Mike & Jeff's Unearthed Videos: Aldo Nova

Remember videos played on TV, mostly the MTV? Mike and Jeff sure do. Together, they have over 70 years of hands-on experience watching and remembering awesome music videos, and by “awesome,” we’re not talking quality. Using mind-blowing technology, Mike and Jeff watch a video at the same time in two different states (think NASA) and discuss the awesomeness in great detail harnessing the power of Facebook Chat. First Up, Aldo Nova!

“Fantasy” by Aldo Nova (1981)

(Strap on a headband, have a drink and open the video in a new window so you can watch as you read.)

Jeff: Let’s do this!

Mike: I am watching it right now.

Jeff: I love his creepy assistant holding the guitar; the only thing he is missing is a ball-gag. Look, private helicopter, I wonder who’s in there?

Mike: It doesn’t really sound like a helicopter. I think those guys were like “Awesome spaceship is coming!” then they were like, “oh, it’s just a helicopter.” Then they were like “awesome! Hot chick in a unitard, oh it’s just our singer.”

Jeff: Yeah, but they still kept their boners.

Jeff: That door just got the shit kicked out of it.

Mike: They try to open the door by banging the uzis on it. Then use the guitar laser to open it. (1:20) Why didn’t they just shoot it with the uzis? Oh well, really Jeff, it’s really one of the best openings to a video over.

Jeff: Easily. Long too! Cool, stage shot: The drummer needs to sit up a bit.

Mike: He really does. They all have kind of terrible posture. Look how they slink through the door at 1:31.

Jeff: Whoa, great hop into the screen, Aldo! (1:41). Nice! Lots of quality hair: 2 zipper-heads, a headband guy and the full-on Nova Mullet.

Mike: Their mullets are not a fantasy. They are totally real.

Jeff: Aldo’s band could easily be Loverboy, no one would know the difference. Not even Aldo.

Mike: I just realized the accountant at the beginning of the video is not actually in the band. He just holds the laser shooting guitar.

Jeff: …and steals their money.

Mike: They were part of the Canadian music scene of the mid 80s:  Loverboy, Saga, Survivor, Aldo Nova…

Jeff: Aldo was friends with Bon Jovi, he even looks like a Tiny Jovi. No one asked for that.

Mike: He does look kind of shady too. Or is he just nervous because he’s holding a nuclear Les Paul that shoots lasers.

Jeff: At 2:46 a girls pushed a young Sammy Hagar to get to the stage. Aldo sees her, he is smitten.

Mike: That crowd guy has a little David Lee Roth going on too.

Jeff: They finally showed the dorky keyboard player at 3:08. I think Aldo’s only demand for the director was “Close ups… lots of close ups of me. Screw those other clowns.”

Mike: I know, and the song is all keyboard… doot doot doot. And they don’t show him until 3:08.

Mike: Aldo gets his money’s worth on the close ups by getting a lot of snorts (2:52) and tongue waggles in. They probably all have helicopter lag.

Jeff: Doot doot doot, indeed!At 3:14 the video goes from performance only to conceptual… huzzah! The crowd is oddly subdued for all this insane amount of rocking going on in front of them.

Mike: So is the guy’s name really Aldo Nova?

Jeff: No, his actual name is Sidney Greenblatz from Yonkers, NY.

Mike: There’s one black guy in this Video and he’s a pimp. That is racist. Or was that the only black guy in Canada.

Jeff: Yup, that was ol’ Canada Jones! A well respected Canadian thespian. He doesn’t move, I think it’s the same guy from that Blondie rap video.

Mike: He’s totally typecast. Jeff, did you realize this song was about prostitutes. I just did. I feel like I cracked the Da Vinci code.

Jeff: In my best Dudley Moore “Arthur” accent, “You’re a Hookah?!”

Mike: And the pimp drives a Pontiac 6000 which is an odd choice for a pimp, and also, the band is named after a Chevrolet.

Jeff: Rapture!

Mike: I had a 76 Aldo Nova. I just traded it in and got $4500 from the gov’t which I used to buy a new Prius.

Jeff: Sizzling guitar solo. Crowd was so scorched!

Mike: They’re faces were melted. They are too hideous to fuck in the tour bus now, that’s why the bodyguards are holding them back.

Jeff: 4:14, Marquee FAIL! I think we were supposed to see “Aldo Nova” in big letters on the giant sign, all we saw PARKING.

Jeff: The other guitar player looks like he could have another face on his forehead underneath the wonderful mullet bangs.

Jeff: Holy cow! at 4:56 all hell breaks loose!… wait, okay, one girl tries to calmly walk onstage and she is subdued.

Mike: I don’t know jeff, It’s like he’s calling out to the girls, teasing them, but when they rush the stage, he has his uzi wielding bodyguards hold them off.

Mike: You know I used to listen to this album when I was a kid. It was pretty solid all the way through.

Jeff: You were an idiot when you were a kid.

Mike: Nobody is arguing this.

Mike: 4:59 Aldo starts disappearing, then reappearing, all while devastating the crowd with another solo.

Jeff: At 5:05, looks like Aldo made a neon sign of his name in shop class and snuck it into the video. He rules.

Jeff: Aldo has recently written songs for Clay Aiken and Celine Dion… exactly where he pictured himself being 25 years ago…

Mike: Is that true?

Jeff: Mike, I don’t kid around about these things. Go wiki the fuck out of it..

Mike: Going back to the beginning, I have to say for a helicopter shot, there sure isn’t a lot of hair or clothing blowing around. And I hate to belabor a point, but why does he need bodyguards if he has a guitar that shoots fucking lasers?

Jeff: Yes, let’s recap, good point about the lasers. Hey, I don’t actually see any blades on the copter.

Mike: Do you mean Jack Blades from Night Ranger?

Jeff: Yes, he was originally cast as the tail blade of the copter.

Jeff: I think the same accountant from this vid is in his Monkey on Your Back vid.

Mike: Ha you are right! Shit we have to go right to Monkey vid.

Jeff: Let’s go to the Monkey video!

“Monkey on Your Back” by Aldo Nova (1983)

Mike: The accountant is wearing the same bow tie. He’s a square and not in the band and they want to make sure everyone knows this.

Jeff: Exactly, he originally had a sign around his neck that said. “Do not feed the nerd… any pussy.”

Jeff: Videos sure came along way from 81 to 83… they really upped the disappearing technology. Also, Aldo’s shirt zipper does not work.

Mike: Wait, did that accountant weird science Aldo Nova in a lab?!

Jeff: looks like it, Aldo’s older brother Chet will be ruining everything very soon…

Mike: You could tell they were still working out the kinks in fantasy.

Mike: Seriously, he used the power of ENIAC to create Aldo Nova.

Jeff: I would at least made me another Mike Reno.

Mike: This guy shits Mike Renos.

Jeff: Hee hee “Shits Mike Renos”… that’s a good band name.

Mike: Aldo Greenblatz is going to fuck someone in this video.

Jeff: Yes, he still has blue balls from the last video full of bodyguard cockblockers.

Mike: That is their official title.

Mike: Oh shit Monkey POV!

Mike: This song is about drugs.

Jeff: Yep, drugs. It also features Bowser from Sha Na Na.

Mike: Look at the girl pissing in the alley at 3:08.

Jeff: Slow down speedy, I just got to the monkey.

Jeff: Nice to see John Elway pop in at 2:40.

Mike: He doesn’t get enough credit for his canadian video acting.

Jeff: Aldo is just being a creep in this video… skulking around…and he sure points a lot.

Mike: Jeff, it’s like he’s getting off on it. Don’t they see him standing there?

Jeff: HOLY SHIT 3:01! Bass Player barks out some quality back up vocals!

Mike: It’s only one line, but he really sings the living fuck out of it!

Jeff: That monkey is being a real nuisance.

Mike: When the monkey screams, the guitar player goes up into the clouds.

Jeff: Isn’t that an old Chinese proverb?

Jeff: I think this video was a precursor to the Sixth Sense… Aldo is dead people… no one knows he’s there… waiting for your Sixth Sense play on words…

Mike: Simian Sense?

Jeff: Perfect.

Mike: I was a little unsure, hence the question mark. Let me try again…SIMIAN SENSE!

Jeff: “Sucks Sense”?

Jeff: The drummer (sans headband) still seems as lethargic as ever… Aldo has more of a Jovi hairdo here, you can tell they traded styling tips.

Mike: Oh wait, this song is a cautionary tale. about drugs.

Mike: Wow, all that shit happened when the accountant went to the bathroom. I bet that kind of stuff happens in labs all the time.

Jeff: “Well, I hope you had one hell of a piss, Arnold!”

Jeff: I like that the monkey kind of starts singing.

Mike: He’s the auto tune monkey.

Mike: Auto tune monkey singing in space. Aldo Fucking Awesome.

Jeff: True, that monkey was 25 years to early… wondering where he is now? Clawing the eyes out of his elderly owner?

Mike: That John Elway guy fucking raped that girl. Who does he think he is Ben Rothelsberger?

Jeff: Zing on Big Ben, Steeler fans will love you.

Mike: 4: 22.  Rape!

Jeff: Double Rape!

Mike: Now that’s a good name for a band.

Jeff: Nice, the Bass Player got a perm since 81. Handsome.

Jeff: Aldo points again at 4:29. He makes a lot of good points.

Mike: The point is to Aldo as the windmill is to Townshend. It’s his signature move.

Jeff: Eww…4:40 okay why is there a used tampon in the middle of the screen?

Mike: When you tear a hole in the space time continuum, you need a space tampon to plug it up.

Jeff: Bloody good insight, Mike. The Space tampon goes everywhere except a black hole.

Mike: The ones that go in black holes have really really really long strings.

Jeff: Really tempted to see if the account/network guy makes an appearance in future Nova vids.

Mike: Only time will tell. Twist! Asia reference.

Jeff: Okay let’s wrap up Aldo Nova night. Parting words?

Mike: I think that Aldo Nova took some bold risks, namely the helicopter, using IBM’s Big Blue Super Computer to create a band that flies to alleys to give cautionary tales about drug use but cannot seem to use that power to stop a rape, singing space monkeys, space tampons and mullets.

How about you.

Jeff: I agree. Aldo Nova is pro-Rape.

Mike: See ya next week.

Jeff: See ya.

By Mike and Jeff

TAGS: Aldo Nova • facebook • Facebook Chat • Jack Blades • Loverboy • Mike Reno • Night Ranger