"Shy Boy" by Bananarama

As alluded to in the previous post, it was on this day in 2008 when I first posted the video for Cruel Summer to mark the birthday of Keren Woodward; the following year on the same day I went to repost it and... Unique among all of Bananarama's videos on YouTube, the video existed but without an accompanying soundtrack - not even an record label authorized non-embeddable version!

I have no idea what bug it might have been that crawled up the ass of Gawd knows which record label fucks (from, in this instance, Warner Music Group) but refusing free promotion for 25 year old product at a time when music industry revenues are plummeting seems like the absolute pinnacle of douchebaggery, at least to me. Especially since music videos were originally intended for - get this - promotion! No wonder the major labels are going down faster than a coke-addled starlet in a hip-hop video...

A n y w a y... After a period of time too long to mention wasted in searching for a useful version of Cruel Summer I decided to cut my losses and instead found this clip of the trio's first-ever single - Shy Boy (Don't It Make You Feel Good) from their 1983 debut album Deep Sea Skiving; it managed to show the original progenitors of girl power at the height of their girl powers, gave my readers a snippet of the sound of the magical year 1983, and yes, even free promotion for the same people whose sole endeavour in life seems to be thwarting little old me from helping them out*.

In the meantime, today the year came back around again and what should I find? Not one but several high quality clips of Cruel Summer with their soundtrack intact! A true embarrassment of riches! Could it be that my various online screeds have succeeded in drumming some sense into the appropriate heads? I doubt it. But the Interweb gods are smiling nonetheless, so let's just enjoy it while we can, shall we?

*Which, I might add, I do at no cost to them. I don't get free promo stuff like those fat cats in Old Media; whenever I write about something I've bought it with my own hard-earned money! Okay, I'll stop ranting now...
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