It’s been more than 15 years since Papa Roach burst onto our screens with the riotous video for their nu metal anthem, ‘Last Resort’.
They’ve made 28 others too. But which video storyline came from his son Jagger? And how, exactly, are the four-piece connected to ginger TV serial killer Dexter Morgan?
Find out now, as frontman Jacoby Shaddix reflects on 10 of their best videos…
Last Resort (Infest, 2000)
Jacoby: “That was one of the coolest experiences ever for us. There was just something special about that song – it was about taking kids from where they didn’t want to be, which was isolated and alone, and putting them where they wanted to go: which was at a rock show. That was the basic premise behind the video too – we didn’t want it to be over-thought, we just wanted energy. Right after we filmed the video, we literally got straight into our van and went on tour – we didn’t even go home. A cool thing about that video is that the director and producer, Marcos Siega, ended up moving on to create and direct the show Dexter.”
Broken Home (Infest, 2000)
“We did this video with Marcos Siega too and it was very personal for me. He wanted to create a vivid picture of the story behind the song, and it was definitely emotional. When we were on set and the actors were going through the story, it was heavy. The lead actor was such a nice guy but, when he got on camera, he brought such ferocity. I guess it put a nail in a lot of things for me. We were actually nominated for a Grammy for this, which was awesome.”
Between Angels And Insects (Infest, 2000)
“We wanted to do something that drew you in, so we decided to work with this guy Joseph Kahn because he was a step ahead when it came to creative ideas. He said, ‘How about if the camera actually travelled into your mouth and went through your body’. We went: ‘What?’ And then we knew it was an awesome idea. It was creative and innovative, so we were really down with it.”
She Loves Me Not (Lovehatetragedy, 2002)
“This was a wild party at a broken down amusement park. This had that youthful energy we wanted and we all just had a party on set. We had a great time at this shoot. Such a great time, that I bleached out my hair. I said I wanted to do something different, so my buddy told me to bleach my hair. It’s not really the best look I’ve ever had, if I’m honest. My wife hated it. My hair was black again pretty soon afterwards.”
Getting Away With Murder (Getting Away With Murder, 2004)
“This was a lot of fun. We wanted to do something that had a bit of politics in it, and it turned out to be a trip: we essentially predicted what was going on in the financial market. We wanted to get all the greed and war in there, then we wrapped it up with a bit of sex. We set the video in the stock market and then, the next thing you know, all these chicks are ripping off their coats and making out with band members. It was a pretty good juxtaposition of sex, politics, war and rock ‘n’ roll.”
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Lifeline (Metamorphosis, 2009)
“When shit goes down, it’s always the hard workers who pay the biggest price. I’ve seen that in my own family and in the community around me. That’s fucked. My father worked for a company for 30 years, working his way up from the bottom. Right before he was due his retirement, they fired him and so he didn’t get the money he was owed. It’s just fucking greed. It’s disgusting. Feelings like that went into this video.”
Hollywood Whore (Metamorphosis, 2009)
“This song was written about certain celebrities. But it was at the same time that I was really having to face my own demons about my substance abuse issues. When I went back and listened to the lyrics, I realised that I was pointing my finger at these people but, actually, I was the Hollywood whore. I was just a raw nerve at the time and we wanted to bring that into the video. We worked with a guy called Jesse Davey on this – he’s a British guy from Cornwall – and he’s one of my favourite people to work with. He came up with a very simple concept, but it’s powerful as fuck.”
No Matter What (Time for Annihilation: On the Record & On the Road, 2010)
“This one was another Jesse Davey video. He has a very cool way of capturing the band in a broken space. This one was a gunfight out in the desert, which was kind of a mix between Young Guns and Reservoir Dogs. It was a really fun shoot and there’s a great twist to the video where it looks like we got away with it, [SPOILER ALERT] but in the end, we didn’t.”
Still Swingin’ (The Connection, 2012)
“My son, Jagger, came up with the idea for this video. We were trying to think up concepts and we couldn’t work anything out. Then my son goes, ‘You should do a zombie killer video Dad!’ I threw that at the video director, he went for it, then we shot it on a rooftop in Brooklyn. It was the quickest video I’ve ever been a part of: we showed up on a day off, rocked out and beat it an hour later. Then they came back with a rad video.”
Face Everything And Rise (F.E.A.R. (Face Everything and Rise), 2015)
“This was my directorial debut and it was fucking awesome! Things have changed since our video with Pepsi, and we partnered with Dodge on this one. A few years ago, it wasn’t cool to partner with corporations – but this time we were like, ‘Give us your money, we’re going to make a badass video with it’. How times have changed. Being on the other side of the camera was awesome – but it’s a lot of work, more than I thought it would be.”
