Dan Flynn explains “The Rise, Fall, and Strange Rebirth of the Music Video“:

The paradox of music videos is that they grew worse as their budgets grew better. Initially, too-literal visual interpretations of lyrics, cheap, clichéd images such as smashing glass, and singers earnestly acting as actors signaled disaster. Later, when the productions resembled, in budget at least, a typical James Cameron film, the pretentiousness clashed with the inherently kitsch format. Think “November Rain.” Aspiring to make an epic music video misses the point.

The jarring new Pixies clip for “Snakes” depicts paper-mache piñata people escaping encroaching predators. It is as off-kilter as the band that doesn’t once appear in it. The disturbing mini-movie makes more sense after a few viewings, which makes sense given that, unlike real movies, music videos aim for hundreds of repeat screenings. The surprise ending, positively Shyamalanian if not Hitchcockian, makes clues, meaningless upon first glance, exude meaning after repeat YouTube visits.

YouTube appears as a worthy successor to MTV. Surely its manner of monetizing—brief ads as payment for watching a clip—works better than the expectation that an inherently impatient demographic, clicker in hand, will waste two-minutes waiting for the songs to return. It’s also less one-size-fits-all MTV, and more user-friendly ’50s jukebox, in its all-request approach. Alas, no Martha Quinn or Triple J walks you through the process, and, like so much on the web, you must go knowingly in search of cool—cool isn’t going to come find you.

Still, making one of the best music videos ever after musicians have largely stopped making, and fans have stopped watching, music videos evokes the idea of a great radio serial broadcast in the 1980s or an eighteenth-century army going into battle with bows at the ready.