25. Gypsy Kings “Bamboleo” (1989)
So here’s the other version of “Bamboleo” Fincher allegedly directed, and it’s another highly atypical video from him; the use of bright block colors as backdrops is not something he’s famous for. Still he’s got a real flair for shooting musicians.
24. The Wallflowers “6th Avenue Heartache”
 (1996)
A good looking “La Jetee“-style photomontage that makes the most of the considerable telegenic-ness of Jakob Dylan and his various hats. It was a kid of a palette cleaner between “Se7en” and “The Game” but it shows how confident Fincher had become.
23. Billy Idol “Cradle Of Love”
 (1990)
We’ve probably been a little unfairly harsh on the earlier portion of Fincher’s music video career, just because so many of those clips have aged poorly due to changing fashions and outmoded effects. But we’ll make up for it by showing a little love for this daft spot where a geeky rich “square” (he’s wearing glasses and listening to classical music) has his night, and presumably life, turned upside down by a free spirited young nymphette who plays Idol’s tape in his stereo. Idol performs via the pop art on the walls, and there is perhaps no single image that more perfectly captures early 90s music videos than the stiletto heel landing in the designer fish tank.
22. Madonna “Oh Father” (1989)
One of four Madonna collaborations and the first of two Fincher vids, alongside Aerosmith‘s “Janie’s Got a Gun“) to deal with parental abuse. This might be the lesser of the two, but it’s still pretty good to look at and manages to work in some truly creepy moments, like the corpse of the mother with her stitched-together lips.
21. Nenah Cherry “Heart” (1990)
Sometimes you just need to let your performer do her thing and get out of the way, and that’s what Fincher mostly does here, setting up the great Nenah Cherry in a circusy/stage show set with a lightbulb microphone into which she can yell her insults about the “Cabbage patch creature” who’s “a phony who just wants his alimony

.”
20. Ry Cooder “Get Rhythm” (1988)
Harry Dean Stanton in a black and white “Key Largo“-inflected promo, What more could you need?
19. Johnny Hates Jazz “Shattered Dreams”
 (1988)”
Despite my weird compulsive loathing of this song, I gotta admit this is a pretty interesting video, experimenting with scale in a way that Fincher would then reverse for his Rolling Stones clip. Here a tiny singer nestles in the woman’s collarbone or in the palm of her hand and again, the effects are pretty good for the time.
18. Johnny Hates Jazz “Heart Of Gold” (1988)

Another successful effects-based promo from that year for this band. This time Fincher overlays picture-in-picture to give an interestingly kaleidoscopic effect.
17. Rick Springfield “Bop ‘Til You Drop”(1984)
A lot’s been said about Tony Scott’s influence on early Fincher videos, and indeed on the medium of the music video in general, but this one feels like it owes a debt to brother Ridley —mostly to his famous dystopian Apple commercial “1984.” Kind of a fun yarn with Springfield as a messiah-type who frees enslaved humanity from evil aliens, it’s one of the more OTT, and therefore least typical, of Fincher’s video outings.
16. Bourgeois Tagg “I Don’t Mind At All”
 (1988)
A glossier version of Johnny Hates Jazz‘s “Heart of Gold” spot in which the picture-in-pictures look like they’re floating on panes of glass. It’s 26 years old, but very little betrays that.
