Music Television, rise of the video clip

Hugo Smart

The Television was commercially available since the late 1930s. During the 50s, American variety shows such as Stage Show, The Ed Sullivan Show and Texaco Star Theatre aired live musicians. Stage Show was a CBS network music variety program, and featured Elvis Presley’s first national television appearances in the USA. Elvis appeared later on the Ed Sullivan show.

In 1964 the BBC began running the show Top of the Pops, which featured mimed performances by the top selling artists of the time with the studio orchestra. The Beatles and The Rolling Stones featured on the early shows. Where a live act was not possible, the act was replaced by groups of dancers.

Miming created some controversy among the musicians. Many were unable to recreate the sound of their recordings, either because they did not have the equipment or they lacked the skills. Miming was banned by the Musicians Union in 1966, but musicians allowed using a recorded backing track to sing along to. The studio orchestra was dropped after a musicians strike and the show reverted to playing pre-recorded tracks only. Some bands refused to play their music in this way and others deliberately abused the setup to make a point. Noel and Liam Gallagher from Oasis switched parts for the song Roll with it, with Noel pretending he was singing Liam’s part and Liam pretending to play guitar. Michael Stipe of R.E.M used a megaphone to cover his lips to hide the trouble he was having miming the lyrics.

In 1981, during this time, MTV was launched in America, broadcasting the top 40 in music videos. Interestingly, the song Video Killed the Radio Star by Buggles was one of the first video clips to be aired. As the popularity of the show grew, more bands were pressured into making video clips for their songs, to facilitate being played on such an influential show.

Today, MTV devotes only a portion of the day’s programming to playing music videos. The US television channel also now plays reality television shows. It has become a central hub for music news, events and promotions, at least, for popular music.

Similar show concepts include Video Jukebox from HBO, Rage in Australia, and Video Hits internationally.

Because of TOTP problems with reproducing recorded artists, and to make airtime for shows played overseas in Australia and New Zealand they began playing only video clips of pre-recorded songs. MTV forwent the live studio performances and went straight to airing only video clips. These decisions made the video clip far more important in music today than it was 30 years ago. In some cases, arguably, it is now more important than the music it represents.

However, the trend of live performances continued through the 1970s and is still present today. Frank Zappa performed “I am the Slime” on Saturday Night Live in 1976. The Who played on TOTP in 1972. Television shows today such as Rove Live, Rockwiz, The David Letterman Show, and Spicks and Specks all feature live performances by artists, though mostly non-mainstream. For instance, the death metal band Uncle Chunk performed on Spicks and Specks.

Sources

Palmer, Robert – Dancing in the Street: A Rock and Roll History, BBC Books

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1k8GKXlDEo – Frank Zappa performs I am the Slime on Saturday Night Live

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwdCxmk0l6g -Uncle Chunk perform on Spicks and Specks

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mtv#Moral_influence_and_controversies – the influences of MTV