- 5/18/2025
Get ready to cringe and laugh as we revisit the most awkward, over-the-top, and questionably conceived music videos from the golden age of MTV! From bizarre choreography to cheap special effects, these classics perfectly capture the excessive spirit of 80s pop culture. Which ones make you want to look away?
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00:00Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for hit 1980s songs with the most ill-conceived, poorly-made, and all-around campy music videos.
00:19Number 10. Obsession, Animotion
00:22It's one of the most seductive pieces in synth-pop, at least as far as the melody.
00:26Animotion's singers Astrid Plaine and Bill Wadhams lead the video for Obsession, lip-syncing, and dancing side-by-side.
00:33The potentially clever contrast between their stoic expressions and smooth moves would work better if they showed any rhythm.
00:46Things only really get lively in vignettes of the band having a pool party, dressed as a genie, Mark Antony and Cleopatra, and more.
00:56As bizarre as anything with this spectacle is its lack of sex appeal.
01:03Nonetheless, MTV's heavy circulation of Obsession was key to the single's success.
01:07Both are now considered aesthetic staples of the 80s, although most remain obsessed with the video for its camp.
01:12Number 9. I'm Still Standing, Elton John
01:23Filmed on the French Riviera and choreographed by Arlene Phillips, the video for I'm Still Standing promised to be outstanding.
01:36Fittingly, the two-day shoot is enough of a statement about resilience, but aside from a camera falling in the water, and Elton John partying with Duran Duran, it's an excessive production.
01:45John didn't help matters when his initially elaborate choreography was reduced to an exaggerated strut with a cane.
01:59Even if the professional dancers are jarringly more dynamic, their costumes and body paint are distracting.
02:05The video has become embraced as a not-so-subliminal declaration of John's sexuality.
02:09It does indeed stand out for that, but also for the chaos of the production and the final product.
02:13Number 8. We Built This City, Starship
02:21Credited as one of the worst songs ever, Starship's We Built This City could only have a cringey video, but you can't even genuinely enjoy it on mute.
02:37It seems fitting to superimpose the band over people running through villages and huge American cities.
02:41Looking for America, crawling through your schools
02:47Unfortunately, the editing effect is crude and visually cluttered.
02:52It's also hard to be roused by such visuals as the Lincoln Memorial standing up against Las Vegas excess, when the singers don't even seem into it.
02:59Was it any surprise when the embarrassed-looking Grace Slick later slammed the song herself?
03:03We Built This City
03:08We Built This City
03:10At least the video effectively represents We Built This City as the most corporate, anti-corporate anthem possible, and like the song, it has towering camp value.
03:18We Built This City
03:19We Built This City
03:20We Built This City
03:21We Built This City
03:22We Built This City
03:24We Built This City
03:25Number 7. Putting on the Ritz, Taco
03:28If you're blue and you don't know where to go to, why don't you go where fashion sits? Puttin' on the Ritz.
03:361980s synth-pop and vaudeville collide in Taco's hit cover of an Irving Berlin standard. They do so in all the wrong ways, for the video for Puttin' on the Ritz. The preserved version is awkward enough for its flimsy, satirical mix of homeless people, well-dressed musicians, and flashy video effects.
03:54On that famous thoroughfare, with their noses in the air, high hats and arrow collars.
04:01What's worse is that the original cut featured backup dancers in blackface. An homage to an unfortunate vaudeville practice was not an acceptable excuse for many TV networks at the time. They instead showed an alternate cut that removed most blackface shots, though not all. This would be the version that featured generations with mock. Hey, it's aged better than the video's immediately offensive original cut.
04:21Puttin' it on, puttin' it on, the R-I-T-Z, how about you and me?
04:28Number 6. You Make My Dreams, Hall & Oates.
04:32Several of Hall & Oates' hottest hits had oddly minimalist music videos.
04:36What I want, you got, and it might be hard to handle, like a flame that burns a candle.
04:43It all started with You Make My Dreams, which consists of idiosyncratic shots of the band unconvincingly jamming against a black backdrop.
04:49It would be pretty boring, if not for their exaggeratedly upbeat pseudo-dancing.
05:01As it is, the sequence looks more like a fever dream than anything.
05:04Hall & Oates would revisit this video concept in private eyes, and I can't go for that, albeit with a little more production.
05:10Was I really so hard to handle for You Make My Dreams?
05:19Whether Jay Dubin wanted the music to speak for itself with his lazy direction, the overly upbeat execution just makes it more distracting.
05:26Number 5. Real American, Rick Derringer.
05:35The World Wrestling Federation faced a smackdown from critics with 1985's The Wrestling Album.
05:48Rick Derringer's Real American stands out for its superheroic jingoism, as well as a music video starring Hulk Hogan.
05:57Half of it is highlights of the Hulkster in the ring.
06:03The other half is a collage of nondescript patriotic images and the wrestler playing an undersized Old Glory guitar.
06:10It's such a debacle of poorly edited, empty hype that it has unsurprisingly fallen into obscurity.
06:23Of course, it's a hidden gem online, especially as Hogan's once endearing patriotism has grown more fanatical.
06:29At least it was something to laugh about with Derringer's anthem, along with the rest of the wrestling album.
06:33I am a real American, fight for what's right, fight for your life.
06:41Number 4. Lick It Up, Kiss.
06:44Don't wanna wait till you know me better.
06:51Surely the music video debut of Kiss without their face paint is memorable, but it's more accurate to say that fans were scarred by Lick It Up.
06:57As long as it takes for the band to reveal their faces, yours will wince at them excessively posing in lieu of their usual spectacle.
07:12That arrives with a vengeance for an explosive, frantically edited concert in city ruins.
07:17If you're wondering about the relevance to the setting, remember that post-apocalyptic B-movies with scantily clad women were all the rage in the 80s.
07:23And this video is nothing if not 80s.
07:33The novelty of Kiss's unmasked era would deliver a commercial resurgence, and thankfully better music videos.
07:39Still, Lick It Up leaves a particular taste in your mouth.
07:46Number 3. Rock Me Tonight, Billy Squire.
07:48Billy Squire.
07:49Billy Squire was one of few true hard rock stars left by 1984.
07:53That changed with the album Signs of Life, specifically the pop track Rock Me Tonight.
07:58Rockin' tonight, walkin' on air, gon' find me some trouble, gon' grab my shit.
08:05It was Squire's biggest hit, until fans were disillusioned by the video of him flamboyantly dancing and gyrating around a bedroom.
08:11Two directors fought Capitol Records to budget for Squire's original concept of preparing for a concert alongside young fans.
08:26With a deadline for the MTV premiere, Kenny Ortega was hired to speedily toss together a catastrophe.
08:30The uncool final product negatively affected ticket sales and Squire's overall credibility as a legitimate rocker.
08:44He maintains a mostly strong legacy, but the Rock Me Tonight video effectively put his glory days to bed.
08:49Number 2. Abracadabra, Steve Miller Band.
09:01I heat up, I can't cool down, got me spinnin' round and round.
09:07The video for Abracadabra required some movie magic when the Steve Miller Band was on tour at the time of production.
09:14Of course, technically innovative director Peter Cohn glaringly favors style over substance.
09:19The final product is a choppy montage of magicians and their lovely assistant boogying around surreal computerized effects.
09:25You make me laugh, you make me cry, keep me burnin' for your love.
09:33The cast can't hope to match the razzle dazzle of the oversaturated visuals, color, and editing.
09:38This could be forgiven for aging poorly through the years, but maybe not when the effects overwhelm the whole video.
09:44It's the gimmicks that make the Abracadabra video so timelessly messy and so iconic.
09:48I see magic in your eyes, I hear the magic in your sighs.
09:56Whether one can appreciate his contemporary creativity, Cohn forgot that confident presentation is half the magic trick.
10:02Abracadabra, Abracadabra, I wanna reach out and grab ya.
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10:25Number 1. Dancing in the Street, David Bowie and Mick Jagger
10:35Who better to revive a 60s pop staple for the 80s than David Bowie and Mick Jagger?
10:39Even better, the profits for their Dancing in the Street cover would go to charity.
10:44Unfortunately, that apparently didn't leave the music video with much of a budget.
10:47It really is just the two iconically cool rock stars dancing around empty locations in London.
10:58As hard as the video was pushed at Live Aid, audiences pushed back.
11:01The hasty production was baffling in his uncreative camp and a sexual tension between alleged former lovers Bowie and Jagger.
11:09It's a fun cover for a good cause, but it's remembered for encapsulating 80s music video's painful lack of self-awareness.
11:14What are some other classic songs that you think are best enjoyed on the radio?
11:25Share your music video horror stories in the comments.
11:27Did you enjoy this video? Check out these other clips from WatchMojo.
11:39And be sure to subscribe and ring the bell to be notified about our latest videos.
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