Prime Time
Well, cable finally came to our sector, and nobody’s been seen out in the street since. The biggest revelation so far, aside from the fact that they sure show a lot of neat movies on Bravo (we’re talking Eraserhead, folks) is that MTV doesn’t seem quite as bad as everyone’s been telling me it is.
Prime Time
PLAYING FOR IT IN FERNDALE
by Richard C. Walls
Well, cable finally came to our sector, and nobody’s been seen out in the street since. The biggest revelation so far, aside from the fact that they sure show a lot of neat movies on Bravo (we’re talking Eraserhead, folks) is that MTV doesn’t seem quite as bad as everyone’s been telling me it is. The VJ’s appear harmless enough and the programming is a small notch or two above standard AOR fare (black vids and less commercial bands are making appearances, though it’s still at the tokenism level for now), and what many seem to think are sins spawned by the form—sexism, the same ideas repeated ad infinitum, a blandness beneath the surface glitz—are all carry-overs from radio, i.e., they’re in the music. Rather than being a new and insidious destroyer of youth, the downside of MTV is the extent to which it duplicates current mainstream rock radio programming... the upside is that there are some imaginatively creative work going on in the vid form, if you have enough patience or luck to come across it.