Electronic — Getting Away With It (1990 Official Music Video)

JUL 01 1990 · 12:00

Electronic — Getting Away With It (1990 Official Music Video) (1990) Director: Judith Briant & Greg Copeland Era: Post-Punk Synth-Pop Crossover (1989–1991) — transitional moment between indie guitar culture and Madchester/electronic dance, catalyzed by a landmark British alt-dance supergroup debut single bridging Factory Records, New Order, The Smiths, and Pet Shop Boys aesthetics Exceptionally high. This is the rarer 1990 US-market version of one of British alternative pop's most celebrated debut singles — a video seldom studied in comparison to the more critically discussed Chris Marker European version. Its quantitative profile (fast edit pace, high saturation, warm-vibrant contrast) provides a measurable index of US MTV broadcast aesthetics at the precise hinge-point between the 1980s and 1990s. The HD upgrade preserves a video that documents a supergroup moment — Sumner, Marr, Tennant — whose constituent artists had collectively defined three of the most influential British pop acts of the preceding decade. Tier 1 archival and research priority. Context: Released in the US in March 1990 — just as the British acid house/Madchester wave was cresting internationally — 'Getting Away with It' represented a rare confluence of three defining strands of 1980s British pop: the post-punk guitar lineage of The Smiths (Marr), the synth-driven melancholy of New Order (Sumner), and the arch, knowing pop sensibility of Pet Shop Boys (Tennant). The 1990 US video was purpose-built for American MTV consumption, replacing Chris Marker's cerebral European studio performance piece with a more chromatic, effects-driven visual language suited to US broadcast aesthetics. The single had already reached UK #12 and US Billboard Hot 100 #38, shipping 350,000 copies in the US alone — remarkable for a Factory Records-originating indie release. The song's lyrics, co-written by Tennant and Sumner, carry a satirical subtext directed at Morrissey's public persona of performed misery, adding an intertextual layer legible primarily to British indie audiences but lending the track a wry sophistication that crossed over internationally. Director notes: This video is the second of two made for 'Getting Away with It' — specifically produced for the 1990 US market release on Warner Bros. Records. The first video (1989, European) was directed by the celebrated French filmmaker Chris Marker. The Briant/Copeland 1990 version takes a distinctly different approach: rather than Marker's studio-performance naturalism, it employs a concept-driven visual language of colored backgrounds and superimposed artistic effects. Bernard Sumner and Neil Tennant appear alternately against chromatic fields; close-up pans on two women's faces are also incorporated. The fast editing pace (avg shot length 3.38s, 78 scene changes over ~4:23) reflects MTV-era broadcast grammar. The warm-vibrant color palette (saturation 144.02, warm temperature 1.69) and high contrast (72.13) are consistent with a stylized early-digital studio production designed for maximum visual impact on broadcast television in the US market.