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There is a lot of content that is obviously shot way before youtube's time and I am just curious, where did those videos go to, such as the many 90s music videos. Where did they go before youtube's time? I also noticed there also many videos that got uploaded on the day of June 16, 2009. Like a TON of music videos on VEVO. I am curious why there were so many music videos released on a certain day. Was it when VEVO was discovered or something? But for the most part, where were music videos shot in like the 50s-early 2000s originally premiered on?
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Various TV channels prior to MTV. But music videos didnt really become a normal thing until MTV... So, to answer your question about the majority of music videos, the answer is MTV.
The VEVO date is probably whenever they uploaded a large set of licenced videos, which were probably origin ally airing on MTV, MTV2, VH1, etc.
I think there was a launch where a whole bunch of major labels removed the original upload on YouTube and put the on VEVO at the same time—like I sort of remember stans getting really salty over their faves view counts being reset.
I miss putting MTV on in the mornings while I was getting ready for school tbh. I hope Kurt Loder and Gideon Yago are doing well.
In the old days, if you wanted to see a particular song’s video, you’d need to watch MTV continuously and hope that they played it.
Some videos were available on VHS tapes at the store.
Today’s ability to instantly call up any (mainstream) music video, for free, is astounding when you consider what we used to do in the ‘80s and ‘90s.
There were lots of 'variety shows' starting in the lateb40's which some of the old things that look like "music videos" that you see are actually from.
Meaning, the band didn't specifically set up a fake stage and play a concert with no cords coming out of their instruments like you might have in a music video- they were just doing it on TV and lip syncing to some recorded tracks. sometimes I got pretty elaborate with backdrops and props and all sorts of stuff, the variety show format went on to become late night TV (tonight show etc)- but I think it was much more music-centric in the past.
Just adding on... When the Beatles stopped touring/performing live they started making music videos and they would then premier on late-night TV. A lot of the old videos we see on Youtube are all from talk shows or Variety shows like The Smothers Brothers, Lawrence Welk, Playboy after dark (among many others).
In the pre-internet age, music videos were shown on MTV and VH1. They were also released on DVD and VHS tapes, but this was a much less popular way to consume music videos.
this post makes me feel like I’m getting old lol. Good ol’ MTV baby, VH1 too. I remember buying dvd compilations of music videos as well. I’m not really sure what the deal with Vevo is though...anyways thank god for the internet and youtube, amirite?🙏🏼
I remember getting my music video fix from Yahoo Launch. Discovered a fair few bands on there, like Cake, 311, Jason Mraz, Mae.
It was a pretty good service from what I remember.
I remember watching music videos on a show called Video Jukebox on HBO prior to MTV. They showed Devo, the Clash, the Police, Psychedelic Furs, Tom Petty, Grace Jones etc. After MTV in the 80's there were also local shows on local stations here in Atlanta. One showed all metal videos. Also there was a brilliant show on USA networks in the 80's called Night Flight. They showed all kinds of cool stuff in addition to music videos but I remember seeing True Men Don't Kill Coyotes by Red Hot Chili Peppers and some Kate Bush and Tom Waits. In the 90's I remember a cable channel where you could call in and request videos. I think you had to pay but could include a message that would run below the video. Mostly they played the pop hits so I didn't watch it much.
I remember the month YouTube launched. It was, at the time, mostly 4-15 second schoolyard fights that had been captured on someone's flip phone and uploaded to the internet. It seemed novel but also not very useful.
There wasn't a (legal) repository music videos before YouTube because the bandwidth for streaming videos didn't exist for most internet / wireless customers. Netflix introduced Video On Demand in 2007, rushing to market because YouTube had just come out.
When youtube launched it was a dating site... So I'm not so sure your recollection is accurate.
http://web.archive.org/web/20050428014715/http://www.youtube.com/
I don't doubt the Wayback Machine but also I definitely do not recall this and Wikipedia makes no mention of it being a dating / rating site.
Haha, probably from a soft launch or before it was rebranded.
Usually bigger tv networks had shows where music videos where shown or variety shows where bands or musicians would play their hits live. That changed when MTV came around and that's when music videos really took off.
Oh god, the way this question is phrased makes me feel ancient.
So yeah the obvious answers would be MTV and VH1 (and to a lesser extent BET, but they were never strictly a music channel). But a lot of cities had local shows that also played music videos. My favorite was Video Music Box, which was on PBS in NYC. My parents were very anti “pay tv” so I didn’t have cable growing up which meant no MTV for me. So Video Music Box was a godsend. It was on five days a week and played mostly hip hop- including stuff that didn’t get played on the radio. That show definitely shaped my musical taste in the early 90s.
I can’t believe that nobody mentioned The Box, which was the 90s equivalent of YouTube. There’d be about 30-40 preselected videos that would crawl on the bottom of the tv screen, and you could call The Box and demand one of those videos for the low low price of $4.99. Then you’d wait until they played your request. Amazing.
They weren't basically. MTV and other music channels would play things at random, more obscure things could be found late at night, these could get ripped and put on fan pages online or taped. Further back you could get commercial videos compiling a band's music videos (I remember a Queen one - Greatest Flicks?) or bootlegged. I remember Youtube being a bit of a wild west early on, then Vevo got the rights to tons of official videos in 2009 which explains what you are seeing. It was amazing, loads of HD videos I had never seen suddenly available free.
You can usually find out on Wikipedia articles of songs. They usually have a section titled music video