There are two parts of England that I know well. The country you were thinking of moving to and the country that actually exists.
The first is a kind of fantasy ready for export. All stately homes, velvet blazers, and guys named Oliver talking softly about literature while holding glasses of red wine.
Second, and in my first-hand experience, this country is sustained by a collective willingness to accept meal deals, wet socks, and dryers that don’t work at all.
Somewhere between these two British lies the truth. And I’m starting to realize more and more that the truth involves…taking that.
For Americans, Take That is a cultural blind spot. Robbie Williams’ name is well-known from the Apes movie, but the band itself never fully crossed the Atlantic like One Direction or The 1975.
That means there’s a fundamental part of British pop culture that Americans are simply missing.
And unfortunately (or fortunately?), my introduction was not a gentle one.
It was the uncensored music video for “Do What You Like.” Enjoy my authentic real-time experience of experiencing this truly memorable audio-visual achievement for the first time, recorded by my notes and recording of verbal responses.
Before you watch: False Confidence
Going in, despite my limited knowledge, I was pretty sure Take That = a British boy band. Robbie Williams = This British boy band still makes me refuse to button my shirt. British = deep attachment.
My editor said this video had a “shocking” surprise in store. As someone who saw people’s reactions to Saltburn and thought, “Oh, so you’ve never been in love before, or what?” I’m not easily shocked.
I thought I was trying to look at something charmingly old-fashioned. Maybe some coordinated dancing. Probably a wind generator. In the worst case scenario, it’s just a mild pelvic thrust.
Reader, I was an idiot.
Opening: Mad Max, but… Catholic?
The video opened and I immediately wrote in my notes: “Oh my gosh, their biker outfits are oh my gosh” Fun! ‘
But then I noticed the cross. So now I’m thinking: Priests after the apocalypse? Did you find a hot topic about Mad Max? It’s leather, it’s fringe, it’s religious iconography, it’s capris. Capri pants! All of them are hairless calves!
There’s something deeply endearing about a group of men dressed like dystopian priests who look like they’re ready to teach a Zumba class in 2003. I also said, “Wait, they’re all so cute. Now I understand why teenage girls had posters of these boys.”
Atmosphere: Confusing, athletic, very humid.
Very quickly we enter a situation that can only be described as: texture forward video phase.
Contains whipped cream. There’s jelly (yes, I just found out you call it jelly, not Jell-O, but in spirit it’s the same). There are women out there… Applying these substances to band members is a lot like watching a toddler cool cupcakes without supervision.
At one point, a woman applies whipped cream to a man’s shoulder with the same intensity you would apply tiger balm to a sports injury.
why? Because let’s forget it, dear. can Do what you like.
I laughed, thinking this video was proof of the possibility of free will. Someone said, “Okay, this song is about doing whatever you want. So if you could do anything, what would you do?”
To which they responded in what I imagine to be perfect harmonious unison: “Jelly will wrestle my brothers!”
Choreography: Homoerotic Jazzercise
Dance is worthy of academic study.
There is one small and fun guy. I’ll look up his name later. Every time he says “energy,” his face lights up and he charges in, as if he personally invented the concept. The other seems to specialize exclusively in what can only be called hand dancing, made all the more powerful by the aggressive fringe on the sleeves. I love both. I hope they kiss.
Then there’s the person wearing a chainmail thong over leather capri pants, who in the video performs ballet leaps and sometimes backflips. Before there was Benson Boone, there was Take That.
At this point, you get distracted by the thought that it might be slippery to do a backflip when the floor is covered in desert.
Synopsis (?): Gospel According to Jelly
At a certain point, I started trying to impose a narrative logic.
Everyone is wearing a cross. Contains plenty of jelly. Jelly is shared, thrown and smeared. Is this…a sacrament?
Is this another world where Christ’s body is jelly and his blood is cream?
“Please make this jelly my body.” I’m just asking, journalism is about staying curious.
Oh, they do more hip thrusts now!
Camerawork: The man who discovered zoom
Around the halfway mark, it becomes clear that the photographer has recently discovered the zoom feature and is determined to get his money’s worth.
Zooming in. Zooming out. You end up zooming in where you don’t need to zoom. At one point I simply wrote, “I got motion sickness.”
Also… there are a lot of crotch shots. Covered with jelly.
Was this the shocking part I had been warned about?
Turning Point: Sticky…brotherly love?
Somewhere out of the chaos, something almost…healthy emerges?
Covered with jelly. They are shirtless. They’re laughing and kind of hugging each other. It gives men friendship. It means “rejecting toxic masculinity through common stickiness.”
For a moment, I thought, “This is great.” This is actually some kind of punk. Look at their radical joy! So, throw away the burden of male shackles and embrace your best friend with a big pile of goo!
after that-
Ending: Ah. Oh my god.
Without warning, the video escalates from “mild disturbance” to “Oh my god, I’m watching this on my work computer, am I breaking the law now?”
Suddenly, a naked butt covered in jelly appeared.
Then all of them.
Completely naked. Covered with jelly. Lying down in groups. It just…exists. Are you giving a presentation? ? ? No, it exists. This is an angle of a man’s figure and the inside of his pants that only a French painter should see.
I wrote in all caps, “WHIP CREAM BUMS!!!!!!” No amount of exclamation points can accurately convey my surprise. I laughed out loud. Perhaps it was more like a sob?
Inexplicably, some women are wiping their butts. I It was I’m worried about ants coming in, but I think it’s good that someone is cleaning it.
At this point I abandoned all attempts at cultural analysis.
Cultural background (I processed the jelly and did a Google search)
After all, this is a low-budget music video, shot in a Heaton Mersey studio in 1991 and co-directed by former BBC Radio 1 DJ and host of The Old Gray Whistle Test, Rosemary Barrett.
Now, wait, was this directed by a woman? Love it? ? Is this the feminine gaze that Emerald Fennell always talks about? Is this a reversal of the feminist idea that “women are objects to be looked at”? Where is this queen now? Did Rosemary Barrett walk like Greta Gerwig could run??
I also learned that the official premise is that the band will be “having fun with women while applying jelly.” “Kavoto” is actually an incredibly funny word that describes authentic dessert chaos.
Not surprisingly, it was banned from being broadcast on daytime television. Unsurprisingly for Britain, which used to air shows like “Naked Date,” “The Hitman” still airs late at night. Because this is a country that believes there is a right time for jelly-based nudity, and that time is after the watershed.
This was early Take That, pre-Polish, pre-Ballard, before Gary Barlow became a national institution, as I now know. Just a chaotic group of young people saying, “Yes, ma’am!” To women with VISION!
Rosemary looked at the statue of David in marble and with the strength and courage of her ancestors tweeted to the PA: “More Jelly” changed the course of this country forever.
final thoughts
Do we now understand the cultural phenomenon of Take That better? No! This experience was mystical.
Still, it was fun! I laughed! I tilted my head! I gasped!
Did you understand Britain better? Also, no.
But I understand that there is a very specific, very British flavor of pop culture that is completely outside of the American gaze, a world where boy bands can be equal parts Catholic Mad Max, dessert-themed performance art, and all-out chaos.
You guys, keep the weirder stuff private and the tastier stuff exportable. I understand that, and I would be honored to have you share your secrets with me.
I will never look at jelly the same way.
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Details: “Music venues are always closing for new bands, so we decided to open a new one.”
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