What follows is a comprehensive, second-by-second analysis of the music video to Fall Out Boy’s 2005 hit “Dance, Dance”:
0:00 to 0:03
This is Fall Out Boy’s most popular song ever and the one that perfectly represents the peak of their fame. While “Infinity On High” might have been their best-selling record, their true style (before they went all Panic! At The Disco on us) is encompassed in this video. It’s really too bad they went on hiatus but it probably for the best. If you told any FOB fan in 2003 who just bought “Take This To Your Grave” and had them listen to “A Folie Deux”, they would freak and think they sold out. FOB was losing touch with their pop punk roots and maturing as a band. Either that or they were scared Panic! At The Disco was going to take all their fans.
0:04 to 0:14
OK, the video introduces us to the setting of the video as a high school homecoming dance by showing “Homecoming?” burned into the lawn of a girl’s home and a random dude riding past it on a bicycle. There are some problems with this. One, if I was the father in the house and saw this burning on my front lawn, I would be insanely pissed. Two, the bike rider must have had an accomplice while burning this question into the lawn because it is impossible for him to light the word, accurately throw the rock at the window, turn around and ride past her house within a matter of five seconds. Perhaps I am being a little too harsh on this part but make it somewhat realistic for God’s sake, so I’ll let this one go. Just like T-Pain once blamed it on the alcohol, I blame this on poor editing.
0:15 to 0:33
Next, the video cuts to a guy putting a flower on the girl’s dress and simultaneously revealing our mystery biker: a nerdy version of Pete Wentz! While seeing an awkward ordeal take place and Wentz pondering whether he had already blown the date mere minutes after its inception (his girlfriend assured him he hasn’t), I thought about the major points from the last scene that were left unanswered.
Based on my little knowledge of women, it takes them an extraordinary amount of time to get ready to go on any sort of date. Seeing women frustrate themselves with picking out what to wear, deciding what their hair is going to look like, and all that shit are truly remarkable and highly aggravating. Taking into account the scientific studies that estimate that it takes the average woman two to four hours to get ready for any formal event and the fact that it was nighttime already when Pete asked her, this homecoming dance must start at like 10 P.M. or they live in Alaska.
Secondly, the video never shows us how the couple gets to dance and leaves the viewer’s imagination to wander…
Is there a car involved, one asks. Probably not since Wentz rode his bike to her house.
Did they walk?, another ponders. The most likely possibility because the awkwardness between them vanishes once they get into the gym and would’ve been a nice icebreaker before he almost pierced her heart with the flower.
Did she ride on the pegs on his bike while holding onto his shoulders?, another wonders. I don’t think so. I didn’t see any when Pete was making his daring escape across the street. Plus, it would have been very rude for Wentz to put her on the pegs and have her skirt fly up and expose her underwear (or ass if she is kinky) just because he wants to get to the school in time to see Fall Out Boy play “Dance, Dance”. No doubt he would’ve been dumped at the gym door if he put her through that. An illogical move.
Did he put her on the front of his bike “ET”-style and fly romantically through the sky over the illuminated town with the moonlight beaming down on them, then have a gentle landing into the school’s parking lot?, one hypothesizes. No.
0:34 to 1:06
The couple goes into the dance just as his rocker counterpart begins to play “Dance, Dance” I’m happy Pete made it just in time.. Upon arrival, Pete gets introduced to the Resident Douchebag, who looks like Travis Van Winkle’s character from Transformers’ cousin. Pete fakes out The Douche with a slick handshake move a looks like a cool guy for once. The Douche stares in disbelief with his surprisingly unattractive girlfriend. More of this to come.
1:07 to 1:17
In the midst of screaming fans, Pete finds Nerdy Patrick Stump and the rest of the nerdy versions of Fall Out Boy. I find it highly unusual that Nerdy FOB never makes the connection that they look exactly like Rocker FOB. Then I realize that these types of things happen in music videos and I shouldn’t be surprised but always am.
1:18 to 1:21
Stump and the other single members of nerdy FOB scout the playing field. The girls range from large, bored and unenthusiastic to plumpy and out of tune.
1:22 to 1:25
For some reason, Rocker Wentz tries to bite off Rocker Stump’s ear.
1:26 to 1:27
Ah, the iconic FOB guitarist spin move. This has been the one FOB trademark that I have never understood. Is it even possible to play the guitar while spinning at a high velocity? It seems like a rather pointless thing to do on stage but it seems rather entertaining. I have always disliked it because I can never get it around my head that somebody can spin around and play guitar without messing up. Also, it is because I am jealous that they are insanely talented and I don’t have a musical bone in my body (except for the one in my pants).
1:28 to 1:32
Nerdy Wentz is crowd surfing. More cool points added to his score.
1:33- 1:34
A shot of black people dancing strangely. I don’t like where this is going.
1:35 to 1:42
The Resident Douchebag kiss blocks Nerdy Wentz and smiles after doing so. Like a Douche.
1:43 to 2:08
Nerdy Stump reenacts every conversation I’ve had with a pretty girl at any social event over the last 19 years of my life. Thanks for the reminder of what a loser I am, Nerdy Stump!
Meanwhile, the Nerdy FOB drummer (whose name I am too lazy to look up) tries to ask a girl to dance but aborts the mission and sits down in stands and reads.
2:09 to 2:15
In the 10+ times I have watched this video, it still shocks me how people can dance to FOB music in such weird ways. I am pretty sure people were square dancing to this song but don’t want to believe it. The Nerdy FOB guitarist (whose name I am also too lazy to look up) tries to nimble off a girl’s ear and properly gets slapped. This video is reminding me way too much of high school.
2:16 to 2:36
Uh oh, the Resident Douchebag’s girlfriend is seducing Patrick Stump. This is not going to end well.
On the other hand, there are some curious dance moves out on the floor that make me question who Fall Out Boy thinks is their target audience and if they ever envisioned people would be dancing so strangely to their music.
2:37 to 3:13
Nerdy Stump doesn’t seem to be appeased by dancing of the Resident Douchebag’s unattractive girlfriend, and with good reason. Unfortunately Nerdy Stump’s nerdiness gets the best of him and starts dancing like a total goof. In a total bitch move, Resident Douchebag’s girlfriend ditches him and leaves him to dance for himself while the surrounding crowd laughs at him manically. Fortunately for him, somebody saves the day by pulling him away and throwing him into a mosh pit. At this point, I really want this music video to end well for Nerdy Patrick Stump. He seems just like me when I was in high school and would hate to see him die by being moshed to death.
Elsewhere, the dance floor introduces us to a very talented dancing Asian kid. At this point, I think FOB wanted to hit all demographics and expanded the marketability of the video by including all ethnicities. Although, no crazy music video is complete without a dancing Asian.
3:15 to 3:23
This is the most offensive part of the video. No joke. First off, guys’ bathrooms do not fill up to the brim with dudes primping their hair and adjusting their attire. At any high school dance, there is a max of five guys in there at a time because most of them are out on the dance floor grindin’ it up/laying the groundwork for getting laid that night.
Secondly, dudes do not say things like “So it’s still gonna be like this for guys like us?” No, one night will change it all”. I certainly hope that he is talking about his virginity. This scene is obviously a ploy that tries to get girls to believe that Pete Wentz is sensitive and soft but in reality, most guys don’t talk about how they want to score their dream girl in high school. As a member of the male gender, this is the most insulting thing I have ever seen and such a misevaluation of a gender has never been clearer than this video. Thankfully, a teacher breaks up the tea party and saves the millions of males who have watched his video from hanging themselves.
3:24 to 3:48
Alright, I have dodged this issue too long to not address it fully. BLACK PEOPLE DO NOT DANCE LIKE THAT! Not once in my life have I met a person of color who listens to Fall Out Boy no less dance like that. These dancers have such funky moves that I cannot even describe it. The guy and girl shown are battling for dance space by doing some odd shaking move before the guy decides to hump her girl, prompting her to shake him off and he exit stage right via a seizure.
This section also brings up a reason why I love music videos by bands under the Fueled By Ramen label: they always include each other in one another’s videos almost as if they are contractually obligated to do so. In this particular video, Travie McCoy of Gym Class Heroes has a small dance solo. Other examples are Patrick Stump in GCH’s “Girlfriend” and Stump and McCoy in Cobra Starship’s “Snakes On A Plane”.
(On an unrelated note, I wonder how Travie McCoy and GCH signed with Fueled By Ramen. They are a hip-hop oriented group but just happen to be a band and it seemed pretty obvious that McCoy was going solo eventually so why sign with a label where every member is largely (if not all) white. I guess McCoy wasn’t thinking about street cred when he signed the record deal. Regardless of my opinion, it seemed to be a pretty good decision by him. Back to the video.)
3:49 to 4:24
All of the sudden, Nerdy Pete Wentz is pushed out of the crowd and is forced to dance solo. Seeing no problem with this and knowing that it is an opportunity to score some major cool points, Wentz brushes the dirt off his shoulder and pulls off a pretty good routine. He must get the practice and athleticism for doing this from doing all those guitar spins with his alter-ego. Eventually, others pickup the dance quickly and form one of the best dance mobs in recent history. Everyone surrounds Wentz as the song ends and Wentz soaks in his newly reached “cool person” status. However, it gets better as…
4:25 to 4:35
His feminine fantasy comes true when his date runs up and kisses him on the lips! What a charming moment. I hope he got to second base that night!
Anywho, Nerdy FOB drummer ended up making out with his stalker and the whereabouts of Nerdy Patrick Stump are still unknown.
4:36 to 4:38
Fade to black.
Despite all the fun I am poking at this video, I really do like it. I find it incredibly fascinating how FOB and popular music has changed over the past six years. FOB was the first band that I really enjoyed and got me into music. May their eventual return from hiatus be as glorious as their birth was, but for now all we have are videos like this to make us nostalgic for simpler times and much crazier dance moves.
0:00 to 0:03
This is Fall Out Boy’s most popular song ever and the one that perfectly represents the peak of their fame. While “Infinity On High” might have been their best-selling record, their true style (before they went all Panic! At The Disco on us) is encompassed in this video. It’s really too bad they went on hiatus but it probably for the best. If you told any FOB fan in 2003 who just bought “Take This To Your Grave” and had them listen to “A Folie Deux”, they would freak and think they sold out. FOB was losing touch with their pop punk roots and maturing as a band. Either that or they were scared Panic! At The Disco was going to take all their fans.
0:04 to 0:14
OK, the video introduces us to the setting of the video as a high school homecoming dance by showing “Homecoming?” burned into the lawn of a girl’s home and a random dude riding past it on a bicycle. There are some problems with this. One, if I was the father in the house and saw this burning on my front lawn, I would be insanely pissed. Two, the bike rider must have had an accomplice while burning this question into the lawn because it is impossible for him to light the word, accurately throw the rock at the window, turn around and ride past her house within a matter of five seconds. Perhaps I am being a little too harsh on this part but make it somewhat realistic for God’s sake, so I’ll let this one go. Just like T-Pain once blamed it on the alcohol, I blame this on poor editing.
0:15 to 0:33
Next, the video cuts to a guy putting a flower on the girl’s dress and simultaneously revealing our mystery biker: a nerdy version of Pete Wentz! While seeing an awkward ordeal take place and Wentz pondering whether he had already blown the date mere minutes after its inception (his girlfriend assured him he hasn’t), I thought about the major points from the last scene that were left unanswered.
Based on my little knowledge of women, it takes them an extraordinary amount of time to get ready to go on any sort of date. Seeing women frustrate themselves with picking out what to wear, deciding what their hair is going to look like, and all that shit are truly remarkable and highly aggravating. Taking into account the scientific studies that estimate that it takes the average woman two to four hours to get ready for any formal event and the fact that it was nighttime already when Pete asked her, this homecoming dance must start at like 10 P.M. or they live in Alaska.
Secondly, the video never shows us how the couple gets to dance and leaves the viewer’s imagination to wander…
Is there a car involved, one asks. Probably not since Wentz rode his bike to her house.
Did they walk?, another ponders. The most likely possibility because the awkwardness between them vanishes once they get into the gym and would’ve been a nice icebreaker before he almost pierced her heart with the flower.
Did she ride on the pegs on his bike while holding onto his shoulders?, another wonders. I don’t think so. I didn’t see any when Pete was making his daring escape across the street. Plus, it would have been very rude for Wentz to put her on the pegs and have her skirt fly up and expose her underwear (or ass if she is kinky) just because he wants to get to the school in time to see Fall Out Boy play “Dance, Dance”. No doubt he would’ve been dumped at the gym door if he put her through that. An illogical move.
Did he put her on the front of his bike “ET”-style and fly romantically through the sky over the illuminated town with the moonlight beaming down on them, then have a gentle landing into the school’s parking lot?, one hypothesizes. No.
0:34 to 1:06
The couple goes into the dance just as his rocker counterpart begins to play “Dance, Dance” I’m happy Pete made it just in time.. Upon arrival, Pete gets introduced to the Resident Douchebag, who looks like Travis Van Winkle’s character from Transformers’ cousin. Pete fakes out The Douche with a slick handshake move a looks like a cool guy for once. The Douche stares in disbelief with his surprisingly unattractive girlfriend. More of this to come.
1:07 to 1:17
In the midst of screaming fans, Pete finds Nerdy Patrick Stump and the rest of the nerdy versions of Fall Out Boy. I find it highly unusual that Nerdy FOB never makes the connection that they look exactly like Rocker FOB. Then I realize that these types of things happen in music videos and I shouldn’t be surprised but always am.
1:18 to 1:21
Stump and the other single members of nerdy FOB scout the playing field. The girls range from large, bored and unenthusiastic to plumpy and out of tune.
1:22 to 1:25
For some reason, Rocker Wentz tries to bite off Rocker Stump’s ear.
1:26 to 1:27
Ah, the iconic FOB guitarist spin move. This has been the one FOB trademark that I have never understood. Is it even possible to play the guitar while spinning at a high velocity? It seems like a rather pointless thing to do on stage but it seems rather entertaining. I have always disliked it because I can never get it around my head that somebody can spin around and play guitar without messing up. Also, it is because I am jealous that they are insanely talented and I don’t have a musical bone in my body (except for the one in my pants).
1:28 to 1:32
Nerdy Wentz is crowd surfing. More cool points added to his score.
1:33- 1:34
A shot of black people dancing strangely. I don’t like where this is going.
1:35 to 1:42
The Resident Douchebag kiss blocks Nerdy Wentz and smiles after doing so. Like a Douche.
1:43 to 2:08
Nerdy Stump reenacts every conversation I’ve had with a pretty girl at any social event over the last 19 years of my life. Thanks for the reminder of what a loser I am, Nerdy Stump!
Meanwhile, the Nerdy FOB drummer (whose name I am too lazy to look up) tries to ask a girl to dance but aborts the mission and sits down in stands and reads.
2:09 to 2:15
In the 10+ times I have watched this video, it still shocks me how people can dance to FOB music in such weird ways. I am pretty sure people were square dancing to this song but don’t want to believe it. The Nerdy FOB guitarist (whose name I am also too lazy to look up) tries to nimble off a girl’s ear and properly gets slapped. This video is reminding me way too much of high school.
2:16 to 2:36
Uh oh, the Resident Douchebag’s girlfriend is seducing Patrick Stump. This is not going to end well.
On the other hand, there are some curious dance moves out on the floor that make me question who Fall Out Boy thinks is their target audience and if they ever envisioned people would be dancing so strangely to their music.
2:37 to 3:13
Nerdy Stump doesn’t seem to be appeased by dancing of the Resident Douchebag’s unattractive girlfriend, and with good reason. Unfortunately Nerdy Stump’s nerdiness gets the best of him and starts dancing like a total goof. In a total bitch move, Resident Douchebag’s girlfriend ditches him and leaves him to dance for himself while the surrounding crowd laughs at him manically. Fortunately for him, somebody saves the day by pulling him away and throwing him into a mosh pit. At this point, I really want this music video to end well for Nerdy Patrick Stump. He seems just like me when I was in high school and would hate to see him die by being moshed to death.
Elsewhere, the dance floor introduces us to a very talented dancing Asian kid. At this point, I think FOB wanted to hit all demographics and expanded the marketability of the video by including all ethnicities. Although, no crazy music video is complete without a dancing Asian.
3:15 to 3:23
This is the most offensive part of the video. No joke. First off, guys’ bathrooms do not fill up to the brim with dudes primping their hair and adjusting their attire. At any high school dance, there is a max of five guys in there at a time because most of them are out on the dance floor grindin’ it up/laying the groundwork for getting laid that night.
Secondly, dudes do not say things like “So it’s still gonna be like this for guys like us?” No, one night will change it all”. I certainly hope that he is talking about his virginity. This scene is obviously a ploy that tries to get girls to believe that Pete Wentz is sensitive and soft but in reality, most guys don’t talk about how they want to score their dream girl in high school. As a member of the male gender, this is the most insulting thing I have ever seen and such a misevaluation of a gender has never been clearer than this video. Thankfully, a teacher breaks up the tea party and saves the millions of males who have watched his video from hanging themselves.
3:24 to 3:48
Alright, I have dodged this issue too long to not address it fully. BLACK PEOPLE DO NOT DANCE LIKE THAT! Not once in my life have I met a person of color who listens to Fall Out Boy no less dance like that. These dancers have such funky moves that I cannot even describe it. The guy and girl shown are battling for dance space by doing some odd shaking move before the guy decides to hump her girl, prompting her to shake him off and he exit stage right via a seizure.
This section also brings up a reason why I love music videos by bands under the Fueled By Ramen label: they always include each other in one another’s videos almost as if they are contractually obligated to do so. In this particular video, Travie McCoy of Gym Class Heroes has a small dance solo. Other examples are Patrick Stump in GCH’s “Girlfriend” and Stump and McCoy in Cobra Starship’s “Snakes On A Plane”.
(On an unrelated note, I wonder how Travie McCoy and GCH signed with Fueled By Ramen. They are a hip-hop oriented group but just happen to be a band and it seemed pretty obvious that McCoy was going solo eventually so why sign with a label where every member is largely (if not all) white. I guess McCoy wasn’t thinking about street cred when he signed the record deal. Regardless of my opinion, it seemed to be a pretty good decision by him. Back to the video.)
3:49 to 4:24
All of the sudden, Nerdy Pete Wentz is pushed out of the crowd and is forced to dance solo. Seeing no problem with this and knowing that it is an opportunity to score some major cool points, Wentz brushes the dirt off his shoulder and pulls off a pretty good routine. He must get the practice and athleticism for doing this from doing all those guitar spins with his alter-ego. Eventually, others pickup the dance quickly and form one of the best dance mobs in recent history. Everyone surrounds Wentz as the song ends and Wentz soaks in his newly reached “cool person” status. However, it gets better as…
4:25 to 4:35
His feminine fantasy comes true when his date runs up and kisses him on the lips! What a charming moment. I hope he got to second base that night!
Anywho, Nerdy FOB drummer ended up making out with his stalker and the whereabouts of Nerdy Patrick Stump are still unknown.
4:36 to 4:38
Fade to black.
Despite all the fun I am poking at this video, I really do like it. I find it incredibly fascinating how FOB and popular music has changed over the past six years. FOB was the first band that I really enjoyed and got me into music. May their eventual return from hiatus be as glorious as their birth was, but for now all we have are videos like this to make us nostalgic for simpler times and much crazier dance moves.