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it wasn't until "Beavis and Butt-head" came along that I clued into the way all that tripe could be used, that the snide remarks my friends and I made while watching passive product were anything but passive. The act of talking back to bad videos was always a pastime, but now, for a few TV smart alecs, it's a career. Consider the fact that the "Pop-Up" staff were paid actual American dollars to give the treatment to Miami Sound Machine's "Bad Boy" -- a video of such quality, such perfection, that improving it was previously considered impossible. You got Gloria Estefan! You got guys dressed up like cats! You got dance moves! A dark alley! And synthesizers! Gold, right? On "Pop-Up," they ID the video, per usual, naming the title, the artist, the name of the album, record company and director. At turns trivial, smart and trivial again, the low-key pleasure of watching the show lies in its randomness. We're given informational tidbits, including that it was "filmed over two nights in an alley in downtown Los Angeles." But the more compelling moments are when the bubbles make sly critique of the action: When Gloria sings suggestively to a cat, "You get me so excited," the bubble deadpans, "Bestiality is a felony in 17 states." A few seconds later, as Gloria drives down the alley with a cat in a convertible, the bubble simply points out that it's "the director's car." If "Beavis and Butt-head" (not to mention its cousin "Mystery Science Theater") ape the social interactions between friends as they face bad videos and bad films, "Pop-Up" comes closer to the lone TV watcher's discourse with herself. Since its asides are of the silent, stream-of-consciousness variety, the show approximates a wandering mind. Since videos are staffed by non-actors acting, since they often impose a contrived story onto a non-narrative song, since they frequently feature wardrobe not encountered in daily life, it is impossible to fully concentrate on them in a linear, beginning-to-end manner. How can you possibly pay attention to Cher in a focused fashion for four whole minutes? You're going to wonder about her poor kid, or why she does that to her hair, or what her real face would look like, what she was thinking when she picked out that outfit, tattoo, etc. "Pop-Up Video" isn't as savage or as funny or as subversive as "Beavis and Butt-head." In those cartoon doofs' world, lots of stuff sucks, but some stuff's cool, and all that carping made room for intermittent head-banging joy. Because when AC/DC or Metallica or whoever moved them, they'd dance. During those moments, the show looked like pure happiness, even if someone using the word happiness was met with a crack like, "Heh heh, he said, 'Penis.'" "Beavis and Butt-head" never feels like art school; it feels like life. If the tone of "Beavis and Butt-head" has the rough edges of rock, "Pop-Up" lives up to its name. Its vibe is more Warholian, cooler and flatter, its commentary almost always linguistic. Whereas Beavis' critiques are often delivered in an unsure mess of grunts and wheezes and screams, "Pop-Up's" annotations are roped off in clean little bubbles of neat, legible graphics. On the other hand, like a lot of people with a clear moral vision, Beavis and Butt-head were predictable: Metalheads were always going to catch their fancy and P.J. Harvey was always going to weird them out. Maybe because it's produced by VH-1, a network that, unlike MTV, seems to know that pop music existed prior to 1982, "Pop-Up's" tastes are more catholic. And more democratic: They make fun of everybody, from pipsqueaks Hanson to old farts the Grateful Dead. The point of art in this century (what's left of it) is to sneak up and blow spit wads in the direction of the deified, the powerful and the pretentious. I don't know if the Mona Lisa necessarily looks better with a mustache, but I'm pretty sure that those pompous Police are more palatable popped-up. Who wouldn't enjoy their video of "Every Breath You Take" more after learning that drummer Stewart Copeland "often positioned his cymbals so he wouldn't have to look at Sting on stage"? Is the "Pop-Up" version of a creepy Police song better than the untampered video? Sure. Is watching "Pop-Up Video" better than just hearing a really great song on the radio? Call me old-fashioned, but no. I don't think about recycling or being out of cereal or the light in my eyes when a song I love is on the radio. And I don't think about the singer's shoes or the song's chart position in 1983 or what year the band broke up. I don't think about anything but the music. Being in a song is like kissing: You always close your eyes. And when your eyes are closed, who needs TV? SALON | Oct. 3, 1997

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