On August 1st, 1980, MTV premiered. Over the course of its first broadcast day, it aired over 160 unique music videos. That’s at least 160 more than they’re going to air today. Yes, there was a time when the M in MTV truly did stand for Music.
The 21st vide that aired on that date was the performance clip from The Cars. This was the first of many Cars videos to air on MTV.
On August 1st, 1980, MTV premiered and, over the course of 24 hours, played 166 individual music videos. Some of those videos and songs are still remembered. Others, like Lee Ritneour’s Mr. Briefcase, are more obscure.
Just because a song or a video isn’t well-known doesn’t mean that it’s not good, of course. Mr. Briefcase has a killer bassline and a pretty good video. I guess Mr. Briefcase and the suits in this video are meant to represent the record company execs who wanted Lee Ritenour to sell out. The vocals here are by Eric Tagg.
On August 1st, 1980, MTV premiered. On that day, they played over 160 unique music videos, which is certainly a contrast to today when they play none. The 19th video that MTV played was the video for The Pretenders’s Message of Love. While the video may ultimately be a performance clip, it still captures the unique aesthetic and sense of humor that won and continues to win The Pretenders a legion of loyal fans.
On August 1st, 1980, MTV premiered and played a total of 116 music videos over a 24 hour period. The 18th video that they played was for Michael Johnson’s Bluer than Blue, which features the singer singing about a failing relationship in a blue-tinged house.
This was an early music video, made three years before MTV even premiered so it looks fairly primitive to modern eyes. It’s still a step up from the performance clips that were used for most music videos during the late 70s. It actually has a narrative, albeit a simple one.
For the past few weeks, I’ve been sharing, in order, the music videos that MTV played on August 1st, 1980, it’s first day of broadcast. I was happy because I thought I had already dealt with all of the REO Speedwagon videos that I would have to share but then I discovered that the 17th video played on MTV was for Keep On Loving You.
So, without too much rancor, here’s the Speedwagon.
Enjoy?
I may make fun of REO Speedwagon because they really are the epitome of Adult Contemporary soft rock but this song was fun to listen to while driving around Vice City.
The 16th music video to be played on MTV on August 1st, 1980 was also the first heavy metal song to ever be played on the network. Appropriately enough, the song and the band performing it were both named Iron Maiden.
This is a performance clip, taken from Live At The Rainbow. It was not easy to find this video on YouTube. Doing a search for “Iron Maiden music video” returned a lot of results, none of which were this one. Finally, I had to go with “Iron Maiden 1980.” To the best of my knowledge, this is the video that was played on MTV.
The 15th song to be broadcast on MTV on August 1st, 1980 was this video for Rod Stewart’s cover of Sailing. There were actually two videos shot for this song. The first video featured Stewart sailing outside of Dublin. The version that aired on MTV was shot at New York Harbor.
MTV’s first broadcast day was August 1st, 1981. On that day, they aired 116 music videos. The 14th of those videos was a performance clip for April Wine’s Just Between You And Me. It was taken from April Wine’s concert film, LiveinLondon, and it was the first video by a Canadian band to be aired on MTV.
Unfortunately, that’s not the video that is at the top of this post. The clip of the LiveinLondon performance is not available on YouTube. (You can, however, watch LiveinLondon in its entirety if you want to.) So, the video above is from another concert that occurred around roughly the same time. This was one was filmed at a 1982 concert at the Five Seasons Center in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
“That was a major moment for me. It was my first foray into co-writing. Kalodner said, ‘You did great with ‘Rockin’ into the Night,’ I want to put you together with Don Barnes and Jeff Carlisi of .38 to see what you can do.’ That first night, Jeff and Don are at my house in La Grange, Illinois and we’re sitting around the kitchen table. Writing sessions are always like blind dates: It’s like making love without the foreplay. Suddenly you’re sitting there face to face, and you’re thinking, ‘OK, what do we do now? Am I going to embarrass myself? What if my ideas suck?’ So we’re sitting there nervously, just making small talk, and all of the sudden Jeff says, ‘I’ve got this lick,’ and he starts with the opening lick of what became ‘Hold on Loosely.’ I go, ‘That’s really neat,’ and Don says, ‘I’ve got this title – ‘Hold On Loosely,” and I go, ‘Yeah, but don’t let go.’
My wife of 32 years now, this is what broke us apart when we were teenagers – I was getting too close. I was getting too serious for her. She didn’t say, ‘Hold on Loosely,’ but that’s what was in her heart. So when Don said ‘Hold on Loosely,’ I immediately knew what he was talking about. He wasn’t even talking about that exactly, he told me later, he just thought it was a cool title.
I immediately saw a story, and it was really my own story. I said, ‘Jeff, play that riff.’ He plays the riff, and I start singing: ‘You see it all around you, good loving gone bad.’ It just started coming. I turned on the tape recorder and said, ‘Guys, I think we have something here.’ We got the stalk of the song in the next two days, then I fine-tuned it in the next two or three weeks. I flew down to Jacksonville where the band was rehearsing and basically worked out the song with them down there.”
— Jim Peterik, on co-writing Hang On Loosely
Jim Peterik was also the keyboardist for Survivor and that band, which was still looking for its first hit, were initially not happy that their keyboardist had written a hit song for another band.
HangOnLoosely was such a hit that the video for it, a simple performance clip, was the 13th video aired on MTV on August 1st, 1980, their first day of broadcast. Fortunately, a performance clip was all the song needed because the .38 Special could really play!
The 12th music video to play on MTV on August 1st, 1981, their first day of broadcast, was the video for HistoryNeverRepeats by Split Enz.
This video feels much more like a “typical” MTV video than some of the other videos that were aired on that day. Though the emphasis is on Split Enz performing, there’s still a slight narrative. In the 80s, there were several music videos that were set up to appear as if they might the lead singer dreaming about a song. As well, the video celebrates the nerd chic that would dominate MTV’s early rotation before being replaced by hair metal (which, itself, was later replaced by grunge which was replaced by pop which was replaced by hip hop which was replaced by reality programming).
Director Noel Crombie was a member of Split Enz. Following the band’s break-up, he’s gone on to have a successful career as a freelance designer.
Through the Shattered Lens 