Posted on 07/23/2015 12:43:54 PM PDT by oh8eleven
Viacom is vulnerable in that many of its networks, including MTV, Nickelodeon and Spike, target youngsters the segment of the population thats most rapidly and definitively abandoning linear TV, according to the analyst.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
At that time there weren’t a lot of videos being made so just about any band could make one and get it played on MTV short of X-rated.
That’s where you got videos like Roly Poly Fish heads
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGR_EgWfXfI
MTV made bands like Midnight Oil.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejorQVy3m8E
And lets not forget where U2 came from.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EM4vblG6BVQ
Or the talking heads.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1wg1DNHbNU
Funny thing is that none of them are really my kind of music but they do have a nostalgic attraction today.
“So now I come to youooooo, with broooooken a-a-armmmsss....”
Gracious I loved that song. This one is pre-MTV, but in the same line of twisted songs-”Hey baby I’m your telephone man...”. Nobody does funny/twisted little songs anymore. Reminds me of Dr Demento, Mr Jaws, etc.
“Yo, Wolf Face, I’m your worst nightmare.”
They had no choice but to change formats.
Filesharing/streaming/MP3 killed packaged recorded music as a revenue stream. Most bands make more money from touring now than from their recorded music, an inversion of the business model that existed until the early 00s.
When someone could sample whatever music they liked online, then instantly downloaded individual songs and read reviews from other music fans, it also obviated the demand for a DJ or VJ to curate music.
I think they attempted to find a niche where the old business model still could work. An example of this was the program “Amp”, which aired for about 5 years in the late 90s and early 00s.
There are newer bands like that, in which all of the musicians are accomplished on their own merits, such as New Pornographers.
There were bands making videos before MTV but they were basically just filmed in studio like this Ozzy Osbourne
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3LvhdFEOqs
Judas Priest was a little more theatrical.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L397TWLwrUU
However, videos from way back also exist that were well done.
House of the Rising Sun was Number 1 on the billboard charts on the day I was born in 64.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5A-4VGfx5lU
Procol Harum: Whiter shade of Pale was another early video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mb3iPP-tHdA
Now, this was a prescient song (from 1986), just 30 years too early. Although MTV really died in 1992 or so.
“MTV-Get Off The Air”, Dead Kennedys
Fun Fun Fun in the fluffy chair
Flame up the herb
Woof down the beer
[click!]
Hi
I’m your video DJ
I always talk like I’m wigged out on quaaludes
I wear a satin baseball jacket everywhere I go
My job is to help destroy
What’s left of your imagination
By feeding you endless doses
Of sugar-coated mindless garbage
So don’t create
Be sedate
Be a vegetable at home
And thwack on that dial
If we have our way even you will believe
This is the future of rock and roll
How far will you go
How low will you stoop
To tranquilize our minds with your sugar-coated swill
You’ve turned rock and roll rebellion
Into Pat Boone sedation
Making sure nothing’s left to the imagination
M.T.V. Get off the
M.T.V. Get off the
M.T.V. Get off the air
Get off the air
See the latest rejects from the muppet show
Wag their tits and their dicks
As they lip-synch on screen
There’s something I don’t like
About a band who always smiles
Another tax write-off
For some schmuck who doesn’t care
M.T.V. Get off the air
And so it was
Our beloved corporate gods
Claimed they created rock video
Allowing it to sink as low in one year
As commercial TV has in 25
“It’s the new frontier,” they say
It’s wide open, anything can happen
But you’ve got a lot of nerve
To call yourself a pioneer
When you’re too god-damn conservative
To take real chances.
Tin-eared
Graph-paper brained accountants
Instead of music fans
Call all the shots at giant record companies now
The lowest common denominator rules
Forget honesty
Forget creativity
The dumbest buy the mostest
That’s the name of the game
But sales are slumping
And no one will say why
Could it be they put out one too many lousy records?!?
M.T.V.-Get off the air!
NOW
Pink Floyd - Arnold Layne
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQTFRq1hjtM
That one was a bit heavy for me in my old age :)
A few of the Heavy metal bands have real staying power. Megadeath, Metallica, and Iron Maiden are still drawing 6 figure crowds. The crowds themselves are young but the bands are my age or older (50 years old and up)
Lot of middle aged metal stars on this stage.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__j5Z_WcVgE
I liked that other band Eric Burdon was part of, War.
I was never into heavy metal, but one song I loved was “Janie’s Got a Gun.” Aerosmith?
Burdon fantasized about fronting a (mostly) black band, so War was a dream-come-true for him.
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