Nothing can last forever, no!

So, I need to write a post about my trip to Oregon last weekend but I've been kind of swamped lately. But I will tell you now, one of the most exciting things about the weekend is that I heard the song "Summer of '69" by Bryan Adams twice in five minutes on the radio. Oregon has got some great radio (exception: one time a DJ said he was going to play Bryan Adams, but instead of playing S of 69, he played "Heaven"). Anyways, this is an important song, and as such, I have provided a viewing guide to the music video, below.



Obviously in the first three seconds we get the most famous riff in all of rock music history.*
*Not verified; rock music history narrowly defined here.

We start with young Bryan very literally getting his first real six string (not at the five & dime)

He is too cool for the guitar case, and so into guitar that he plays while walking.

I don't really think Bryan "tries real hard" with this band, as he claims, because all he does is drink beer in the rehearsal scenes. But he blames the band's failure on Jody and Jimmy. What an ass.

Then the house falls down. A metaphor for lost youth? The guitar gets buried below the house, so one would think so, but then we cut to Bryan in a hammock. IN COLOR. Look, I can't even begin to explain the metaphorical implications of switching back and forth from color to black and white in this video, but it probably has something to do with either nostalgia or the Wizard of Oz. But the metaphor for lost youth loses some kick here, because lying around in a hammock...who has time for that?

He's in a therapy session. Then the hammock falls, much like the house. Perhaps foreshadowing the fall down the charts Bryan Adams would take?

Back to black and white. Bryan has some weird indiscernable job at a drive-in. He meets a girl (we are getting to the love part of the song). Are all the falling scenes metaphors for falling...in love?

Then black and white love scene turns into color scene and Bryan walks away. You may think, why is he walking away from the girl? Well, I will tell you, it's so we can get to the COOLEST part of the video, which is in black and white, and BRYAN ADAMS JUMPS ON A STREET FIRE AND KICKS THE FIRE AROUND. This moment happens at about the minute-forty mark and is probably the best thing ever in music video history. It is showing how "young and restless" he is, cause then he throws some stuff, breaks things, etc. and you kind of wonder, hey, if he had all these outlets like love and the guitar and whatnot, why can't he just calm down a little bit? Can all this recklessness truly constitute the best days of your life? The answer of course is yes, because the album that this song was on was called "Reckless" (I'm not proud I know that, but I've been reading about this song lately).

The cops are foiled by the old fruit on the floor trick, while Bryan talks about times changing...just as it goes from black and white to color again. So deep.

Now, if Bryan jumping on the fire is the coolest moment in music video history, then the moment when Bryan catches the guitar mid-session is probably at least in the top 100 other moments for me. Then the video kind of falls apart, with a generic jam session (in color). This scene provides no insight into the mystery of song, which is of course whether the song refers to a year, a car, or a sexual position. Obviously with this kind of artistry, we are not meant to know.