Synopsis

Set in a stark white fantasy space, the video turns "Abracadabra" into a surreal magic show. A mysterious enchantress performs with scarves, umbrellas, fireworks, a white mouse, and a top hat while two young magicians assist with her disappearances and transformations. The imagery shifts between playful stage illusions, seductive poses, colorful collages, and exaggerated visual effects. Steve Miller appears only through still photographs, often with his eyes obscured, leaving the spellbound performers and the song's visual magic at the center.

Factoids & Trivia

• Steve Miller was touring in Europe when the video was made, so he does not appear in newly filmed performance footage. His presence is created through still photographs, sometimes paired directly with images of the enchantress.

• Suzanne Trimble is identified in the credits as the "Abracadabra Girl." Her changing roles - magician, juggler, sorceress, and seductive stage figure - provide the video's main visual link to the lyrics.

• The production uses collage editing, extreme color treatments, repeated images, and early computer-generated effects. These techniques helped give the clip a distinctly experimental look during the early MTV era.

• The opening and closing image of a ball balanced on a spinning umbrella echoes the lyric about something going "round and round" without a known stopping point.

• The video was released in 1982 alongside the title song from the band's album of the same name. The song became the Steve Miller Band's biggest US hit, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

• The clip was unusual for a major rock act because it largely avoids showing the band performing. Instead, it presents a self-contained fantasy spectacle built around magicians, props, movement, and visual trickery.

• The song's video was later included in the early music-video television culture that developed around MTV and was also broadcast on BET.