In 1977, Michael Nesmith -- or "Nez," as he prefers to be called -- was working on an album called "From a Radio Engine To The Photon Wing." He tapped one song from the album to be the lead-off single: "Rio" (not the Duran Duran or Peter Allen song). As a promotion to catch the attention of radio music directors, he and friend Bill Dear wrote, produced, and filmed a video accompaniment -- not simply a filmed record of a performance, but a quick-cut production that both illustrated the lyrics and contained is own semi-independent storyline. The first modern-day music video became a hit, and with it the song and -- to a lesser extent -- the album.

Nez was (correctly) convinced that video was the future of pop music, and both Nez and Dear went on to produce music videos for Nez and other artists such as Lionel Richie; in 1980 Nez began the production of a television series called "Popclips," consisting of back-to-back promotional videos from the likes of Queen, David Bowie, ABBA, the Tubes, and other early adopters. The series aired briefly on Nickelodeon in 1980, spurring Warner Amex Satellite Entertainment to plan a 24-hour cable music channel. Nesmith was involved at first, but his vision of music video as art clashed with Warner Amex's vision of a heavily formatted and researched album-oriented rock outlet for the eyes. Nez balked and Warner Amex went ahead without him to create MTV.

Concurrent with this Nez continued to develop his own videos, and he briefly considered his next record -- "Infinite Rider On the Big Dogma" -- to be the first video album. His company, Pacific Arts, would no longer release audio-only albums, he said.

By all accounts videos were only made of five songs off the album, and four of them -- along with "Rio" -- were to form the musical basis for Nez's next project, a one-hour music-and-dadaist-comedy compilation that owed as much to Ernie Kovacs and Monty Python as it did to Nez's TV training as a Monkee.

First released in 1981 on VHS and Pioneer laserdisc (with two minutes' worth of scenes cut in order to fit the program to a 60-minte CAV side), Michael Nesmith's "Elephant Parts" went on to win the very first Music Video Grammy; it was re-released in 1990 on CLV laserdisc (with the missing two minutes restored) in a two-disc set that included a live concert performance, "Live At the Britt Festival." In 1998 the program finally made it to DVD, and included a dadaist stream-of-consciousness Nez commentary that few people could listen to for more than a few minutes (but snippets of which make an excellent phone-answering-machine message).

Now in a twentieth-anniversary re-release, Nez has recorded an actual making-of commentary that fills in many of the details of this historical (if not historic) long-form video.

As a standalone piece of entertainment, however, "Elephant Parts" shares the fate of most comedies. Many of the pieces that were once hilarious and innovative have -- by repetition in lesser works and by the passage of time -- become dated and stale, in much the same way that the once-groundbreaking videos appear primitive to today's audiences. Yes, many of the segments retain their original power (notably "Bitty Soda," "Neighborhood Nukes," and "Mariachi Trans Later," to name a few), but unless your viewing experience is pharmaceutically enhanced then the piece must be placed in its historical context to be fully appreciated.

With that said, however, "Elephant Parts" is a must-see -- especially for fans of the music-video format, and those too young to remember when MTV actually was Music Television.

The music itself is wonderful, and although none of the songs here (perhaps excepting "Rio") reach the artistic level of Nez's First National Band ouvre, one can see in each of the videos the creation of a film grammar -- the quick cuts on the beat, the dense imagery to support multiple viewings, the post-camera massaging of the image, the intentional lack of frame-to-frame continuity -- that formed the foundation of all videos to come.

If you purchase the DVD directly from Nez's website at http://www.videoranch.com, you can request that Nez autograph a copy for you. Be sure to tell them that VideoTropic sent you.

Film Synopsis:

"Michael Nesmith in Elephant Parts" is an original film produced especially for the home video lover. Packed with a full 60 minutes of non-stop laughs and music, Nesmith and his cast of crazy characters oversee the transformation of Joanne into Rodan; burger kings into sky pilots; and neighborhood nuclear superiority into a reality. With detailed attention to cinematic depth and color, you'll travel through the stars to Rio and cruise Hollywood with Lucy, Ramona, and Sunset Sam. The five illustrated songs and the numerous connecting comedy pieces are all tiny movies in their own right, and can be experienced over and over again. There is something new to catch each time you view a part or all of "Michael Nesmith in Elephant Parts."

Technical

Video:	Fullscreen 1.33:1
Audio:	ENGLISH: Dolby Digital 2.0
Subtitles:	None
Chapters:	41

The video is presented in its original 1.33:1 fullscreen presentation. While noticeably clearer than in its previous DVD and laserdisc incarnations, the image is soft and cannot be projected on a big-screen TV (50" or larger) without its limitations becoming visible. As video was still in its infancy it is not surprising that the filmed segments appear smoother than the videotaped ones, but we feel that -- as limited as the video is -- this is preferable to an artificially-enhanced image. The colors are occasionally shaky, again an artifact of the original source.

The audio is Dolby Digital 2.0, and is good throughout, and excellent on the music videos -- not surprising, considering Nesmith's attention to detail on this aspect of his craft (the original Elephant Parts laserdisc was the first to be released using CX noise reduction, and his "Tropical Campfire's" album was the first CD released in Dolby Surround).

Supplements

• Scene-specific audio commentary by Michael Nesmith
• Photo gallery

On the scene-specific commentary track, Nez discusses the origins of the film and talks at length about what went on both in front of and behind the cameras. The entire film, except for the on-location music videos, was filmed on a shoestring budget in a converted garage in Carmel, California (yes, it's the garage/studio that appears towards the end of "Tonite" over the closing credits, with Nez's motor home in the foreground: 361 Orange, San City, CA).

We were somewhat disappointed with the scarcity of supplements. The more-or-less sequel to Elephant Parts, Dr. Duck's Super-Secret All-Purpose Sauce, has never been released on DVD (nor has Nesmith's six-episode TV series Television Parts, or it's subsequent Television Parts Home Companion video); adding any of these would have been a welcome addition, or even the concurrently-released "Infinite Rider On the Big Dogma" album on an audio track. Perhaps when it is re-released again on Blu-ray DVD...