We know it all too well - a great song being ruined when shortened to video/radio format, leaving all the excellent leads and solo's and heavy metal brilliance out, and only savoring the verses, chorus and main solo.

The absolute worst bitchslap I can think of is the music video for Helloween's "Halloween" - this song is my absolute favourite Helloween song (it was also the first I heard), and when I saw the music video I just shook my head - some people really have no clue what brilliance they turned their back on.







You guys have any contenders for the title?

Funny when I saw the Helloween Halloween video in '87 I thought it was awesome. It made me buy the album.

Savatage - Hall Of The Mountain King

I avoided Savatage for years because of that video. It seemed goofy as hell to me. The joke was on me of course and unfortunately I didn't get any Savatage until the mid-90's.

Raven's "On and On" -- great song, great band, godawful video

Run to the Hills

I can see the Raven one. That was plain cheese. The Helloween, I didn't mind so much.

Dokken -- "Breakin' the Chains" is pretty bad, though the song was always cool

Has anyone seen the video for Billy Squire's "Rock Me Tonite"?

It's a great Zeppelin-esque rock song but...

This one is absurd:



And not much better:

Great song, but this video...

It was apparently shot in a ride in Universal Studios and though Jeff Scott Soto sang on the track, they have Mark Boals in the video with a wig to look more like Jeff. What were they thinking?

Great song, but this video....oy. Trying to be "artsy" on a budget of about six bucks and a broken cracker.

Note Halford's little Freddy Mercury-ish mustache, thankfully that look didn't last beyond this video.

Many of the early Priest videos where very bad. Grim Reaper's "See You in Hell" is legend in it's badness.

This is very fun discussion

Not metal,but how come there are no mentions of Journey's Separate Ways so far?

Also,don't forget Candlemass's Bewitched...

Except for that JUDAS PRIEST-Dont Go video, Squier's Rock Me Tonite, and the HELLOWEEN, guess I either don't mind, or actually like most of the others mentioned.

Why would anyone not like Billy Squires music just because he made a goofy video?I mean he still was rocking.Dont understand why its been said his music went downhill after that and he wasnt popular anymore after that.

It was like when Judas Priest released the Turbo Lover video, and it was just a synthesized pop song.
It just was not cool anymore and time to look for heavier music.

Immortal's Call of the Winter Moon. That video seemed a real howler to me.

Accept's legendary classic "Balls to the Wall" had its length trimmed for its music video, which sucks because that is one of their best songs even if it is the only one some people recognize.


However, I don't think that a crappy music video can actually ruin a fantastic song, I just don't watch the freakin' video. I must say, though, as much as I love the Saxon song "Killing Ground",I have to give the video a thumbs down. I don't like how they took a bunch of live footage that was later shown on a DVD anyway, I mean what's the point? I'd rather watch that footage with what they were actually playing at the time. In most other music videos, the bands at least look like they're actually playing the song. A lot of the footage that's used doesn't really fit either, they'll show footage of guitar solos during the verses or something. Here it is if anyone wants to see it: