with mother's day coming up this weekend, i thought it would be the perfect time to
take a look at Danzig's song 'Mother.' The song sparked such a reaction out
of mtv that they not only banned the video but threatened to ban all of danzig's future videos
but at the end of the day the frontman will get the last laugh and the song will get a re-birth
let's explore what happened in today's video
Starting off his career with the legendary punk rock band the Misfits who would disband in 1983
Danzig would go on to form the group Samhain before the name was changed to just danzig
in 1987. Using his surname it would afford the singer the ability to have a revolving lineup of
musicians. It was one year prior that Danzig signed to Rick Rubin's label def jam who had
helped catapult the careers of slayer the beastie boys and run dmc the 80s were a difficult time
for rock music as it was in the crosshairs of both politicians and most notably the parents
music resource center or the pmrc, which would pressure record companies to start labeling their
albums for offensive content. The opening line of danzig's song mother goes 'mother tell your
children not to walk my way' it was a direct shot at the pmrc danzig would tell city pages
in a 2013 interview mother was a song i wrote about the pmrc al gore wanted to tell people what
they could listen to and what they couldn't. What they could record it was basically coming down to
the idea that he wouldn't let anybody record any music that he didn't think you should be doing.
Released as the lead single from danzig's first album in 1988 under his new moniker
mother was going to be the video that launched the new phase of Danzig's career. Rick Rubin felt
that mtv was going to be pivotal in promoting the record and he would be overseeing the video shoot
in addition to playing producer on his record vincent giordano who worked on the music video
would publish a detailed account of what happened with the shoot and he would recall "Rick Rubin
put together Glenn Danzig and Rick Minello the video's director to begin hammering out a concept
the rough treatment was cobbled together quickly and was a crazy quilt of unusual film references
danzig's mother was about silent films and horror movies like fritz lang nosferatu hot girls shot in
black and white. Giordano would admit how one of the shots for the video would prove to be
problematic. He would write that rick minello rick rubin and glenn danzig had come to an agreement
that the final shot in the video would feature a chicken sacrifice with the blood splattering
on a topless woman. Giordano was concerned that the video would never get played on mtv,
but the trio felt so strongly about the idea, that there was no plan b that was actually set
in motion and he would be quoted as saying "you just hope for the best he referring to rick rubin
developed and courted the controversy but how it would turn out was anyone's guess" The whole video
shoot would happen over just one day and there would be a few hiccups. Danzig apparently wasn't
happy with the shot of a flame emanating from his hand as you can clearly see the protective
jelly. Upon reviewing the tape mtv wanted major edits before they would broadcast a single mtv
actually thought a chicken was sacrificed during the making of the video even though it wasn't
and chocolate syrup was used in the place of blood. Not just that but according to btr today
mtv hated the video so much they threatened to ban all future videos from danzig.
The video would be edited and resubmitted to mtv but the network accidentally played the original
video for one whole week. Rick Rubin couldn't have been more happier as he got the band the
publicity they wanted and was able to talk over 100 people into calling mtv and requesting the
video for mother. A year after the video came out danzig would express his displeasure with mtv
telling metal mania it really pisses me off because they'll show freddy krueger, his bones and
the dog comes over and pisses on his bones and all of a sudden his skin comes back and his guts. I
thought mother was pretty tame with my background i could have done something really wild he'd say
The video would get a second rebirth though five years later when it was released as part of the
thrall demon sweat live ep which featured a live version of the song known as mother 93 a live
shot performance soon got heavy rotation on mtv mother 93 would reach number 43 on the mainstream
rock charts in the u.s and his self-titled debut album would go gold in 1995 and would eventually
be certified platinum soon afterwards. That does it for today's video guys thanks for watching be
sure to like button and subscribe and we'll see you again in rock and roll to stories take care