First 2 hours of MTV

[jimmyjazz 45,621]

40 minutes ago, utee94 said:

They should make a channel or a stream that runs 24/7 and just plays the first 10 years of MTV in exact order from when it started.  With all the old ads and everything.  I'd probably tune in for a ridiculous number of hours per day.

That's a great idea.  You should get on it.

[utee94 15,747]

Just now, jimmyjazz said:

That's a great idea.  You should get on it.

Smacks of effort.  Not really my thing.

[Dennis Taylor 18,735]

On 9/28/2023 at 10:42 PM, Smax said:

Stumbled across this and man what a time warp. I was young, 8 but I remember this as my older siblings were really excited which meant I was too.

 

 

 

The play list is interesting, some names that stood the test of time and some who most have forgotten or never even heard of 

1:14 “Video Killed The Radio Star” - The Buggles 

5:43 “You Better Run” - Pat Benetar

12:03 “She Won’t Dance With Me” - Rod Stewart

14:31 “You Better You Bet” - The Who 

20:16 “Little Susies’s On The Up” - PH.D.

23:18 “Brass In Pocket” - Pretenders 

26:27 “Time Heals” - Todd Rundgren

29:48 “Take-It-On The Run - REO Speedwagon

31:37 “Rockin Paradise” - Styx

37:21 “When Things Go Wrong” - Robin Lane & The Chartbusters

43:36 “History Never Repeats” -  Split Ends

46:39 “Hold On Loosely” - 38 Special

51:44 “Sailing” - Rod Stewart

58:52 “Iron Maiden” - Iron Maiden

1:03:29 “Keep On Loving You” - REO Speedwagon

1:08:09 “Bluer Than Blue” - Michael Johnson

1:10:59 “Message of Love” - Pretenders

1:14:20 “Mr. Briefcase” - Lee Ritenour

1:17:58 “Double Life” - The Cars

1:21:58 “In The Air Tonight - Phil Collins

1:29:02 “Looking For Clues” - Robert Palmer

1:32:59 “Too Late” - Shoes

1:35:58 “Stop Draggin My Heart Around” - Stevie Nicks

1:39:53 “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy?” - Rod Stewart

1:40:19 “Surface Tension” - Rupert Hine

1:43:50 “One Step Closer” - Split Enz

1:46:36 “Baker Street” - Gerry Rafferty

1:53:49 “I’m Gonna Follow You” Pat Benetar

1:58:04 “Savannah Nights” - Tom Johnston

2:04:13 “Lucille” - Rockestra

2:07:12 “The Best of Times” - STYX 

2:11:39  “Vengeance” - Carly Simon
 
2:14:44 “Angel of The Morning” - Juice Newton

Had no idea Tesla's Little Suzi was a cover. The original is fucking terrible 

On 9/28/2023 at 10:56 PM, mdmost said:

We didn't get MTV until 1984. I remember watching this and thinking, yeah I want one like her. I was 8. She was transcendent. 

 

I was 15...that performance was very well received by 15 year old boys at the time. 

[jimmyjazz 45,621]

3 minutes ago, Dennis Taylor said:

I was 15...that performance was very well received by 15 year old boys at the time. 

It was also very well received by 20 year old young men.

[G650 14,143]

4 hours ago, Dennis Taylor said:

Had no idea Tesla's Little Suzi was a cover. The original is fucking terrible 

What fresh nonsense is this.

[Jerry Callo 8,673]

On 10/5/2023 at 9:46 AM, Guest said:

Question about those first videos -- were music videos really a thing before MTV? Just wondering how they debuted with enough videos to run 24 hours a day. Were artists already making them? Did MTV let them know their plan ahead of time and told them to produce videos they could air?

Guest - I've been pondering your question for a little over a year.

As I understand, music videos to promote singles was a thing in Britain in the 1970s.  One of the Monkeys had a video show in that predated MTV as well.  Since the British bands already had videos, much of the early MTV videos were from random UK bands that had received little to no airtime time in the states - at least until their videos made them instantly popular.  Think Men In Hats, Dexy's Midnight Runners, Madness, Big Country . . .

[honolulu horn 6,157]

3 hours ago, Jerry Callo said:

Guest - I've been pondering your question for a little over a year.

As I understand, music videos to promote singles was a thing in Britain in the 1970s.  One of the Monkeys had a video show in that predated MTV as well.  Since the British bands already had videos, much of the early MTV videos were from random UK bands that had received little to no airtime time in the states - at least until their videos made them instantly popular.  Think Men In Hats, Dexy's Midnight Runners, Madness, Big Country . . .

I have heard that the video for Strawberry Fields Forever was the first true music video, since it was produced as a standalone video and not part of a movie. Not sure if true, but definitely true that many music videos existed after that and then throughout the 70s. 

[trubbaman 36]

There were short films produced in the 1920s and '30s, like Bessie Smith's immortal take on St. Louis Blues. Those continued through the '40s and were shown in movie theaters along with the cartoons and newsreels and such. They didn't make a ton of them, but they did make some. In the 1950s, as television rolled out across the country, time blocks weren't like they are now - there were five minute blocks, fifteen minute blocks, half-hour, hour and 90 minute blocks that would contain a wide variety of content, some of it some music act in performance. At the same time, Scopitones were popular, which were jukeboxes that played short movies of performers singing the hits of the day.

In the '50s and '60s those shorts began to be incorporated into full-length movies so you'd have a band doing a few songs or a bunch of bands doing one or two each, and then some teenage hijinks stitching a storyline together - think Beach Movies or Teenage Romance type stuff, and movies that featured a band like The Beatles or Herman's Hermits or whomever. More productions, more popularity and more available tools meant that bands like The Beatles could do short films for songs and variety shows like Ed Sullivan would snap them up and show them, so there was an outlet for the bigger bands to do that.

So no, visual content of music performances and interpretations have been around as long as there has been sound connected to pictures, and Strawberry Fields Forever was not the first time it had been done. The generation of content accelerated as the availability for viewing became more widespread, and once record companies, flush with cash, had the money and the talent and the tools to make these enduring advertisements for a launching channel that would play this content, it exploded. Don't forget that MTV was not an overnight sensation - it started out taking this content, which had been shown on local New York cable and independent channels, to a regional NYC-area audience. It wasn't even a 24-hour channel in the beginning. It took some time for it to grow beyond that area and eventually spread across the country. You may have come across those "I Want My MTV" ads where rockers would say that between commercials and songs - it wasn't picked up by cable systems and it took a couple years to grow into the massive thing it became.

Edited November 1 by trubbaman

[BonzoMontreaux 1,034]

On 11/1/2024 at 9:46 AM, trubbaman said:

There were short films produced in the 1920s and '30s, like Bessie Smith's immortal take on St. Louis Blues. Those continued through the '40s and were shown in movie theaters along with the cartoons and newsreels and such. They didn't make a ton of them, but they did make some. In the 1950s, as television rolled out across the country, time blocks weren't like they are now - there were five minute blocks, fifteen minute blocks, half-hour, hour and 90 minute blocks that would contain a wide variety of content, some of it some music act in performance. At the same time, Scopitones were popular, which were jukeboxes that played short movies of performers singing the hits of the day.

In the '50s and '60s those shorts began to be incorporated into full-length movies so you'd have a band doing a few songs or a bunch of bands doing one or two each, and then some teenage hijinks stitching a storyline together - think Beach Movies or Teenage Romance type stuff, and movies that featured a band like The Beatles or Herman's Hermits or whomever. More productions, more popularity and more available tools meant that bands like The Beatles could do short films for songs and variety shows like Ed Sullivan would snap them up and show them, so there was an outlet for the bigger bands to do that.

So no, visual content of music performances and interpretations have been around as long as there has been sound connected to pictures, and Strawberry Fields Forever was not the first time it had been done. The generation of content accelerated as the availability for viewing became more widespread, and once record companies, flush with cash, had the money and the talent and the tools to make these enduring advertisements for a launching channel that would play this content, it exploded. Don't forget that MTV was not an overnight sensation - it started out taking this content, which had been shown on local New York cable and independent channels, to a regional NYC-area audience. It wasn't even a 24-hour channel in the beginning. It took some time for it to grow beyond that area and eventually spread across the country. You may have come across those "I Want My MTV" ads where rockers would say that between commercials and songs - it wasn't picked up by cable systems and it took a couple years to grow into the massive thing it became.

There was always content like that out there.  Hell I remember watching basically a music video of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' - Refugee a couple of years before MTV came out.

 

[utee94 15,747]

In the late 70s, HBO was airing a modern version of the music videos that were later popularized on MTV.  They'd air a couple in a row every now and then, as filler between feature presentations.  They were labeled as "HBO Video Jukebox." Then in 1981, HBO packaged Video Jukebox as a short show, around 30 minutes, with 6 or 7 or 8 music videos in a row.  That show was officially launched after MTV aired, but the music video format had been around for several years at that point.

It's possible that music videos were broadcast on other networks as well, perhaps the cable SuperStations like WTBS or WGN or USA network, but I only remember them from HBO.