History of Music Videos:

A Music Video is a short film or video that accompanies and compliments a music track. Music Videos have, since their real rise to prominence in the 1980's, become critically vital in the promotion of new music tracks giving fans and audiences around the globe the voyeuristic pleasure of being able to watch their favourite main stream artists perform, where without a music video, this may of been a dream people could never fulfil. Some people argue that the introduction of the music video has also hurt the music industry as well as bolstered its success. Now the most important assets of Artists is not their vocal or instrumental ability - but their looks and dance moves on screen have become just as critical, if not more. It is because of this that many musical critics believe the era of 'cheesy pop' music was born, a genre that stormed the music scene in the 1980's and has been at the top ever since.

So, when exactly was the first music video made. Well, that question is open to great debate. MTV or "music television" were the institution that first put music videos out to that world, airing the ironically named Buggles song, "Video killed the radio star" as the first ever music video. However, their had already been videos to accompany music for a long time. Sound Films and Talkies where introduced as early as 1926. They where short films that had a music track coupled with it through technology, a step up from a silent film or a movie with the sound being diegetic. One song short films called promotional clips where another early form of the modern music video. Produced in the 1940's for the Panorama Visual Jukebox these shorties paralleled Musical Films, which where to become so vital and influential to the music videos, especially in the mid eighties. Several, well known, popular music videos show intense similarity to Hollywood musicals from the 30's to the 50's. Many of Michael Jackson's videos are influence by the codes, conventions and styles of a product that at the time was already over thirty years old, for instance the stylised dance scenes in the "beat it" and "bad" videos show great resemblance to certain scenes from the Romeo & Juliet adaptation, West Side Story. On its release, "Thriller" became the most expensive Music Video to date, and many of its aspects where taken from classic 1950's horror.

The black & white mock documentary "a hard days night" was released in 1964 and starred The Beatles. As well including comedic sequences involving John, Paul, George and Ringo in what the audience was shown as their everyday life, the pictures also included exciting and innovative musical sequences, which created a basic structure that countless subsequent music videos have taken as a paradigm. Bob Dylan and Pink Floyd also used documentary form to promote themselves between 1966 & 1970. With fans being able to see their favourite artists perform, fashion on the 1960's and 70's escalated as people wanted to dress like their heroes from off the telly.

In the 1970's, long-running music show top of the pops and Australian counterparts Countdown and Sounds became significant in the rise of the music video as they began to air music video clips on the programmes to promote the latest releases from top artists. The BBC placed strict limits on the number of promo clips TOTP could use, in order that if a clip helped gain an artist great success, it could be shown again the following week by popular demand. Artists began creating music clips to be shown on TOTP when they could not be on the show themselves, for example. In 1980, David Bowie released an eye-catching promo for track Ashes to Ashes. The promos popularity gained excess support for Bowie, helping him reach the top spot for the first time in the best part of a decade. This became a popular and extremely successful tactic for many artists, famously Madness, who constructed comedic short clips for the releases.

The Who's release of all music feature Tommy to compliment their 1969 rock opera that shares the same name.

Then came one of the most significant moments in the rise of the Music Video as Queen released a promo video for one of their most successful songs, "Bohemian Rhapsody" to be shown on Top of the Pops. what was so notable about the clip was that it was the first of music based video to be entirely shot and edited on videotape

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As Split Enz and Blondie became the first artists to release a music promo for every track on their latest albums and the release the clips on Video cassette in 1980 and Micheal Nesmith won the first Grammy for a music clip in 1981, the music industry had been completely revolutionised. The world no wanted to be able to see their favourite artists all the time and with that came MTV's rise to domination. MTV lead the 24-hour-a-day music television era and the relatively new music video material was catapulted into a central in mainstream music.

Everyone from Bruce Springsteen to Madonna where releasing a Music Video to compliment all their successful tracks. The quality of an artists music video had become more important than the quality of the song itself.

The importance of the Music Video has just escalated through the decades in correspondence to the technology available at the time. The quality of Editing and Recording equipment has become vital as has the skill of the director and editor. In more recent times, the credit list of a music video may look as if it has been taken from a new feature length Hollywood film.

With the growth in technology and the Internets rise to dominance in the Music Industry, it has become possible for bands and artists not signed to record labels be able to share their own music videos on streaming websites such as You-tube.