They didn't have to go to L.A. I'm sure there is an airplane graveyard in Japan they could have filmed at, and plenty of Japanese rock musicians they could have worked with, but that wasn't the image they were going for. If they had more resources or time I'm sure they could have gotten a better lineup, since I do feel a lot of American rock groups are fascinated by Japanese pop culture, but Universal Japan either didn't have connections to them, or they already knew who they could work with.
Only commenting on this like almost a whole year later:
- Really appreciated your overall thoughts and views here, qwiksXnd
- I think the reason they didn't have access to an airplane graveyard in Japan is cos the Japanese climate is too wet and humid to store planes easily. The airplane graveyard they filmed "Next Flight" at is at Mojave Air & Space Port
http://mojaveairport.com/ +35° 3' 29.18", -118° 9' 27.11" (just copy & paste those coordinates into Google Maps, zoom out one notch and you'll see all the stored planes to the north and north-east of the main airport) which is in the desert and very very dry so the planes don't deteriorate fast.
- The plane which they perform under is a 1969-built Douglas DC-8 painted in the livery of Air Transport International (ATI), registration N820BX (which you can see as they pan across the plane in the first seconds of the PV). Some shots of this specific airplane when it was in service are at
http://flickriver.com/photos/tags/n820bx/interesting/ and also at
http://www.planepictures.net/netsearch4.cgi?srch=N820BX&stype=reg&srng=2 where some of the shots are in previous livery of BAX
- You can see the full set of these planes in storage at Mojave, as they were when Passpo was there, in the middle of last year (1st June 2012) at
http://www.airteamimages.com/douglas-dc-8_N820BX_ati---air-transport-international_154706.html This is where Passpo filmed their PV of course. (Large view of this shot at
http://www.airteamimages.com/douglas-dc-8_N820BX_ati---air-transport-international_154706_large.html - you can almost work out where they did the filming!) You can see this set of planes on Google Maps by entering these coordinates: +35° 3' 59.59", -118° 9' 57.93"
- The full lineup of American musicians (from TokyoHive at
http://www.tokyohive.com/2012/05/passpo%E2%98%86-reveals-full-pv-for-upcoming-single-next-flight/ ) is...
Next FlightJosh Freese (drums) - formerly with Nine Inch Nails and Guns N Roses
Robin Finck (guitar) - formerly with Nine Inch Nails and Guns N Roses
Chris Chaney(bass) - huge range of work including work with Alanis Morissette, Slash, Michelle Branch and many more
BathtubEric Brittingham (bass) - bassist with glam metal band Cinderella
Fred Coury (drums) - drummer with Cinderella
Edit: this full lineup with some other mentions is also at
http://aramatheydidnt.livejournal.com/3821238.htmlThis PV is definitely still one of my favourites from Passpo... love the contrast with the pink outfits and pretty much everything else in the video being rough and dirty.