11 Rain-Soaked Classic Rock Music Videos
It's sorta incredible that classic rock artists escaped the '70s, '80s and '90s without being electrocuted. After all, one of the most common tropes in the era's music videos — besides diaphanous scarves, quick-cut editing and, shall we say, distinct hairdos — was rain. Buckets of rain, in fact, where some clips are concerned. Video directors often seemed to delight putting the world's biggest rock stars into a position where they might get completely soaked, all for the sake of art.
Of course, sometimes it made sense to have rain in a video, especially in cases where song titles mention rain. (Most notably, Guns N' Roses and Bruce Hornsby and the Range.) Many times, artists found themselves in inclement weather for no good reason other than it established moody bona fides (the Rolling Stones) or created, er, plot movement (Paul McCartney and Wings). And, to be honest, we're at a loss to explain why someone made the head-scratching decision to put Eric Clapton and his band in a pouring rainstorm to film the 1989 video for the song "Pretending."
But rain can also be an unparalleled dramatic element. Take U2, whose 1983 U.S. breakthrough performance took place at the gorgeous Red Rocks Amphitheatre during a chilly, rainy night with weather so terrible, the concert almost didn't happen. Nevertheless, the members of U2 bucked up and powered through the proverbial storm, and turned in a star-making concert that remains a fan favorite to this day.
Grab your umbrella and throw on some galoshes: Here are the top 11 rain-soaked classic rock videos.