YouTubers CinemaSins Start Taking the Piss out of Music Videos With Companion Channel

Do you like music videos? Those predictably formulaic free form short film experiments/visual aids that accompany most of our favorite songs both old and new have become increasingly popular in the streaming age. Part of their magic of the medium (particularly for those of us who make them) is that they don’t particularly have to make sense. In fact, more often than not, they’re a lot cooler if they don’t. Even still, sometimes artistic license runs rampant, leaving even the least discerning viewers a little puzzled.

Chris Atkinson and Jeremy Scott, the two local dudes behind the overwhelmingly successful 3.7 million-subscribers-strong YouTube Channel CinemaSins (and subjects of a Scene cover story last year) recently launched a spin-off series/channel called Music Video Sins. When they’re not yanking the rug from under suspended belief, pointing out gaping plot holes or simply poking holes in old-fashioned music vid tropes, they’ll even point out lyrical cues that don’t quite add up. Music Video Sins is a lot like VH1’s Pop Up Video — and debatably more enjoyable. That is, if you take out all the fun factoids, replace them with snarky commentary, tally up the egregious transgressions and hand down a hefty sentence by which the video can redeem itself. Check out some of our faves after the jump.

While Guns N' Roses “November Rain” — the bloated nine-minute memorial of MTV’s pinnacle of relevance and the harbinger of rock n roll’s final wave of financial excess — is kind of low-hanging fruit. Slash slinging a guitar in front of the lonely church in the middle of the desert is a punchline old enough to buy its own beer. One could probably make a feature length Mystery Science Theater-style documentary mocking Axl Rose's wealth of questionable creative choices in the sound-and-vision department, but the MVS guys handle it pretty dutifully, adding some witty insight to its gaping plot holes and dramatic gaffs. They even pause a few seconds to squeeze in an extra 10 or so quips attempting to explain why that guy dives into a cake during the wedding reception rain storm. Though even MVS sins in failing to point out that Slash's guitar isn't plugged into an amp.

Taylor Swift’s innocuous ode to teen-schlock tropes “You Belong to Me” also must atone for its sins. Again, while all it its glaringly self-evident clichés are accounted for (the old hot-girl-disguised-as-frumpy-nerd chestnut, Tay-Tay’s dual role as the good and bad girl and a plot so trite even a blind man might roll his eyes), this vid is rife with anachronisms even I (a self-confessed Swifty and music vid aficionado) didn’t notice most of them before now.

Maybe not so obvious is Radiohead’s “Karma Police”, directed by 90s MTV heavyweight-turned-filmmaker Jonathan Glazer (Sexy Beast, Under the Skin). There aren’t so many sins here I hadn’t noticed so much as a presumably-clothed emperor accused of streaking.

Where do we go from here? Even the more contemporary vidya sins of Niki Minaj, Katy Perry and Neon Trees are pretty grandiose spectacles with bones exposed and ready to pick clean. What about low-budget broad strokes by Earl Sweatshirt and Matt and Kim or Biting Elbows? What of the controversial contributions of Sia? Is anything sacred or too challenging for these dudes? I guess that's all the more reason to tune in. The Music Video Sins channel already has more than 250,000 subscribers.