This song by the Buggles, which was the first video on MTV, became the 1,000,000th shown yesterday afternoon/evening. Of course, this was an obvious choice for the accompaning contest in which they paid a million to the 2000th caller who dialed in the number shown along with the video (obviously, when it was first shown, not when it was re-run later in the middle of the night). This sparked the old discussion we've been talking about in other items amongst the MTV video jockeys, past and present. Matt Pinfield, former host of 120 Minutes, exclaimed, "Video didn't kill the radio star, but it did give radio a good kick in the a**." Maybe that is the point. MTV, in its early days, gave airplay to New Wave and progressive stars that weren't getting time on the radio. (Ok, someone clue me into what kind of videos were being shown on Friday Night Videos.) Much of the UK and Europe had already been making a big deal about videos-- several bands there had already made a few before MTV came along, but since many were decently produced, they now had a bit more exposure in the U.S. Musicians had already been using film for years-- Elvis Presley and the Beatles starred in several full-length movies that had fairly little substance other than to promote the music. But short video clips that accompanied music did exist, although that particular medium did not come to fruition until then. One hit wonders began to grow a little bit more based on the success of songs *with* the music video marketing package. Other musicians-- such as Madonna and Michael Jackson (in his solo career), most notably-- built most or all of their careers with music video. MTV also noted that established acts grew nervous about the new medium-- showing John Oates in a televised press conference expressing his displeasure about suddenly being expected to act. Madonna (who else?) made the rebuttal. The cliche of stock imagery in videos also began to grow. But I think "Video Killed The Radio Star" succeeded precisely for what it was. It was a one hit wonder because of the video. A Rolling Stone editor commented it was good because of the seemingly unrelated plethra of images that foreshadowed the cheesy 80's stock imagery aforementioned, and that was the point. Also, the band faded into obscurity, while lead singer Trevor Horn became a successful music producer, working on projects for Seal, Tina Turner, and David Bowie. Seal's self titled 1994 album won a Grammy, and I still believe it to be one of the slickest pieces of work that came in that year. Quite the statement. They also mentioned Dire Straits' "Money For Nothing," which the lead singer (I forget his name) explained was inspired by the comments of some friends of his who were watching MTV and claiming the stars weren't really working. Sting was also quoted as saying he didn't expect it to be a hit. But it was. The video satirized the idea that being a video star wasn't work, and MTV was all about easy money. Consequently, it satirized how MTV was being considered, but also by reason of its refrain. Sting's refrain of "I want my MTV" hearkened back to early promos of rock stars chanting the same slogan for the network. Another MTV VJ was quoted as saying the song and video seemed to be a bit of a satirical Mobius strip, but in the end-- they didn't care-- "I want my MTV" made "Money for Nothing" an instant and monster hit, as well as the network's unoffical anthem. The cable channel has changed drastically, however, from its original roots. MTV Networks originally consisted of MTV and Nickelodeon, which I assume was a Canadian company, based on the endless Canadian programming (and shows produced in Canada) that was plastered all over Nickelodeon. Of course, since Viacom purchased MTV Networks, both stations have a decidedly different look about them, 20 years notwithstanding, as well as the addition of VH-1 as an video channel of adult contemporary music. MTV also fell victim to some minor worries about discrimination until about the mid 80's. Herbie Hancock reportedly did not directly appear in his video "Rocket" (save on a TV screen) because he believed the audience would not want to see a black musician on MTV. Michael Jackson's arrival with "Billy Jean" is also noted to have been a big deal with black audiences. The New Romantics and synth bands had a big influence on MTV in the early 80's, although the artists that were gay would not announce their sexuality until much later. Ironically, homosexual innuendos seem to have largely vanished from the scene (George Michael aside from that obvious video), while African-American contemporary music has since enjoyed a great deal of exposure on MTV, especially after YO! MTV Raps started. Today, I see much more colorful videos among the black artists than I do the rockers; perhaps it's because there is more money there. But then there's Busta Rhymes-- I started getting much more excited about rap and hip hop when I saw his bizzare but amusing videos. Anyway, I'll shut up now. Comments?31 responses total.
see also item:61 for more discussion.
No one's interested? Well, MTV has done some programs on its former VJs, and VH1 started a program series called "Video Killed The Radio Star" just last night. Finally, I think I get somewhat close to the facts. As I said, music groups have done something approaching videos for years, most notably the Brits. The Beatles films were really a prototype for this, as were the Elvis ones. The Monkees followed this tradition in a TV show, and it was member Michael Nesmith that really did conceive the idea that became MTV. Sometime after the Monkees was disbanded, Nesmith had made a video called "Rio." More later.
As well as making a few music videos, Nesmith collected some others. He had an idea for a channel that would play music videos the way radio played commercial recordings. His initial offer was rejected. But then he got lucky. Time-Warner, I believe, had a satellite feed that was taking up empty space and costing them valuable money. This was what became MTV a year later in 1981. Before that, there was a show called "Pop Clips" or something. (Forgive me, I didn't tape the show, so I'm struggling to remember this.) The idea was pretty ambitious and risky. The reason why New Wave got the popularity it did was because MTV just didn't have enough video stock. The base stock was about 200 videos, and the first VJs were quoted as saying the major artists among them were Rod Stewart and Pat Benetar. British artists, on the other hand, had been making videos for some time, although they didn't have a big medium in which to present them in. So videos of New Wave artists were brought in so MTV would have enough videos to show, as its original conception did indeed show wall-to-wall videos with introductions by the VJs in between. But American artists were following the New Wave trend as well. (Laurie Anderson's "O Superman" was shown, as well as some Devo videos, and a few Talking Heads vids.) There was time to play and be very artistic, David Byrne explained, since the medium was not yet taken seriously. Andy Warhol even had a program for a short time. America really hadn't heard of these artists, but there they suddenly were, and record stores gradually began to be at a loss, since customers began to ask for music they had watched by video on MTV. The wild creativity was about to decline, too, since the channel had bills to pay and it had to prove to the business that it could help sell records. The case was made in a record store in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which for a time was the only place Americans could get Buggles records. It was an effective argument, and this is where MTV became subject to the corporate machine. New Romanticism and anything else New Wave began to decline, and domestic acts that were already established began to take full advantage of the new medium, watching their careers soar. Ironically, Devo's biggest hit, "Whip It," was intended to poke fun at corporate sponsorship. But Devo never really was a musical group-- they considered themselves performance artists who made political statements (hence the name, which is short for devolution. Their earliest film featured the actors turning into apes. By the way, that film won the 1979 Ann Arbor film festival award-- so isn't there *someone* that can find out more information on this?) The program Monday night also mentioned Trevor Horn's involvement as producer of Frankie Goes to Hollywood. The video for "Relax" was mentioned and shown, of course, because the original version was banned (i.e., no one saw it) for its homoerotic imagery. The song was banned in the UK as well, which only helped to push it to the top of the charts. The third version of the video was the one that was shown in the States. In the same breath, of course, Duran Duran's video "Wild Boys" was mentioned, which was based on a homoerotic video of the same name. So video had its controversies, although it was pointed out that Boy George was welcomed with much enthusiasm. (I wonder if the fact that some folks weren't sure of his gender had anything to do with it.) I started catching MTV by the time the music business had really started catching up. David Lee Roth was doing his cheezy solo career and glam metal and rock was pretty much the order of the day. The program touched on that, then ended with the current craze of "the pretty young thing"-- or teen pop artists.
Going back to #0, I recall the phrase "I Want My MTV" being used *Before*
"Money For Nothing," which is why Dire Straits used it in the first place.
Also, the story that I'd heard at the time was that it wasn't Knopfler's
friends, but rather that he happened to be an appliance store and overheard
workers bitching while they were watching the TVs... hence the lyrics and the
video, featuring appliance shop workers.
And "Video Killed the Radio Star" succeeded because it was a catchy song. I
don't even reemmber the video. Trevor Horn had been a producer (including
probably the most artistic New Wave album, ABC's The Lexicon of Love, as well
as Art of Noise and, later, Frankie Goes to Hollywood), and Buggles were a
one-hit wonder mostly because most of their other tracks were too erudite to
be readily accessible ("I Am A Camera" also got some airplay).
I recall "Relax" also having BDSM imagery. The song also appears in "Body
Double," in a reasonably graphic scene involving Melanie Griffith making a
porn movie. The scene looks more like a music video than a movie clip, and
shows the growing influence of music videos on other media.
On the gay video front, there was also Bronski Beat's classic "Smalltown Boy,"
whose album packaging was banned (the album being "The Age of Consent") for
listing the ages of consent in every major country, for both heterosexual and
homosexual act (the point being to illustrate the disparity in the ages). MTV
never balked at "Smalltown Boy," although it didn't contain any explicit
images, so I really doubt it was the homo- as much as the erotic that got the
first version of "Relax" banned. There were some other videos at the time that
were banned (following criticism) for sexual content, most memorably "Dance
with Me" (Lords of the New Church), which featured a little girl running
through a Gothic set to the words "Let's dance little stranger / Show me
secret sin / Love can be like bondge / Seduce me once again," which lead
watchdog groups to conclude that the video was promoting pedophilia, and Oingo
Boingo's "Little Girls," banned for content ("I like little girls / They make
me feel so good / I like little girls / They make me feel so bad / When I'm
around they make me feel like I'm the only guy in town"), again after watchdog
protests.
Finally, NIN would also later be edited for content, because of some erotic
imagery. I'm sure there were other videos in the meantime.
Ironic in all this is that, years later, I believe VAST's video for "Pretty
When You Cry" got MTV airplay. I know it got played on The Box. Even though
the model in the video is adult, it's clear that was done only to keep the
video legal... it shows a man at the wheel, and a woman dressed as Little Red
Riding Hood, asleep in the backseat, and segues into a series of images such
as the woman running through a forest, the man trapped in a hallway with walls
made of outstretched hands, and most graphically, the man standing in a pool
o fmilk, with only his head visible, while the woman stands over him and
taunts him (before the room turns red and a hundred clones of the woman pull
the man under). A long way from banning a girl running through a Goth scene
to fairly inoccuous lyrics.
(BTW, the astute will notice a similarity in meter and even rhyme between The
Lords of the New Church's stanza and the second stanza from "Fly," out a few
years ago, which is partly why I didn't like the latter song... too similar,
sounded like accidental theft. =} )
don't forget REM's Losing my religion was oycotted by the vatican for it's homoerotic <!?!?> imagery of an efemmenate <sp?> dark skinned angel with blond hair. er boycotted.
Madonna had a few scandalous videos, too, particularly for "Like a Prayer," which had to do with having sex in a church, if I recall correctly.
Yes, that snd the burning crosses, if *I* recall correctly. snd = and
Not only did the Beatles films approach the condition of videos, but in the very early days of MTV (I haven't seen any MTV since around 1984), song-length cuts from Beatles films were used as videos just like the new videos. "Relax" is the song I still use as the purest example of the kind of hit song I call the "tuneless wonder". It was the growing prevalence of these that drove me away from listening to pop in the mid-80s. I understand that pop songs are much more tuneful now, and have been for some years, but I've never come back. But I'm still amazed that Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time", also nearly tuneless, has become a classic, while the highly catchy "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" seems to be almost forgotten.
I don't think "Relax" was a great song, but it was a truly cool *production*.
Dance music isn't *supposed* to have a definable tune, it's supposed to have a beat and enough repetition to encourage a dance without so much repetition it gets boring. "Relax" has, what, about a dozen words? "Two Tribes" has more relevance, and a a bit more of a tune, but you can't really dance to it (at least, not club style).
i can dance to almost anything but i do remember a dance i was at in college in kansas, and they played more than a feeling, by boston..and everyne was really confused. some people slow danced for a bit but then the fast part came in and everyone just kinda stood there lookin dumb. now i like boston, but not to dance to.
boston, along with bad company and kansas are the collective banes to my existence...oh, yeah...foreigner, styx, and journey, too......all evidence of these six bands should be permenantly erased IMHO have a nice day :)
diznave, you better not dis styx. Heh.
styx , boston, journey, kansas..bands i love....genesis too. my ol skool stuff. and styx rocks.
<gag>
The Beatles has put together 'concept' videos for Strawberry Fields Forever and other tunes of that near era for promotional purposes. Then again, with the BBC, maybe that had an outlet for it. Their Magical Mystery Tour was like a bunch of concept videos strung together by the plot of the tour. It was released on Boxing Day (December 26th), 1967 (or was it 1968?). Paul McCartney used the same thing for his "Give My Regards to Broad Street" movie.
barry...bite me! that movie was dumb.
no barry, bite me, I'm dumber.
no! he wants to bite me! wait, he was dissin my music, he can bite you k?
Well, I dunno, what if he has rabies?
we could ask him...i suppose its possable. he does own a big ferocious dog. ,.
>Dance music isn't *supposed* to have a definable tune, it's supposed to >have a beat and enough repetition to encourage a dance without so much >repetition it gets boring. What I like in dance music is something that has a complex, hypnotic beat _and_ a good tune on top of it. Tune without beat isn't danceable, but beat without tune isn't catchy: I wouldn't want to dance to it. (Would you dance to a solo drum track? Maybe you would. But I wouldn't. We also have very different thresholds of boredom.)
I have heard one or two solo drum tracks that I would dance to. I imagine somewhere out there, there might even be a drum solo catchy enough to make you want to dance to it. The point is, such things are rare and hard to make; bits of melody make it much easier to make stuff that more people will want to hear.
Isn't "Wipe Out" basically a drumbeat? =} Anyway, lots of trance/techno is just modulated beats and rhythms with no discernible melody. Then again, the reason why record stores sell more than five different titles is, well, different people like different things.
Re: the Beatles-- well, that would seem to point to the fact that the
Brits put pop music to video for a long time. But as I said, you could
probably take out musical numbers from Elvis movies and tout them as
videos-- Elvis really couldn't act well, and any attempts he really
made to were suppressed. It's been noted that there were some biting
and slightly realistic scenes from "Jailhouse Rock" that were never
used and were never shown until a documentary brought them to light.
I should correct what I said earlier: Nesmith found a company that had
an empty *broadcast* feed, and "Pop Clips" was a series he created to
convince them to start MTV.
"I Want My MTV" was a promotional slogan that a *lot* of artists were
involved in. It's interesting to note that the Police were involved,
as Sting sang this slogan for the Dire Straits song. brighn is correct
in stating this was inspired by an overheard conversation, and the
program noted Dire Straits was not a particularly video-ready band
before the video was made. It looks horribly dated now, but at the
time, they were barely keeping up with the computer animation. What's
hilarious is that an MTV VJ was quoted as saying this tune seemed to be
a mobius strip of sorts in its statement. The computer animated
characters were only used to avoid some controversy and distance it a
little from raw reality, so the show said.
I managed to tape the entire series as it was shown as one program last
Saturday. The history is pretty comprehensive; the discussion includes
influences on television, on movies (like lousy movies that essentially
promoted soundtracks); discussion of video cliches, pop, rock, and rap;
commercialization of the music video; music videos 'saving the world'
("We Are The World", Band Aid: "Do They Know It's Christmas", "(I Ain't
Gonna Play) Sun City," the Pet Shop Boys' involvement in MTV Russia and
the claim that MTV helped bring the Berlin Wall down, etc.)
I feel a little deprived: as I said, glam rock was the order of the day
once MTV came to my house-- Twisted Sister, David Lee Roth, and Motley
Crue were the bands I could remember. But MTV wasn't accessible
everywhere very early on. In its first year, only a few houses had
access, and this was the point behind the "I Want My MTV" slogan. If
it was available in Spokane (MTV Network's kid channel Nickelodeon was
in the early 80's), I doubt I would have been permitted to watch for
long.
In their specials about MTV VJs, MTV itself explains the details of how
they kept the bills paid-- even wall to wall vids of commercially
successful stuff didn't do it. My guess is M2 can do more of what
early MTV used to do since income from expenses for satellite carriers
or large population cable areas covers the costs.
I'll cut to the point since this item is about dead. The whole thesis of the VH1 program was the question: Did video kill the radio star? Technically, no. But the rise of MTV has made video a necessary marketing tool for creating superstar careers. Relatively few people make it big on radio play alone these days. Again, I thought the program was a pretty thorough analysis of the connection between film and music that could be described as the music video. It also makes sense of the connection that movies and music have now days.. from Elvis and the Beatles to music video directors moving to become movie directors and vice versa (Russel Mulcahy directed "Highlander"), it all has a root somewhere.
Hmmmmm.... could MP3 kill the video star? It'll be a while before people have the bandwidth to download videos...
that won't kill the video star, though...
right, and I think someone pointed out that MP3 works well for college students and network professionals, but that the general public probably won't download it en masse. So the video star will at least be popular with the high schoolers.. dunno.
videos were better when record execs hadn't *quite* twigged to them yet. these days mtv might as well be running three-minute softcore pornos.
well, yeah, but the program points out that it was inevitable.. we're running on a capitalistic system, and artsy videos just didn't pay the bills. The whole *point*, or objective, I should say, of MTV was to prove that a music video channel would sell records, and they stated that very clearly. What's even funnier is that VH1 also ran a program connecting porn and rock (via the groupie phenomenon, I guess). Edgy rock stars are either appearing with groupies in porno flicks, or associating with porn stars. There's even talk about some of them recording music for porn videos (which would be an improvement for the vids). So the idea of MTV running 3-min softcore pornos doesn't sound *all* that surprising to me. It's hard to stay progressive, since that doesn't make a lot of money. MTV, much like any network, fell to corporate greed a long time ago and subsequently went more and more mainstream. Sometimes I wonder if it could get any worse.. there is less there that is unusual. 120 Minutes isn't the show it used to be, and neither is AMP (which is AMP 2.0 now, actually), and it comes in at 02:00 here.
You have several choices: