Music Video Friday: Gwen Stefani, Tom Petty & Jefferson Airplane (An Alice In Wonderland Special)

Today’s music videos all have an Alice In Wonderland theme to them. Here’s my thought process:

While playing Just Dance with my daughter, I often choose What You Waiting For? by Gwen Stefani because I really like the song (but my favorite Just Dance routines are the ones for This Is Halloween and for Dynamite by Taio Cruz in case you want to know). 😉 So when I last played it, it got me thinking about the Gwen Stefani video and I decided that I’d do it for my Music Video Friday. But then I of course thought of Tom Petty’s very famous Alice In Wonderland-themed video for Don’t Come Around Here No More so it made sense to post them together.

I then went Googling shit as I clearly need a life and, holy hell, there have been soooo many Alice In Wonderland-themed things. It must be one of the most widely adapted stories ever (there was also an Aerosmith video that I’d never seen called Sunshine – video HERE). I was never big on Lewis Carroll’s Alice In Wonderland (a bit too weird for me) but I can understand its appeal, especially to artists such as these.

Gwen Stefani’s What You Waiting For? video was directed by Francis Lawrence (director of The Hunger Games films Catching Fire and Mockingjay Part 1 & Part 2). I’ve always really liked a lot of Stefani’s songs (and have probably always kind of wanted to be her) and I think this song is one of her very best. I love the video’s style and am sure she had a lot of fun making it and getting to wear all the clothing by designer John Galliano:

Don’t Come Around Here No More by Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers is more special to me as I’ll always love videos from the Eighties above all others and I saw this one many many times in my pre & early-teen years. I’d never have called myself a big Tom Petty fan but I did really like a few songs & this one was probably my favorite. This video was directed by Jeff Stein. Stein directed The Who documentary The Kids Are Alright and the videos for Billy Idol’s Rebel Yell, Heart’s These Dreams, and… Oh no…. Warrant’s Cherry Pie. No! Not Cherry fucking Pie!!! Ugh. Well, none of them beat the Tom Petty video, which is an all-time classic:

Finally, when doing my Googling, I was reminded of Jefferson Airplane’s White Rabbit, which uses Alice In Wonderland references in order to sing about druuuuuuuugs. I’ve always loved this song since I was a hippie druggie in my past life (before I was reincarnated as a boring 80’s kid) so I had to include it. Go ask Alice!: