I hope this question hasn’t been asked before – the search engine wouldn’t let me search for “MTV”, which has less than four letters.
When MTV began playing music videos on August 1, 1981, from where did they get their content? I was only 7 at the time, so I don’t remember if there were regular television programs that showed videos. And if there were, why were those videos shot before there were programs to air them? Chicken and the egg?
And how far back does it go? I recently saw a video for “Stayin’ Alive” that appeared to be shot in the late 70’s. You could argue that “Hard Days Night” began the concept of the music video, and the Monkees aired one during every episode from 1966 to '68… but what was the first “real” video?
Videos, or “promotional films”, have been around for some time. In the 60’s, for example, EVERYBODY wanted the Beatles to appear on their show. Well, that was just not possible, so a video was made and sent to the shows in lieu of an actual appearance. That way, the show could be advertised as having the Beatles as “guests.”
The videos were also used to drum up sales for new releases.
However, videos as MTV played them really got their start with cable movie stations. These stations needed short filler videos for between movies so you wouldn’t lose your audience by showing 18 minutes of promos. The combination of music and imagery had been around a long time, but this created a real market for production of very short videos and the length of a pop song or two was perfect for filling in a small hole in the schedule.
I don’t remember seeing videos on TV before HBO, but I was young when the musical variety shows were on the air.
I remember a show called Friday Night Videos that would be on late Friday nights. I don’t remember if it was on a network or a local station, but it wasn’t cable.
IIRC, Friday Night Videos debuted at least a year after MTV, possibly two years. I loved videos and never got a chance to see them (distinct lack of cable in college apartments) until that show started.
Yes, I remember Friday Night Videos, as well as a show called Night Flight that, IIRC, was on either WGN or Fox. It showed videos, but I don’t think it was pre-MTV. However, it was on before MTV was widely available. It also showed strange foreign films, ‘Biography’ type shows about musicians, and generally weird stuff all night long. I kind of miss it…
The Betales made what at the time were called “promotional films” for Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane to sort of throw at the masses in lieu of touring.
There were venues for music videos before MTV went on the air in 1981. These shows featured a mix of live acts and the occasional video:
Shindig! (ABC, 1964-1966) Hullabaloo (NBC, 1965-1966) Where the Action Is (ABC, 1965-1967, 1973-1974) The Midnight Special (NBC, 1972-1981) Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert (ABC, 1973-1981) Solid Gold (syndicated, 1980-1988)
Even Ed Sullivan, host of TV’s top variety show, was willing to show music videos if your name was The Beatles.
I remember seeing in the 60s a jukebox-type of machine (it has a special name that I presently can’t recall) that showed videos along with the music, so music videos aren’t that recent.
[Back in my day]
Ah, I remember the Good Old Days on HBO, signing on at 5pm weekdays. Lots of filler material, including videos. Fav: “Bop Girl” by Pat Wilson. (One of the bridesmaids went on to much bigger things.) Lot of goofy short films.
But there was still a real paucity of videos. So when MTV signed on (I actually watched the sign on) they had a real short list of newish videos at hand. For some reason Rod Stewart had made a lot so they played his stuff over and over for a while. (“Disco Rod”, ugh.) This allowed a lot of really unknown people to get airtime. Hence Men Without Hats and such became successful mainly because there wasn’t a lot of competition. (And MTV hadn’t sold out yet.)
Looking back, it seems there was an inordinate number of British and Aussie videos available.
I have seen what look like videos for 40s era bands- the Andrews Sisters, Count Basie. They play these shorts on either Ted Turner’s Classics or AMC, and they look complete in themselves, not like they were cut from a movie.
Night Flight aired on USA Friday and Saturday nights through much of the 80s, then in the late 80s/early 90s moved into syndication. USA replaced it with “USA Up All Night” hosted by Gilbert Gottfried one night and some bimbo (Rhonda something?) the other.
As far as early “music videos,” they go back pretty much to the advent of talkies and depending on how you define the term, prior. I have seen bits of silent shorts with lyrics on the intertitles, presumably so the audience could sing along with the in-theatre pianist. I don’t know how successful they were. Studios used to also snip out musical numbers to stand alone in exhibition. This happened a lot to my favorite singer from the early days of sound, Ruth Etting.
I remember seeing videos for The Doors Unknown Soldier, Devos great, GREAT (I’d give my left nut for a copy of this) epic Devolution video, Blue Cheer’s classic version of Summertime Blues on Don Kirchners show. That would have been around '78, but the Doors and Blue Cheer’s videos were from a good Ten years or more before that.
There was a cool show on at the same time that was hosted by Twiggy that showed lots of cool british glam rock like Slade, Trex and Fanny.
There was a video for Sabbaths Paranoid as well, and I remember seeing british punk vids late at night a few years before eMpTy Vee.
Everybody wants to be in movies, except maybe for Boston. Heck, Bob Dylan made a video that consists of him dropping huge cue cards containing last words of each line in “Subterrranean Homesick Blues”.
I used to love “The Midnight Special”. Lotsa great bands performed live on TV for that one. I’m pretty sure the video for the Guess Who’s “Albert Flasher” is just live video shot for that show, as was at least one popular Queen video. And Wolfman Jack!
