Rock ‘n’ roll is all about defying societal expectations and pushing boundaries, but as these controversial rock music videos suggest, too much of anything can quickly turn sour. And while tracing an artist’s decline back to a specific moment is rare (it’s almost always a combination of factors), these music videos caused a shift in the previously positive public opinion about these bands.
Videos by American Songwriter
To the bands’ credit, most of these shifts occurred in the United States as unfortunate consequences of Puritan ideology around sex, rampant homophobia exacerbated by the AIDS epidemic, and Christian fears rooted in the Satanic Panic of the ‘80s and ‘90s.
Despite how backward we might find this status quo to be today, it had real ramifications for these rock artists who alienated notable portions of their fan bases with their controversial music videos.
“Rock Me Tonite” by Billy Squier
Perhaps the most famous example of a rock artist whose controversial music video sent their career into a downward spiral, Billy Squier’s career was never quite the same after the release of his 1984 single, “Rock Me Tonite.” Squier had already enjoyed tremendous success with other cuts like “The Stroke” and “Everybody Wants You.” But when he released the music video for his 1984 single from Signs of Life, public opinion shifted.
In a different decade, we would probably consider Squier’s music video relatively tame. However, in the 1980s, the rock ‘n’ roller rolling around in pastel satin sheets and dancing around in a pink tank top was too homoerotic for Squier’s fan base at the time. Both Squier and others have blamed his career decline on this video.
“November Rain” by Guns ‘N’ Roses
Considering Guns ‘N’ Roses guitarist Slash thought he was going to die while filming the controversial music video for “November Rain,” it’s unfortunate that the iconic rock band’s video seemed to hurt their career more than help it. Of course, as glam metal made way for grunge and pop-punk in the latter half of the 1990s, one could argue that this career decline would have happened with or without the sprawling short film that was the nine-minute music video.
At a time when lo-fi music videos like the one for Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” were on the rise, lengthy dramas like the “November Rain” music video seemed indulgent and over-the-top (and not in a fun, rock ‘n’ roll way). As Dave Grohl said in I Want My MTV, “When a musician starts to use the term ‘mini-movie’ to describe a video, it’s time to quit.”
“Jesus Christ Pose” by Soundgarden
Sometimes, a music video is just controversial enough to elicit some eye rolls and groans. Other times, the controversy becomes so contentious that a band will receive death threats. Soundgarden found themselves in the latter category over their 1991 music video for “Jesus Christ Pose.” As you might assume from the title, the video prominently featured the Jesus Christ pose, i.e., the crucifixion, in various forms. Public outrage over its seemingly anti-Christian values was swift, and MTV banned it from the channel.
Frontman Chris Cornell would later say, “It doesn’t have anything to do with my religion or my view on it. It just has to do with people exploiting a symbol. I think it’s silly for other people to exploit it on the basis that it is sacred.”
“I Want To Break Free” by Queen
Queen’s music video for their 1984 classic rock cut, “I Want to Break Free,” was simultaneously one of their most iconic and controversial. The video featured the band in drag as characters from the British soap opera Coronation Street. Men in drag proved too salacious for the United States in the mid-1980s, as Brian May later recalled in a 2018 interview with NPR.
“I remember being on the promo tour [for “I Want To Break Free”] in the Midwest of America and people’s faces turning ashen. And they would say, ‘No, we can’t play this. We can’t possibly play this. It looks homosexual. I went, ‘So?’ But it was a huge deal. I know that it really damaged our sort of whole relationship with certainly radio in this country and probably the public as well.”
Photo by Stock Ruiz/Shutterstock
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