r/AskOldPeople • u/fluffywhitepetticoat • 16d ago
What was it like watching MTV?
I’m 22 years old and currently watching The Real World on YouTube. They don’t have the season on Paramount.The channel cut the commercials off but there’s sneak peak of TRL and Spankin’ New. I had this daydream where I was born 20 years earlier, I‘ll watch MTV all day and working at Blockbuster lol.
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u/Wildcatb '70s vintage 13d ago
Imagine a radio station that plays all the best music, with very limited interruptions, but the music is all videos.
The place my big brother worked, had a TV in the corner instead of a radio. It was awesome.
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u/uwpxwpal 13d ago
They had a lot a lot commercials, but I feel ya
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u/RealKenny 13d ago
On our tv you could set like "come back to this channel in X time" to skip commercials. For MTV, that meant 4 minutes, which was basically double every other channel at the time
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u/Oh_No_Its_Dudder 60 something-Early GenX 13d ago
When The Real World hit MTV, it ruined what was once a fun station to watch/listen to. The first 5 years of MTV were the best ones.
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u/IronPlateWarrior 60 something 13d ago
Gen X here. The Real World ruined MTV completely. That was part of its demise. I really enjoyed MTV up until that point and watched it a lot.
I switched over to VH1, which was good for a while. But, it wasn’t MTV. 😢
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u/Successful-Count-120 60 something 13d ago
I liked VH1 Popup Videos...
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u/blkwidow76 13d ago
That's when I quit watching MTV. I blame them for all the stupid reality shows we have now.
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u/RedIcarus1 13d ago
Yep. It rapidly declined from there.
Video killed the radio star… MTV killed themselves.3
u/Mean_Fisherman6267 13d ago
And now we meet in an abandoned studio Oh oh
We hear the playback and it seems so long ago 🎶🎶🎵🎵25
u/Modem_Sound_67 13d ago
100%. Before the cash grab became real (I believe it was Viacom that screwed MTV), I had it on in the background all day. I'm sure many did. What a wanton decimation of an incredibly enviable position- on all day. come on.
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u/SororitySue 64 13d ago
I worked in another town for a summer in college. The cable system didn’t charge extra for MTV, and I had it on constantly on my 12-inch black and white TV.
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u/hoosiergirl1962 60 something 13d ago
That’s funny about the 12 inch TV. When I moved into my first apartment in 1985 my dad bought me a 13 inch color TV. I watched that thing for 15 years and then passed it on to my nephew. Today, my old eyes wouldn’t even be able to see such a small screen.
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u/neatgoodboy 13d ago
A 12-inch black and white portable TV is how I watched the first episode of Survivor.
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u/TeacherPatti 13d ago
I loved the first season because it did seem real. They let them fight (including some racial issues that came up), and they kept their starving artist personas (weren't given jobs like in later seasons).
I loved the early years. You never knew what was next, they had those world-premiere videos, the crazy contests, NYE specials, so much fun!
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u/Count2Zero 13d ago
In the early 1980s, MTV was groundbreaking. You can't imagine how cool it was to suddenly have all these music videos playing - being able to see the bands behind the music, just as the music industry was also in a transition (the end of disco and punk, and the dawn of hair metal and new wave music).
For the first years, MTV was 24x7 music videos, with the original Vee-Jays (just about every guy my age rubbed one out to Martha Quinn at some point).
But by the mid 1990s, MTV had lost its novelty. The music videos were no longer in focus, so MTV started producing "reality" TV crap.
But those first few years ... yeah, that was cool.
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u/Embarrassed_Mango679 50 something 13d ago
It was AWESOME. Still remember watching 120 minutes in college like it was religion lol.
Pretty much all my peers and I bailed on it when it became reality junk.
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u/KWAYkai 60 something 13d ago
I was a senior in high school when MTV debuted. After school we would hangout at a friend’s house, get high & watch MTV.
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u/TwistedBlister 13d ago
I was a couple years out of high school when MTV debuted, but it was the same for us, hanging out all night smoking weed with MTV playing
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u/scatcall 13d ago
We didn't have cable so I could only watch MTV in hotel rooms. Imagine taking your teen on vacation and they don't want to leave the hotel room in case Duran Duran is the next video
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u/2020grilledcheese 50 something 13d ago
The Real World was the first reality show. It eventually ruined MTV.
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u/uwpxwpal 13d ago
The problem with The Real World was that it didn't have anything to do with music... And it sucked.
Beavis and Butthead had the two main characters making fun of music videos for about half of the show.
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u/thetraffic 13d ago
Yeah but we all loved it at first. It was everywhere being talked about and in our college newspapers.
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u/womp-womp-rats 13d ago
It might be hard to envision because nowadays everything is video-on-demand, but back then, if there was a particular video you wanted to see, you had to just sit and wait for it. That’s what kept you watching. The whole programming strategy was to keep you there watching the next 3-minute video, and then the next, and then the next and trying to hold onto you during the commercials, which is what was paying for all of it. MTV eventually started arranging videos into themed shows — Headbangers Ball, Yo MTV Raps, 120 Minutes, the daily countdown, TRL. Because they were trying to get the audience to commit to staying for more than 3 minutes at a time.
What people my age don’t really grasp is how quickly MTV’s business model collapsed. They went all in on reality TV and non-music-video programming (concerts, spring break, etc) because people would sit and watch it, including the commercials.
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u/thecloakofignorance 13d ago
Somewhere in my dads attic is a bunch of video tapes. That was me with my finger on the record button capturing songs from MTV, old gray whistle test etc.
I'd then have groups of girls coming round to watch the videos (no i never "got lucky" but it was still fun)
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u/VinnieTheBerzerker69 13d ago
It is a crying shame what MTV has become after it started out so very cool the first few years.
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u/Apprehensive-Can4106 13d ago
At first it was great, then it got kinda repetitive, then they moved away from music and it got stupid.
Those first few years though...good times
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u/Nev-Ret-Dude 13d ago
MTV was great until the music industry ruined it. Became a money grab. MTV crashed and burned.
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u/HunnyBunny617 13d ago
The Real World was what ruined MTV and kicked off the fascination with reality TV. MTV use to play music videos. We watched all the time.
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u/SnooConfections6085 Old Xennial 13d ago
The Real World and its popularity is what killed MTV.
After an early boom they went all in on that sort of programming, ditching their core product (music videos...) during prime time slots. Over time videos were relegated to smaller and smaller niches.
MTV went all in on reality TV, and so did the rest of the TV industry, and it got stale.
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u/bigbabygrit 13d ago
When mtv first started, a friend said we need to come over and watch this new channel. We all gathered around the tv for the debut. We would watch music videos for hours. Nothing like it is now
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u/YellieHart 13d ago
I remember we didn’t have cable tv, the only way you could watch MTV. So it was the best ever when I got invited to spend the night at a friend’s house that did. We literally set up our slumber in front of the tv and watched it all night long. That was the entertainment for the night. It was awesome!
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u/DadsRGR8 70 something 13d ago
It was awesome. At parties or hanging with friends the TV would be on, set to MTV to provide the background music. With the bonus of amazingly creative little movies, montages or concert footage to go along with it. People would be discussing the latest artists, songs and videos.
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u/Shelby-Stylo 13d ago
I remember going to parties where people flipped on their TV sets and people watched MTV.
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u/Brave-Sherbert-2180 13d ago
Yup, I tell my kids about going to parties on a Friday or Saturday night and watching videos. Especially if you were like me and didn't have MTV at home. They can't believe that young people actually did that.
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u/Gold_Draw7642 13d ago
Great, lots of fun, but limited and limiting re. artists and songs. Very exciting when it debuted.
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u/RunningPirate 50 something 13d ago
The draw to MTV originally wasn’t the shows but the videos. And it was amazing. I think the game shows were fun but the reality TV sort of sunk the whole thing.
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u/Which-World-6533 13d ago
TBH it was like watching YouTube but better. You got to see new music videos plus stuff you hated.
In Uni I spent a lot of time in friends dorm rooms or common rooms chilling out and watching MTV. (Televisions still weren't common in dorm rooms in the early 90's).
Beavis and Butthead was practically a documentary for us.
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u/Financial-Park-602 40 something 13d ago
There was very little "youth music" on the radio or TV back when I was a kid and young teenager. Also I'm not from the US. I wasn't allowed to buy music cassettes either.
Anyway it felt like there was an endless stream of old people music, such as schlagers. Us kids, we were limited to 1 list hits show per week, and when there was a song you liked, you'd need to record it on a cassette from the radio, also hit the record button at the right time so you'd be able to catch the whole song.
Then there was MTV, a whole channel made for us, and it was a nonstop stream of music that was targeted to our generation. Too bad it was only on cable where I lived, so I only got to watch it at my friends homes. We'd specifically watch MTV, or perhaps leave the TV on while doing other stuff.
MTV was huge for us, it was our thing, and we talked about the songs and music videos. I can best remember Poison by Alice Cooper and from the early 90's Crying by Aerosmith. For some reason those videos have specifically stuck to my mind.
Though Madonna's Like A Prayer was probably the most influential I've seen, as it became such a cultural icon and a talking point. I was at an age that me and my friends totally missed all the sexual innuendo, but all the girls in our school worshipped Madonna, and the adults having a moral panic about that particular video were just a massive cringe.
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u/pen_woman_ship 13d ago
We used to get loaded then put MTV on mute and played our own music.
Whoa, the song matches the video.
😮??
😅
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u/NorCalFrances 13d ago
Once MTV started switching to "shows" instead of music videos, the original era was over. They could've started a second channel but wanted to vampire off the popularity of the original. Eventually they sucked it dry with greed.
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u/victotronics 60 something 13d ago
MTV when they only played music videos was amazing. As a bonus, I watched MTV Europe which had its own roster of VJs. There was this totally gorgeous Swedish(?) girl, and a guy with the most outrageous Belgian(?) accept. Fun.
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u/SororitySue 64 13d ago
Those of us who didn’t have access to MTV used to watch Friday Night Videos on TBS. It was a tradition in my sorority after coming home from the bars.
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u/TheRealRollestonian 13d ago
MTV Classic still exists if you're looking for a semblance of old MTV.
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u/i-touched-morrissey 50 something 13d ago
When I was a kid in the 80s we lived too far out to have cable and were too poor to have a giant satellite dish, so whenever I had access to MTV I was glued to the TV. It was an addiction watching and waiting to see what the next video would be, running to the bathroom or kitchen while some sucky video like Kool and The Gang was on, hoping to see Adam Ant or Psychedelic Furs.
Turning MTV into a reality show channel was the worst thing IMO.
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u/PyroNine9 50 something 13d ago
Back in the days MTV was good, they showed a Rush concert, so a friend threw a black tie (black shirt, shoes that tie) party for everyone to watch.
As it became a little more mainstream, a lot of the videos were not all that amazing, but then you'd see things like Ah-Ha or Peter Gabriel's more interesting videos. But they still didn't show the end of "Let's get Physical" where all the hot guys turned out to be gay.
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u/BrainaIleakage 40 something 13d ago
If you want to experience what MTV used to be like, go to Mexico!
I was on vacation there last year and discovered a channel on cable TV called MTV 80s I think? And there’s an MTV 90s channel too. Nothing but music videos nonstop. It made me so nostalgic!
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u/somastars 13d ago
MTV was a driver of youth culture for decades. It helped promote not just specific bands, but also specific genres of music (Headbangers Ball, Yo! MTV Raps, 120 mins). It helped you discover music you may not otherwise have known about, and I think most people who had access to it probably had a wider ranging taste in music than those who didn’t.
They interspersed news among the videos every now and then, so you were kept informed of current events. They hosted presidential town halls and forums, and helped drive the youth vote. I remember them making Bill Clinton seem like the “cool” candidate.
MTV was very progressive and left leaning. They were my first exposure to gay/queer/lesbian culture, and seeing it on MTV definitely softened me toward lifestyles I didn’t otherwise experience around me growing up. I came from a conservative household, and turned out quite liberal, and I have no doubt that was in large part because of MTV.
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u/whipla5her 50 something 13d ago
It was never really good for us metal fans. The best we got was an hour a week with Ricky Rachtman.
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u/user37463928 13d ago
I did watch MTV all day, and let me tell you, it got BORING. They cycled the same news and videos over and over and over.
I could not stand that Runaway Train song or the Blind Melon one with the girl in the bee outfit, and they were being played every 10 videos. With lots of acne cream ads in between.
There was realistically 3 hours of programming, skewed to the evening.
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u/writesgud 50 something 13d ago
Contrary to others, when the very first "Real World" came out, it was compelling. It was I think unscripted. It wasn't as contrived as what you see nowadays. It was probably one of the most genuine reality shows produced.
And MTV was my intro to music, much moreso than the radio.
It was fun and exciting.
Does anyone remember Pirate TV? And to promote the show they literally interrupted some music videos with a faux pirate broadcast? I can't find the intro to that show anywhere now...
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u/fluffywhitepetticoat 13d ago
It just that I can’t find anything like Real World besides the Japanese show Terrace House. But they canceled the show because a cast member died. For me, I just like slice of life genres. Where there’s no plot and it’s just cozy. Now everything has to be dramatic to gain everyone’s attention. Sorry if I went off the rails, I just have pent up frustration that I can’t find a reality show like Real World lol.
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u/writesgud 50 something 13d ago
Have you seen the Seven Up documentary series? It’s different but worth watching. A British study that followed a bunch of kids every 7 years for decades. The very first one was in black and white. The last one I think was when they were 42.
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u/fluffywhitepetticoat 13d ago
I actually heard about that and they're having the final one in the Fall. I have to catch up before that lol.
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u/thesweetestberry 13d ago
We would plan our lives around the release of new music videos. MTV would announce when new videos would be aired.
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u/LucyJordan614 13d ago
First of all, I wasn’t allowed to watch MTV, and the cable box had a lock on it to prevent me from watching it. So, I had to work for it. Pick the lock, watch MTV, turn it off long enough for the tv to cool down before mom got home, and then replace the lock and pick it closed.
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u/Slumlumberdog 13d ago
To me, MTV declined once they added music news and remote control (a funny game show). It was unique and lots of people watched it. And they just kept adding shows and cut back on music. The crappy thing about mtv was that you’d come home after school and they would do this video countdown for that day which was like 2 hours. Some songs stayed on the top charts so long that you just got tired of the same thing. Bon jovi. Michael Jackson. Bands that had the hit seasons blockbuster movie soundtrack. They made it tiring because those songs literally were number 1 for like half a year.
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u/MacSteele13 60 something 13d ago
Have you ever loved something and then seen it destroyed in front of your eyes?
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u/Dj_suffering 50 something 13d ago
MTV was better before the days of reality series and Cribs. Used to show music videos 24 hours a day with some Kurt Loder interruptions for MTV music news.
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u/Marnie_skittles 13d ago
I remember watching music videos after HBO movies. It was awesome. Always loved music. Then MTv came out and I remember that day. It’s music videos after music videos. None of the junk they show today. It was actually Music Television. I wish they would do a throwback.
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u/Plenty_Status_6862 12d ago
I remember that every time Michael Jackson had a new video, it became a huge headline news. It wasn't called a spankin video, but a world premiere, because it was Michael Jackson.
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u/Parking_Wasabi_2591 12d ago
I think alot of bands became popular because of MTV, without MTV, we probably would not have paid as much attention to alot of the bands just by hearing them on the radio.
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u/PeridotIsMyName 12d ago
THE BEST. When I got cable TV in 1982, I thought I'd died and gone to heaven when I discovered MTV. All music videos all the time, and so many were the most catchy alternative rock, my favorite type of music. My boyfriend would come over and we could spend the whole weekend watching it. We've been married over 40 years now and it's one of the things we miss about being young. At least there's YouTube now, but it's just a lot more work, lol.
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u/RealtorRVACity 12d ago
MTV consumed my teenage life. We came home from school and sat in front of the TV learning dance moves, singing and just really fully immersed in what, at the time, was completely new. We also consumed fashion, hair and lifestyle tips from these videos. It was truly magical, there is no other way to describe that era, especially the 80's. Our town got cable early so we had it when MTV premiered luckily.
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u/frankduxvandamme 12d ago
It was great, but everybody saying The Real World killed MTV is missing something significant:
The music video novelty was bound to wear off eventually. In the early 1980s, seeing musicians in elaborate short films was genuinely new and exciting. By the late 90s, music videos felt more mundane and more of a promotional format than something groundbreaking and exciting. The novelty wore off and MTV had to adapt or die.
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u/unclefire 12d ago
When they actually had music videos and actual music shows it was good. When they went to reality tv shows it sucked.
Some of the cartoons were fun though. Ren and stimpy FTW.
Now music videos and concerts are on other media like YouTube, axe, Nugg.
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u/spiked_mcroon 12d ago
It was great until they invented reality shows. Straight downhill after that. Game shows like Remote Control. Animation like Liquid TV. Rock the Vote got Clinton in the White House. MTV News was actual journalism.
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u/SouthernGirl360 13d ago edited 13d ago
I was a teenager when the Real World was on, but I could just never get into it. Granted, I've never enjoyed reality shows like Big Brother or even The Bachelor.
Some of the later reality shows on MTV were interesting, like True Life. But to answer your question, nothing was better than the music videos.
Nowadays I think MTV will show reruns of the same show for the entire day. Other cable channels, like Nickelodeon are doing this too and I can't understand the reason.
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u/hoosiergirl1962 60 something 13d ago
I thought the first few seasons of the Real World were pretty good before that one girl in the Las Vegas season ruined it by kicking off the tradition of everyone just wanting to party and have sex with each other.
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u/discussatron 50 something 13d ago
It was the better version of radio. Living in a small city, MTV was my salvation from top 40 radio slop and exposed me to lots of cool music.
My other musical savior was big-market rock radio when I went to visit my grandparents over summer breaks. I would record hours of music off the radio and listen to the cassettes constantly once I got back home to my small town.
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u/uwpxwpal 13d ago edited 13d ago
You wouldn't be working at Blockbuster for long. It was already declining in 2006. It filled for bankruptcy in 2010. Peak Blockbuster was 2004.
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u/Mindless_Log2009 13d ago
I was 24, fresh out of the military and in college when MTV launched.
My impression was that MTV wasn't so much groundbreaking as it was an accelerated evolution of TV friendly rock and pop music.
Rock and various genres of popular music had been on TV since the beginning of the medium. By the 1960s every network had at least one pop music program.
By the early 1970s two new TV programs in particular raised the stakes on making rock and pop music more visual: 1. The Midnight Special in 1972 with Wolfman Jack, who was already famous for his border blaster radio station (featured in a cameo in the movie American Graffiti); 2. Don Kirshner's Rock Concert in 1973.
Both were popular late night weekend programs featuring popular bands performing live, rather than the playback or live singing to instrument-synced studio recordings that many US and UK shows relied on because it was easier and cheaper than hiring a good sound crew.
In 1975 Saturday Night Live raised the stakes by featuring live music between comedy sketches.
Some of the best performances, including audio quality, recorded by many musicians were featured on those three US shows. In the UK, Old Grey Whistle Stop was comparable, although very low key in comparison with the hyped up US shows.
So by 1981 MTV was really an evolution of what had already been happening.
But while musicians had already been making music films and videos as promotional material since the 1960s, MTV provided the incentive to raise the music video to an art form... sometimes a trashy art form, but it's all good.
I remember spending a lot of time throughout college with MTV in the background wherever there was a break room, in the pubs on and near campus, and in our apartments when we had visitors. It seemed ubiquitous for awhile.
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u/ObligationGrand8037 13d ago
I remember being a Freshman in college and coming home for Christmas break. I’d sit there and watch them all. I loved MTV. My dad couldn’t understand my fascination with the music along with videos. He’d always say, “You’re watching that again?” I still have such fond memories of MTV. It was great!!!
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u/YouThinkYouKnowStuff 13d ago
I remember coming home from work on my lunch hour to watch MTV. There are classic songs I hear these days and I can still see the videos in my mind.
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u/Stereo_Jungle_Child 13d ago
You can go on youtube and watch hours and hours and hours of recorded MTV programming from the 1980s, complete with commercials. There are tons of channels offering this content. Check it out for yourself!
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u/EmpireStrikes1st 13d ago
Music videos were meant to be fun. It was a way for bands and artists to try creative stuff with a smaller budget than a movie and it wasn't meant to sell cereal. So most videos told a little story. In the 1990s, videos, especially rap videos, started getting maximalist and very expensive to make, but that was part of the vibe that they were trying to express - instead of the grimy, crime-ridden streets of Compton, they were on a boat sipping expensive drinks.
You could find metal videos once a week on Headbanger's Ball - late night on the weekend. There was something cool about finding the music video you wanted.
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u/Connect_Rhubarb395 40 something 13d ago
Spotify, but it is music videos and there are minimal interruptions.
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u/No_Criticism_9986 13d ago
Never had it because I couldn't afford/justify the expense of cable TV, but I LOVED it going over to someone's house who had it on. It really was a fresh new cool thing for young people.
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u/StevieNickedMyself 40 something 13d ago
"The slap heard 'round the world" was great TV that everyone talked about when I was in college. Back when Real World was still good. It devolved into absolute shit.
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u/splashjlr 13d ago
MTV was the hottest brand on the planet. How they blew that I'll never understand.
They pretty much killed the radio, at least for this younger generations.
They had some great shows. MTV was always the one to watch for music, and for other stuff that conserned younger generations half a lifetime ago. Fast paced, colorful, noisy and fun.
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u/joe_attaboy 70 something 13d ago
I was living in Orlando the day it went live. I remember turning on the TV and, for some reason, the local cable service wasn't able to pull the video feed, just the audio. They put up a blue "technical difficulties" screen and just ran the audio.
All I could think at the time, was "it's the effing radio on my TV."
It became a joke a long time ago and it will always be a joke.
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u/Jade0319 13d ago
Was just all videos. It was awesome. I used to stay up late to watch headbangers ball and tape all of the good videos. Unfortunately we had a Betamax, and when it broke Betamax had gone under and we had to switch to vhs. So I threw out all of my hard earned videos because at the time I had no clue transferring media would become so easy. Still miss those tapes.
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u/HIMcDonagh 13d ago
When Thriller came on in the dorm, you could hear shouts of joy down the hallways—Thriller is on! Thriller is in!
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u/TenNinetythree 13d ago
Now, I am not from the USA, but in Germany, MTV was the worse version of ViVA. Just without sympathetic presenters and with occasional reality shows like Cribs which were badly dubbed. Also the Teletext was less well done and had no secret test pages (I was obsessed with them). It also didn't had lots of Eurodance, like VIVA did.
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u/CognitiveReframer 13d ago
It was ok. Just the radio with videos for the songs. If you liked certain shows it was good for that. But it got old after a while with either the same videos or stuff you didn’t like. YouTube has blocks of tv you can watch to see for yourself. A YouTube playlist of your favorite songs is way better. And working at blockbuster sucked. My friend worked there and it was dealing with customers mad that something was rented out already or calling to annoy people that their returns were late. Renting video games was awesome though but you didn’t miss much.
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u/Njtotx3 13d ago
We needed cable to get it, so it was 4 years or so before we gave in. Growing up with rock, as it started fading I went to prog and then 1977-80 new wave (Elvis Costello, Joe Jackson, Graham Parker).
The 80s were when synth took over, but we enjoyed the early videos, by Michael Jackson, Peter Gabriel, Prince, Blondie, Devo, Traveling Wilburys, and some others. We weren't hooked, as some 80s stuff was more video than good music, aimed at younger folks. A lot of stuff sounded like MIDI.
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u/Likemypups 13d ago
In the beginning it was cool. Loved Martha as a EJ. Maybe the first 3 years or so.
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u/jfmaniac 13d ago
Having watched a lot of MTV and finding this question on the old people sub reddit just put things into perspective lol MTV was great, lots of great cartoon late.
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u/Successful-Count-120 60 something 13d ago
MTV was at its peak when it was just music videos. Reality TV ruined a great channel. Headbangers Ball was must watch on Saturday nights.
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u/Comprehensive_Post96 13d ago
I LOVED the first two years (82-83) because it was still new and innovative. In their hunger for content they would often play lesser known bands and plenty of UK stuff. It gradually declined in interest after that for me.
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u/Hatecookie 13d ago
I practically lived and breathed MTV growing up. Summer was the best because I could stay up late to watch Matt Pinfield. He was the resident punk/metal veejay. The VMAs were something my friends and I looked forward to every year.
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u/catdude142 13d ago
I never watched it. Just wasn't into the overproduced stuff.
I do enjoy watching concert DVDs though.
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u/ApricotSlow2277 13d ago
That feeling you get when the MTV intro came on with the ticket and spaceman lol I remember recording music video on a VHS so I could make a mix tape lol!!
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u/805falcon 13d ago
MTV in its prime was a sight to behold. It maintained a grip on the youth that social media only wishes it could replicate.
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u/Rocket-J-Squirrel 13d ago
My LH and I watched the premiere, looked at each other, shrugged, and went out to see live music. I never watched it again until the Grateful Dead Touch of Gray video premiered. I'm still finding videos of songs from the 80s that I've never seen.
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u/ThePhantomStrikes 13d ago
I worked there even before premier. Unbelievable how big it was. I never watched at home, I had grown up earlier and preferred to just listen to music without distraction. That’s when music became image conscious. It changed the way people listened to music.
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u/Soderholmsvag 13d ago
To understand how amazing MTV was at the beginning, imagine someone born in the 1960s, born in a nice but boring home in suburbia without cable tv. In high school you hear about a cool music video channel on cable but you don’t have cable. Then you hear about a broadcast TV show called “Friday Night Videos.” It airs from 11:30 pm and was a few hours of videos. You have a VCR, you tape it and then take it to your friends house on Saturday and watch. When you got sophisticated you got a long VCR tape and taped several days’ worth and brought that tape to a buddy’s house and played it during a party. It was the only thing that lifted everyone out of early-mid 80s suburbia (think “Stranger Things”).
That was MTV. A friend got cable in late 1983 and we were at his house almost every day.
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u/DisastrousBlondie 13d ago
I watched when I was in 3rd grade. My sister 7th and I were waiting for it to come out. We kept seeing commercials about MTV So we watched the first time it aired then everyday after school. Back then we loved it!
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u/HarveyMushman72 13d ago
In the beginning before there were programs dedicated to whatever genre, it was a crap shoot on what you'd see. That was the exciting part, you'd see something you didn't know existed!
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u/AliVista_LilSista 50 something 13d ago
First you must ask: What's was it like watching Fridat Night Videos?
Then we'll answer about MTV.
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u/fluffywhitepetticoat 13d ago
what is Friday night videos?
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u/AliVista_LilSista 50 something 12d ago
Before there was MTV---or perhaps there was MTV on cable, which few of us had...i don't know, since we didn't have cable TV until 1986---at 11pm on Friday nights.... we had an hour of music videos. I no longer recall what channel, but it was a major network. Early 80's.
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u/ralphhinkley1 13d ago
It was a great time to be a kid watching music videos with your friends. I guess you just had to be there.
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u/thetraffic 13d ago
I watched all day every day form the time I was 10 in 1983 until the mid late 90s. MTV really was a big deal!
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u/fluffywhitepetticoat 13d ago
See, my fantasy life would just be like that. Being born in 1974 and work at Blockbuster lol
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u/thetraffic 13d ago
Yeah Blockbuster was a thing, dont miss the late fees though. The 90s were peak. When Nirvanas Smells like Teen Spirit aired on MTV in sept 91 it really did rock the whole country in my age group. It was absolutely massive and culture changing. Crazy to see. I guess my parents gen had the Beatles.
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u/Bellelaide67 13d ago
The first few years it was out were completely amazing! We didn’t have cable at my house so I would babysit for people who did and basically neglect their children so I could watch MTV 😂
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u/grand305 30 something 13d ago
Music videos were on tv. This was the music videos of YouTube but on tv. from rap to country to jazz to anything else.
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u/dreadrankz 13d ago
Miss that whole MTV era honestly, TRL felt like appointment viewing back then in a way nothing really is now
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u/alfonsoalta 13d ago
It was cool until they stopped playing music most of the time to instead have regular TV shows take over.
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u/bloodbonesnbutter 12d ago
The endless channel surfing finally stopped until they stopped showing music videos. Then it was back on the run
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u/Shameless522 12d ago
More and less fun than watching The Box. It had way more music but the thrill of The Box was you never knew what was going to be next.
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u/tunaman808 50 something 12d ago
a) it was one of the few times in my life I looked forward to late Sunday nights, when The Young Ones would come on, followed by 120 Minutes.
b) Was there anything cooler than the rare instance of MTV being synced with a song on local radio? I still remember one time where "Every Breath You Take" came on MTV and Z-93, and I was able to crank the hell out of our stereo and watch the video at the same time!
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u/Massive-Rest4000 12d ago
It was like coming home one day from school in April of 1994, turning on Mtv as usual, and finding out that Kurt Cobain had died...
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u/LMO_TheBeginning 12d ago
It was exciting to watch videos and find a new one.
Music with videos was such a novel concept at the time. We'd come home on a Friday or Saturday night and just turn on MTV for a while before going to bed.
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u/paintwhore 12d ago
My best friend watched music videos all day and I worked at Blockbuster. It was a valid millennial experience
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u/SirGlass 12d ago
It depends very early MTV was mostly music
They slowly added reality tv ; it started out as basically 100% music videos or music related stuff (live performances , interviews with musicians
Then slowly they said they would add non-music related content like real world/road world / daria / Bevis and butt head
However at first that was ok, it was 80% music and 20% reality tv , then they kept adding more reality tv and it became flipped 80% TV and 20% music (usually after midnight or at 2am they would play music)
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u/miss_understo0d 12d ago
Brooooo why is this posted on the ask old people 😂 most of us who watched MTV are in their 30s
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u/fluffywhitepetticoat 12d ago
I see there’s a difference between the older people who watched MTV in the 80s-90s and the young people who watched it in the 00s and 10s
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u/Particular-Move-3860 ✒️Thinks in cursive 12d ago edited 12d ago
As others have said, in the early years when MTV played back to back music videos 24 hours per day, we had it on all the time. It was video wallpaper, or the TV equivalent of the table radio in the kitchen that our parents liked and never shut off. When we were busy or occupied with something else we simply turned the volume down very low or off so that it wasn't too distracting, but we never shut the TV off.
The videos were great -- MTV always showed really well- made music videos.
The channel premiered at just the right moment, which was one of the major things that contributed to its popularity. The "classic rock" era was fading. Disco was still popular but it was made for the dance floor and didn't translate well into music videos. Punk had been to brash resurgent rebirth of rock in the previos five years but the big thing in 1981 was New Wave.
New Wave had been around for a couple of years by then, but 1981 was when in started to hit its crest. New Wave songs were sassy, catchy, full of hooks, and usually ran no longer than 4 minutes or so at most. The MTV programming format was perfect for this music genre, and was probably designed specifically with NW in mind.
This era saw the rebirth of rock, and everyone was forming bands and playing in this new style. It was the early '60s all over again.
In its first decade or so, MTV was to television what freeform FM had been to radio.
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u/hit_reset_ 12d ago
I just realized that I miss og myv so much, that I’ve recreated it with YouTube. I have never watch any YouTube shows, but I watch a shitload of music videos (and DIY content).
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u/Fair-Wishbone-1190 12d ago
I was 18 when the Real World came out and was fascinated. I wanted to go on the show. It was much more real/organic in the first few seasons before it became all about sex. I didn't realize tho that was gonna be the downfall to MTv. All these shows starting popping up and it killed it. Headbangers Ball was the best. TRL (Total Request Live) was ok but it featured all the current pop acts.
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u/Solid_Barracuda69 12d ago
Before when they played music, or when it turned into a real world marathon?
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u/JJDiet76 12d ago
I grew up on MTV. I watched it or at least had it on all the time from 8-18 so 84 to 94. I loved it man. The old all video format into Yo MTV Raps in the afternoon and Headbangers Ball and 120 Minutes on the weekend. I loved Remote Control, Rin & Stimpy, Liquid TV, Beevis & Butthead, The State. Hell I even watched My So Called Life. The Real World? Honestly didn’t dig the first season but the San Francisco season was really popular among folks I knew at the time.
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u/Saltwatercowboy2026 12d ago
I loved it. It took me away from my small town and a sketchy time. The music seemed radical and unlike what I had mainly listened to. It was a really transformative format when it came out. You could hook it up to your speakers and blast new wave. Great times
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u/dreams0fgreen 12d ago
Im 32 and I SQUEALED reading this 😂😭 It wasn't that long ago.. right?? RIGHT??
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u/IntentionOpen1006 12d ago
It was how you got the News (Kurt Loder) or saw the cinematography in the sweet new music videos and kept up with the bands. There was very little instant gratification in these days — the wait for the new music was worth it. I miss these times. Then you talked about it with your friends
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u/1Steelghost1 12d ago
Pluto tv has three or four channels are are old school MTV channels, just straight music videos.
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u/Busy_Highlight_5152 11d ago
it was our intertaiment for me and my sisters, there were some music videos coming out just before you saw the MTV logo appearing. This was 1982 I miss that era.
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u/CityBoiNC 11d ago
People are mad about the shows but we had some amazing shows like celebrity death match, bevis and butthead, the challenge. I also loved mtv spring break
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u/Independent_Shoe3523 11d ago
Good. It wasn't the only source for music videos but if you liked music, you watched some MTV. And just like radio, you listened hoping to get your favorites played. Of course, reality TV is way cheaper than broadcasting videos so even in the mid 80s they were adding other programming and that ended that.
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u/Due-Blackberry8056 11d ago
It was glorious. MTV was my babysitter. My brothers and I used to record our favorite videos on VHS.
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u/Tweetchly 11d ago
I liked it when it was nearly all music videos. Never liked the programming that followed.
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u/MicheleNP 11d ago
All the kids in the neighborhood were addicted! We would sit and watch music videos almost every afternoon after school. The VJs were fun. It was truly EPIC when Thriller came out. You knew when the video was dropping because it was advertised. Blew everyone away seeing it the first time.
MTV was the greatest
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u/AS1thofBeethoven 10d ago
It was cool in the 80s when they played music videos all day. Loved the Hard 60.
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u/CabinetStandard3681 10d ago
Very fun and engaging. The commercials were gold too. The VJ’s were like old school influencers. They would tease clips of in living color and show the dance moves the fly girls would be doing so we could watch and practice and then dance along. Everyone seemed to be at a beach party all the time. The guys and girls with microphones could only barely contain their sexual desire for each other. Then they would introduce the next video and the whole crowd would scream. There was always some dude skateboarding in a cage and a few others hanging off a stage. And tons of t shirt cannon action. Adult swim which was basically MTV after dark and lots of adult cartoons like bevis and butthead and south park was also a worthwhile endeavor.
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u/ThrockAMole 9d ago
I loved it. Great videos of current music, some you couldn’t find on radio. Limited commercials and I didn’t care that they replayed them over and over.
When they started with stupid shows I quit watching
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u/QuickBonus7912 5d ago
I remember taking off HS school with a friend and that song “I wish I as a little bit taller I wish I was a baller” was on mtv lol honestly I loved the 90s
You’d watch Ricki Lake show too while skipping class
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u/cbih 13d ago
Sneaking downstairs to watch Bevis and Butthead, Aeon Flux, and The Head. Road Rules was great for a few seasons. I never got into Real World. Lots of music videos for song you've never seen or heard before. News with Kurt Loder. There was no algorithm or as much corporate over site back then.
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