Donald Fagen: New Frontier

Of all the amazing tracks from Donald Fagen's debut album "The Nightfly" the nostalgic "New Frontier" was the one that got a music video made as a promo and though I know the song for ages I just acquainted with the video recently. If the song is great and imaginative, the video follows the exact idea, through segments with a couple and some animation as well.

Directed by Rocky Morton (1988's "D. O. A.", "Super Mario Bros."), the video encapsulates the 1950's and 1960's Cold War paranoia in America with the constant fear of a possible nuclear strike coming from the Soviets and bomb shelters had became the new trend. Fagen's song analyses, in a sarcastic manner, the challenges and advantages of this new frontier, imagining how life would be inside of those shelters, and as for images we have a typical 1950's young couple dealing with survivalism underground - but truth be told they're having a lot of fun in there.

Not just "New Frontier" covers the same nostalgic ground of the 1950's, basically the whole album goes that way with the original songs by Fagen and a cover for "Ruby Baby", and that concept makes it a unique experience to be heard over and over. This one had the opportunity of having a clip made for it, a quite fun and cool video to watch - just disappoints that the track is slightly edited. Still a very good clip. 8/10.