinister and thought provoking half way through. 'Sexy Time' gone a bit wonky.
Best bit: The final close up on the pyramid of scary ladies.
Released: 2011
Director: Johan Söderberg
A bit of 'And God Created...Lykke' as Ms.Li sheds her little girl image and becomes a determined, cave-woman on an angry mission.
Best bit: The triple, tribal assault of 3 Lykke's.
Released: 2010
Director: Jérémie Périn
Lots of hipster nakedness on show, on this before 'Born This Way' take on birthing a new nation. Wayne Coyne sneakily manages to keep his clothes on.
Best bit: The triumphant naked parade with Wayne carried about the revellers heads in that clear plastic ball.
Watch it on Vevo.
Released: 1999
Director: Hype Williams
Like the song, the video from renowned hip hop director Hype Williams, is a celebration of excess and a wish fulfilment of Jay-Z's to be the biggest rapper in the game.
Best bit: Jay surrounded by bikini clad lay-dees. What would Beyonce say?
Released: 1994
Director: Pedro Romhanyi
At the time this felt like a brilliant mix of comic set pieces and social commentary, before they went too 'Lahandan'.
Best bit: Dave Rowntree and Alex James as the couple that never was.
Released: 1996
Director: Jonathan Glazer
A master-class of moodiness with it's black and white speed varying shots of a cast that includes a shut eyed Thom Yorke, some dancers, a small boy and a dog.
Best bit: When the dancers leap up in a synchronised jump, like a flock of birds taking off.
Released: 2010
Director: Wendy Morgan
A lesson in economy. The camera stays on a close up of Monae’s face performing the track, channelling the spirit of both Sinead O’Connor’s ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ clip and D’Angelo’s ‘Untitled’
Best bit: When she starts crying. All the more affecting for the fact it seems to come out of...
Released: 1999
Director: Michael Moore
It caused the New York Stock Exchange to be closed and Rage were taken from the scene by security after they tried to gatecrash the Exchange. Literally 'the Machine' being raged at.
Best bit: The message of victory at the end.
Released: 1984
Director: Mary Lambert
She would go on to make much more complex music videos, but this one worked because of the way it captured the spirit of early, downtown Madge. Post-feminist kudos too for spurning her boyfriend for the rich photographer dude.
Best bit: That crazy, slow-mo street dancing at the very beginning.
