1995: directed by Jonathan Glazer

"There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, Dim being really dim, and we sat in a Korova Milkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening." - from A Clockwork Orange

Microphone against a stark white background. The cord extends, and we see it snaking away across an all-white room - white padded walls, white openwork ceiling, white floor, white furniture - with the lower halves of mannequins lined up against the tops of the walls. Against the far wall is a little stage setup, with microphone stand and drums.

On a London rooftop, a figure in a long white lab coat and black boots strides towards a big white ball on a tripod. As the camera moves in closer, we see the big white ball is... er... a big, dimpled white ball, like a huge Chanel-padded golf ball, with er... subwoofers in it? The figure in the white lab coat attaches what looks like an audio cable to the tripod.

Ok, now we're inside the ball (hence the Chanel-padded walls) and up in Damon's face. He's dressed in a white Nehru-collared jacket and white T-shirt, and one of his eyes has dramatic black liner on the lower lid, à la Alex in A Clockwork Orange (just without the extra eyelashes). As the camera pulls back, we see Alex, Graham, and Dave, wearing the same clothes as Damon's, and a terrific amount of makeup so that they look immaculate, plastic, and perfect. The makeup and lighting can't hide the fact that they all look quite zombified and tired (especially Dave, whose ginger colouring doesn't really favour an all-white environment). They sit, unmoving, at a table with a single bright red bowl on it, filled with big white Necco Wafers. They're so still that it's a little startling when Alex blinks. Though the vocal track begins, they don't move. They are barely breathing.

We get a few still frames on a vivid orange background - the lower half of a mannequin, and the white shape of a bowler hat hovering above it. (If I'm not mistaken the Earthlink TV spots are either done by the same company, or else they used the same idea. It's definitely the same colour, and the Viewer will never again see an Earthlink TV advert without thinking of this video.)

When the band returns to the screen, Damon mimes the lyrics, moving nothing except his lips. The room is shown again, but this time it's filled with people at the tables, talking, drinking martini glasses of blue fluid, and taking the wafers out of identical red bowls on their tables. Blur stands on the stage - Alex leaning against the wall with his bass, Graham sitting down with his guitar, Dave gently playing the drums, and Damon standing with his arms hanging limply at his sides. The camera pans in tighter on Damon, who isn't miming at the moment - instead he's got a psychotic grin on his face. At once, he snaps to attention, stops grinning, and sings "Yes, the future's been sold... every night we're gone..." and he raises his eyes and hands to heaven.

At once of the tables, a group of four men sits around a slinky blonde in black leather (if you observe closely, you'll notice that it's the same woman from the "To The End" video that Posh Bird keeps on running into). We shall call her "Libby" (short for Lady In Black, ™nej and Smiley). Libby holds up a libretto (or a menu) and sings a little, gesturing languidly, while the man on her left cozies up close to her. Meanwhile, Damon, Alex, and Graham slouch at another table, looking really, really tired, resentful, and bummed out. Alex the droog - I mean, Damon - glances up (his eyes very, very blue). Libby looks over at him. Damon slowly but viciously smirks, probably imagining a bit of the old ultra-violence. Yes, it really, really, really could happen.

The band plays and sings the chorus. At a different table, a regular bloke in a brown leather jacket gets sloshed on the blue martinis with Charlie Chaplain.

Another orange frame - this time, a head-down fetus over the black outline of a martini glass.

Outside the Chanel Kubrick golf ball (joined by a smaller version of the same thing), four people on bicycles appear to be attracted to it (perhaps they can hear the music?)

Back inside, Damon gestures spasmodically with his waxy white hands. He glances back at the camera, his enthusiasm ebbing away, and he barely moves his mouth for the last few words of the chorus. Alex stares at the camera, and Dave tries to, but Damon's hands are in the way.

We see a hairy man's hand with long, gorgeous, fire-engine red salon fingernails, clasped on a bright red sleeve. Damon "shoots" the camera with his fingers. The hands belong to the Red man - not the Def Jam recording artist, but some skinny jug-eared white bloke with bright red hair and shirt, watching Blur expressionlessly. Next to Red man stands an Art Patron in black tuxedo, bow tie, and trendy-square glasses. He glances at the Red man, and asks, "How long have you been a Red man?" in subtitles with a great typeface.

The Red man, without taking his eyes off Damon's suedette-wrapped package, responds, "About fifteen years", also in subtitle. On the stage, the lovely undead Graham sits and plays his guitar. Art Patron asks, "What were you before?" Red man, with extremely subtle but unmistakable contempt, arches his immaculately plucked maroon eyebrows, and replies "Blue". Tee hee. The two men go back to undressing the band with their eyes.

The party seems to heating up - some lucky chap in a white turtleneck has a swooning femme in red on either arm, and they're reeling together, obviously drunk... Damon looks on, eyes green. Goodness, how'd they get his skin to look like that? It's like he's made out of marzipan. Behind him Dave stares into the distance. One of the femmes leaves a trail of crimson lipstick across the Lucky Chap's cheek. Blur, in a row, slowly raise their hands to their eyes. Outside the Kubrick Ball O' Fun, the observers (now a good eleven strong) mirror Blur's movements.

On stage, Damon laces his fingers together, and stares at the camera pleadingly. He's here for everyone, just get in line, people... one at a time. Well, maybe two. He glances smokily out of his lined eye and smirks some more, daring you to rip his clothes off. The femmes in red cackle. At another table, old twin men in red swimming goggles zone out. Through their point of view, we see rosy heat signatures of Blur - Damon's head is giving off mad infrared! "Wow!" subtitles one of the twins. That's what I'm sayin'.

Outside the KubrickBalls, Harry Dean Stanton scowls at how cheesy this song is. No, wait, it's not Harry Dean Stanton - it's far too young to be Harry Dean Stanton. There are now a good 25 people outside the balls, gazing worshipfully up at them, and another old man in red swimming goggles stares at his own ball with no one else around him.

"Well here's your lucky day," goes the song, and Lucky Chap's brain apparently goes off line as both femmes in red kiss his cheeks at the same time. Lucky Chap goes slackjawed. Blur keeps playing, a little more energetically now (but that's not saying much). Libby is really going to town with her singing, up on her chair and flinging her arms about. She's got on a seriously nice black leather suit. The men at her table leer. In an orange insert shot, the white outline of handcuffs.

At the bad kids' table, Blur look over as one. Regular Bloke and Charlie Chaplain have a good laugh. Blur look back. While the band perform on stage, there's a bright white flash, and Damon jumps back, startled. One of the old twins in the swimming goggles subtitles, "This can't be Heaven - I recognise it!" Uh, the Author isn't sure she agrees with your police work there. On stage, Damon gestures some more, and his miming goes quite out of sync with the playback, but I trust his judgment. Libby explains something to the man on her left. Damon - oh man - er, Damon licks his lips. And not in a sexy "ooh baby feel the velvet" kind of way, but in a "soon I will savour the taste of your entrails as I rip them, still steaming, out of your body" kind of way.

In a lift, seven people (one of them Faux Harry Dean) and one of the Kubrick Balls O' Fun arrive in what looks like the basement of Information Retrieval from Brazil. On stage, Damon clasps his hands and gazes heavenward, asking forgiveness for killing and eating several highly-paid extras. Outside, on the rooftop, the observers watch the balls. Get your mind out of the gutter. Back on stage, the band makes a good go of it, but another one of those flashes happens, and Damon half-backbends, gobsmacked by the mighty sword of divine vengeance. His jazz hands flap wildly at his sides.

Close up on the Coco Chanel Stanley Kubrick Memorial satin quilted booty bass speaker spheres.

Back inside, all of Blur gaze upward - Dave is a little skeptical, Alex is a mannequin, Damon looks like a bored kid in church, and Graham is made of injection-molded plastic. Outside, the observers watch. One of them, inexplicably, is wearing an oatmeal scrub masque and a jaunty black hat. Damon does wonderful things with his eyes, which have gone back to blue again, under gorgeous long sable eyelashes and strawberry-blond fringe. Thank goddess for still frame.

Regular Bloke and Charlie Chaplain have put away a metric fuckload of blue martinis, and are now falling all over each other cracking up. Damon half-smirks, half-snarls. Libby makes kissy face at the man on her right. Lucky Chap bears his burden of babes, getting a snootful of bosom while he's at it. Regular Bloke and Charlie Chaplain are practically holding each other upright at this point. Damon winks knowingly. Libby toys with a wafer but doesn't eat it, then later, shoves away one of her besotted admirers. Charlie Chaplain whispers something into Regular Bloke's ear. Regular Bloke keeps cracking up for a second, then he straightens up with a stricken expression. His sobriety washes over him like a cold shower. Charlie Chaplain keeps being jolly, but Regular Bloke now has the same expression as Blur do, sitting at the bad kids' table. Suddenly Damon looks at the camera and snarls, showing off his fucked-up teeth and the unmistakable age lines around his eyes. A mere two years of Blur put them there. It's a wonder he looks as good now as he does.

An orange insert shot of a U-shaped magnet, pointing down at a horizontal (falling?) human figure.

Blur have had enough. They get up and start walking slowly out through the room. Alex, the crap actor he is, keeps glancing at the camera, like "What are you gonna do, eh?" It's funny. Damon suddenly throws back his hands, stopping his bandmates in their tracks. Outside on the rooftop, the crowd of people, who were approaching the ball, also stop. Damon, crazed with power, gets that psycho grin on his face again. They stand there, not moving, Alex's knee flexed. Damon stops smiling. The video is over. Everyone is sad.

However, apparently, at the last moments, Charlie Chaplain decides that it's Regular Bloke's lucky day, and tackles him with a kiss! Thanks to the sharp eyes and dextrous remote-control finger or Firesnap and the enthusiasm of Casey, there is now something else to look at besides the lads, if the Viewer wishes to entertain any such concept. Yes, it really, really, really could happen!

CUTE FACTOR: nearly unbelievable, except for poor Dave, and he suffers only in comparison.
VIDEO QUALITY: Best. Blur. Video. Ever.
FUCKED UP FACTOR: impossible to tell.
OVERALL GRADE: A+++