Remember when world premieres of music videos would be all-day hyped events on MTV, VH1 and BET? Now the Internet usurped these channels’ thrones by releasing directly online before ever appearing on any television station.
As much as nostalgia fondly recalls those epic world premieres like Michael Jackson’s “Scream” and Madonna’s “Frozen,” I remember feeling hostage to hour-long often repetitive airings of video including the artist’s video catalog.
Even when there was a video deemed provocative enough for MTV to restrict it to the late-night hours like Prodigy’s “Smack My Bitch Up,” it garnered enough interest because it couldn’t be seen anywhere else. Now, not so much. Youtube straight murked that. Even Madonna’s once raunchy “Justify My Love” looks like a tame episode of Gossip Girl almost 18 years later.
Still, MTV’s action just certified it’s irrelevance in terms of a music source.
No doubt that if the video killed the radio star back in the 80s then the Internet
has been slowly poisoning the music channel for the past five years.
