13,148,719 Minutes
My family didn’t get basic cable until Summer 1986. What it boiled down to was that I mostly missed out on the first five years of MTV. There was a lot of catching up to do. A ravenous teen interested in visual artistry, I would watch music videos wherever, whenever possible — mostly MTV, but also BET, Friday Night Videos, Night Flight and even programs on the Spanish and religious channels. But MTV remained king. I witnessed Martha Quinn and Alan Hunter give way to Adam Curry and Kevin Seal, 120 Minutes, Yo! MTV Raps and Club MTV. We had a good run together, but nowadays I glance at MTV and see a complete stranger. I find it tacky and repulsive, but then again I’m no longer 18. Happy birthday, MTV. For further reading try CNN’s 25 Memorable MTV Moments or 25 Years Down the Tube, a wistful and perceptive essay by The Washington Post’s Hank Steuver.
August 1st, 2006 at 10:12 pm
We. Are. Older. Now.
if we were NOT so shocked and saddened, then MTV wouldn’t have done its job!
And yes, I don’t like it anymore either.
And yes, I miss (insert fave band here).
At least we have YouTube for the memories.
My Mom used to go on and on about Buddy Holly.
Now I know how she felt.
August 2nd, 2006 at 5:53 am
Holy crap, I remember Friday Night Videos.
It was such The Event of the week!
And the logo of the rotating dude tied to the spindle of the record player- good times.
Since I didn’t have my own TV in my dorm room, my friends and I would gather around the world’s crappiest TV in the basement of the boy’s dorm and watch this show. The lameness of it all is almost too much to bear.