Warrant — Blind Faith

JUL 01 1991 · 12:00

Warrant — Blind Faith (1991) Director: Nigel Dick Era: Glam Metal / Hair Metal Twilight Era (1991) - Late-peak hair metal power ballad cycle, released months before Nevermind reshaped mainstream rock radio; Columbia Records major-label production at genre's commercial apex. High curatorial value as a confirmed-director, major-label production capturing glam metal's power ballad visual grammar at the genre's commercial apex and cultural inflection point. The monochrome-to-color device, Nigel Dick's involvement, and the song's documented chart performance make this a primary archival artifact for scholars of early-1990s MTV aesthetics, Los Angeles hard rock culture, and the transitional period immediately preceding grunge's mainstream breakthrough. Context: Released in 1991 as the fourth single from Warrant's Columbia Records album Cherry Pie, 'Blind Faith' represents the genre-peak and simultaneously genre-twilight moment of Los Angeles glam metal. Warrant occupied a commercial sweet spot between carnivalesque party rock ('Cherry Pie') and earnest melodic balladry ('Heaven,' 'I Saw Red'). The video's monochrome-to-color reveal mirrors a broader industry aesthetic language of sincerity — a visual grammar that signaled emotional authenticity to MTV's mass audience at a moment when hair metal was beginning to face cultural pressure from emerging alternative and grunge movements. The song charted at #88 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #39 on Mainstream Rock Tracks, reflecting solid but not peak crossover performance typical of later singles from a blockbuster album cycle. Director notes: Confirmed via IMVDb (https://imvdb.com/video/warrant/blind-faith) and IMDB (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7030060/) as the director of this 1991 video, released as the fourth single from Warrant's album Cherry Pie on Columbia Records. The video employs a monochrome-to-color structural device: it opens in black and white with the lead vocalist performing solo against a black background, transitioning to full color when the full band joins at the chorus. Color narrative inserts of a woman are intercut throughout. This technique aligns with Dick's established aesthetic of using stark, high-contrast lighting rigs and controlled color palette shifts to underscore emotional dynamics — consistent with his broader 1990-1991 Columbia/Sony work. The rapid editing pace (avg shot length ~1.55s) is atypically fast for the power ballad subgenre, suggesting a deliberate editorial decision to sustain visual energy across a slower musical tempo.