Matt Sloan and Aaron Yonda, the local lights behind Chad Vader and a heapin' handful of other goofball videos, have a new, well, goofy rock 'n' roll parody song out now on their own "SexHat Records." Titled "(Let Me Find the Way to the Middle of Your) Heart's Desire," this monster power ballad composed (and sung) by their regular musical collaborator Andrew Yonda is belted out by the coke-snorting rock and roller villain Jimmy Samson.
This hair-metal god portrayed by Aaron Yonda appears in Episode 1 and Episode 3 of their series Morning Radio Mysteries, which is featured on the online video network Super Deluxe. In the third episode, the doofus morning drive guys for WRZR "The Razor" FM have insulted the manhood of Samson one time too many. The flower boa-draped Ronnie James Dio clone retaliates and takes the two prisoner, then tortures them in song.
Yonda says they liked Samson's brief performances so much they decided to feature him in a stand-alone full-blown music video.
"It was a big budget video, one of our most expensive to date," says Yonda. Topping out at nearly $8000, it was directed by Sloan and Yonda and features a slew of Blame Society Productions regulars in front of and behind the cameras. "The recording was done at Andrew's studio," explains his brother Aaron about its making. "Matt and I wrote the lyrics, gave him some ideas for the melody and let him go with it. That's actually him singing, not me. Once he had a cut finished we came back and hashed out the finer touches."
Sloan and Yonda debuted a rough cut before fellow Madison filmmakers at the Wis-Kino screening in March, worked out some details, and subsequently published it online last Sunday. Aaron Yonda stars as "Rocker Jimmy Samson," with Matt Sloan as the Slash-homage "Slice" and Andrew Yonda as "Wizzy" rounding out the band.
The subject of the tune is Jimmy's deep, throbbing, uncontrollable love -- or as he puts, his "earthquake blast" -- and not bloody mayhem, while the musical treatment falls somewhere between The Tubes and a treacly Top 40 ballad from the early Seventies. For its part, the video overflows with genre-appropriate lighting effects, hot chicks and snickering references to MTV hair metal hits like Van Halen's butt 'n' boobs classic "Hot for Teacher."
It's very funny stuff, although not quite laugh until-you-piss-your-pants hilarious. For that, you still have to turn to the note-perfect videos embedded in the first iteration of This is Spinal Tap. But the storyboard's dead-on, and whenever Sloan and Yonda cut to the sex-crazed Jimmy climbing an enormous, well-toned female gam, you can almost hear the real Dio yodeling his way to leather-bound climax.
"It was a lot of fun and if the video takes off," concludes Yonda, "I suspect we'll be making another one." Can't wait for the live show, dudes.
An MP3 of the track is available in the related downloads at right.
MadTracks highlights and provides MP3s of songs performed by local musicians. All tracks here are provided with permission of the artist. If you are a musician based in the Madison metro area and are interested in sharing your work as a MadTrack, please send a message.
