80's Video Critical Interpretation: Lesson Three

Time for me to bring back one of my favorite recurring posts to the blog: The 80’s Video Rewind in which I dissect one of the classic videos from my youth. Tonight we will be focusing on Steve Perry’s solo hit “Oh, Sherrie.” Solo as in a) not with Journey and b) the only hit he had where he wasn’t a member of Journey. Let’s break it down…

1) I don’t know if anyone ever knew why he did a non-Journey album or exactly how this song differed from every other Journey song. There isn’t much difference between this song and Open Arms in that they are both sappy love songs. In fact, the only way that you can tell that it is not a Journey video is due to the complete lack of people playing keyboards that are attached to the side of a warehouse.

2) At this point in human history (1984 to be exact) Steve Perry was considered a sex symbol. After seeing him in closeup during this video you truly wonder just how in the world that could even be possible. Sure the dude had some serious pipes to him but he is not what one would consider to be a handsome man in the traditional sense. Even as a kid I couldn’t figure out how he would get a girl like Sherrie and this is made even more confusing by the fact that the woman in the video is his girlfriend who happens to be named Sherrie. To be honest even as an adult I can’t quite believe it.

3) Back in the good old days of MTV a video could have a minute worth of things happening before the song even starts. In this instance it is the filming of what would have been a much cooler video at least to the 11 year old me. A fight between good and evil in a primeval forest? Why couldn’t we get that video? What always amazed me is that the production costs for this video must have been astronomical as they had to film all of that wedding scene with the huge cast and costumes and props all to set up the fact that the actual video was going to consist mainly of Steve Perry singing on a staircase at a train station. Also makes you wonder why they just didn’t film that in the first place.

4) On your list of mid-80’s music clichés we have a) the British video director wearing a skinny tie who is of a firm belief that a Steve Perry video is fine art, b) a gum chewing, over made up publicist with comically large glasses and c) the music reporter with the severe platinum blonde hair who feels that the opportunity to interview Steve Perry is the highlight of her career.

5) For the guitar solo section of the song Steve Perry is playing a broom while someone else is rocking out on a lute. Now viewing this outside the realm of video this is clearly insane. While I can understand Steve Perry getting upset with the video shoot and running off to just sing the song and maybe even play a broom when he gets to what he knows is the guitar solo how the hell is the other guy on the stairs supposed to know there is a guitar solo going on? Did they cue up the music or something?

6) Here is your first verse “You should’ve been gone / knowing how I made you feel / and I’ve should’ve been gone / after all your words of steel”. I have no idea what words of steel are outside of possibly carbon and stainless.

7) In fact, the entire song is about how they would be better off apart. Yeah, the chorus is about how their love holds on but every other line discusses how they should have been gone. It’s not really that uplifting a love song.

8) Finally, the reason why the eleven year old in me will always remember this video: you could totally tell that Sherrie wasn’t wearing a bra. I’m not proud of knowing this fact but as an eleven year old boy before the days of the internet facts like this were very important.