P.O.D.-Addicted

[Crushcrushchris]

March 11th, it's official.

[American Idiot]

Woo. Finally an adds date! I'm looking forward to this for sure. I hope this new album finally brings them back the success that they had off of the singles on "Satellite," but I wouldn't say that's very likely.

[pen]

I like the guest star ideas on this. Mike Muir and Page Hamilton. Interesting choices.

[Nicholas2.0]

Oh yeah, I'd forgotten Mike Muir contributed. Did you mean both on this very song, or just both on this album somewhere?

Yeah, since he's resurrected Helmet, Page has made some odd choices lately with the bands he's chosen to work with.

[pen]

Just on the album, not on this song. The song with Mike Muir is "Kaliforn-Eye-A", I think. And I don't know where Page is.

[Crushcrushchris]

This song is made of win.

[jvandyck87]

I don't think it's gonna do very well, judging from their last couple albums. It seemed too "veteran" and not fresh enough to capture a lot of people. But that's just my first reaction.

[pen]

Well, Tunelab likes it, if that means anything.

[American Idiot]

www.tunelabmusic.com/2008/02/21/new-pod-single-streaming-online/#comments

I think it's damn good, but I'm not really sure if it's going to make much of an impact.

[Nicholas2.0]

Holy sh**, Sonny cut off his dreads!

[zago]

imho is a mediocre album but the track with Page Hamilton ("god forbid") is great.
Not so great the track with Mike Muir.

[pen]

I've only heard a third of the album so far, but right now it doesn't feel near as good as the last album, which is strange since I thought Marcos returning would bring great things. "It Can't Rain Everyday" stands out a lot to me though. That could easily be the "Youth Of The Nation" of this album, if it gets a chance on radio.

[American Idiot]

I just listened to the entire new album and I don't really have a ton to say about it. I think I probably will agree that "Testify" may be slightly more memorable than this one after a first listen, and it's easily better than their Self-Titled album. It just seems to me that while the past three albums have all been good, they're not close to great, and I haven't been really impressed since "Satellite." The first half of the album I thought had a lot more potential and included catchier tracks that could be future singles, while the second half seemed to kind of bore me and dragged on of what it seemed like forever until the album was over.

[reception]

mms://66.186.0.101/allaccess/podaddic.wma

[Crushcrushchris]

Explanation of the new video...

P.O.D. Addicted music video symbolism

"The song's message is quite succinctly and directly defined in its name, and I wanted to actualize an array of interpretable images that would symbolically scream it. And, to augment the metaphoric vignettes, I felt it was critical to film a performance that was as visually ferocious as the track.

Some of the imagery in the video is obvious and doesn't need much explanation, but there are definitely some sections that are quite cryptic, which I would like to decode for you. To start, the woman wearing the veil and holding the light orb is a sort of fortuneteller bookend. She holds the crystal ball that is granting us access to the unhinged and off center imagery.

The first place she takes us is into the basement where a man is seducing and then devouring raw eggs. He is caressing and appreciating the unborn/unknown and once he gets a taste, he consumes everything that is placed in front of him – the yoke of one egg drips down his face while he reaches for another – he can't get enough and needs more before even finishing eating what's still in his mouth. This is symbolic in a very broad sense to many addictions. We tip toe on the fringes, kicking the tires of curiosity, but once we can't resist the temptation anymore, we take that step and more often than not we are eaten by quicksand.

The next vignette we are introduced to is the little boy smoking a cigarette next to a man's needle injected thigh that pumps the pedal of a stationary bike. This vignette is easier to interpret, and is basically calling out today's role models. Kids look up to both their parents and a myriad of other role models that are placed in front of them via the internet, television, radio, etc., and unfortunately, many of those role models are poisonous – and you know the ones I'm talking about.

The third vignette is the obese man lying on a large pile of fish. This sequence carries great biblical symbolism and was inspired by Luke 5:6: "And when they had done this, they caught a great number of fish, and their net was breaking." We are addressing one of the most abhorrent tendencies of human nature – greed. Fish were a staple of Galilee, and therefore it became a mechanism of power. Greed is perhaps the most dangerous and common addiction on earth, and it is perhaps the most overlooked.

The old dying lady on crutches is our only real taste of reality in the video, which is why I feel she is so important. She is on the end of a very hard, painful, and lonely journey that is a consequence of choice – poor choices that she made. This is a real end that is all too common for many of us.

Next up is the young girl imprisoned behind a brick wall, dancing in bubbles blown onto her by a crazy old woman. We are saying with this vignette that our children must start life from behind a brick wall that we already built before they were born. When someone falls victim to addiction, the effects are far reaching, and nothing is more unfair and sad than the consequences inflicted on the lives of their children. Then, all that child has is her dreams and the reality that exists when she closes her eyes.

The symbolism of the evil barber is quite similar to the little girl dancing in bubbles. In this scene a masked barber cuts away at a young girl's hair with a large knife. The barber represents addiction itself, as it cuts away at the innocence of youth.

Finally, we have the beautiful women in wheelchairs. Perhaps one of the most distasteful and damaging addictions is vanity, and the weight that is placed on women to be physically beautiful. The psychological effects that this pressure has on many women is immeasurable, and needs to be stopped. Where does our definition of beauty begin and where does it end? Unfortunately, it very rarely stops inside a person, and therefore many peoples' sense of self is diminished and marginalized by how they look in the mirror (from head to toe!). I wanted the viewer to be attracted to, and dazzled by the women when they were only shown shots of her face, and then I wanted the viewer to be conscious of how they felt about her when it was revealed that she is crippled. Does their attraction to her change? Where is the line on beauty drawn?

In summation, I'd like to thank P.O.D. for giving me the opportunity to work with them to bring this video to life. It was an absolute pleasure to work with such inspired artists and genuine men. Not one interesting visual would have been possible had it not been for the sincerity that I was able to draw from the song.

Michael Maxxis

That first part of the video could be taken as an anti-abortion thing too...I never really looked at the video that way...it seemed really random at first.