“What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.” – Samuel Johnson
Posts tagged MTV
The King of Pop — My Turn
Jul 1st
You’re not going to get some elaborate post about how Michael Jackson changed my life or that type of nonsense here because he didn’t, but I can’t help but ignore such a huge moment in my entertainment lifetime.
I look through the music in my ITunes and I realized that many of the songs on here are somehow inspired by Michael Jackson. The hip hop sound, the dancing. You name it. He inspired it.
I wasn’t his biggest fan or support. Nope. Quite honestly, his personality weirded me out, but that wasn’t to say that I didn’t like his music. Geniuses tend to be unique in their own way, and I just accepted Michael for being Michael.
His music was huge, but I think his biggest contribution to our entertainment generation is the being the forefather to music videos. Back when MTV was a struggling first-year network, it played pretty much concert footage and very rarely did you see a full blow production for a music video. Let’s face it, I remember hearing about the video collection being a majority of Rod Stewart.
Enter Michael Jackson and “Thriller.”
This near 15-minutes piece of work was the moment that music videos really took a new approach, whether it be story arcs, matching the video to portray the song’s message or huge elaborate dance sequences. This video made the music video the popular medium that MTV needed.
He later went on to produce other full length feature music videos like “Smooth Criminal”, “Remember the Time” and “You Rock My World.” Think about your favorite music video and think how different would it be if, Michael Jackson didn’t set the tone for adding a storyline to them.
We might still be seeing lots and lots of concert footage.
It’s why MTV VMA’s have the “Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award.” The award is the highest honor it can bestow on an artist, and rightfully so named after the King of Pop.
His music was great. His personality odd. His videos were revolutionary. The world lost its King of Pop. He’s probably chilling with the King of Rock right now.
The Paper – MTV’s attempt for high school drama
Apr 12th
MTV has always tried to capitalize on the lifelong reality TV known as high school. They have that stupid and pointless high school stories show, that make me feel that for some people high school was the high point of their young lives. They ran the football drama ”Two-A-Days.” Now, they bring the newspaper staff of a high school paper front and center as its new reality series in ”The Paper”.
Basically, ”The Paper” is ”Two-A-Days” with newspaper students rather than football players and cheerleaders. The high school drama combined with an extracurricular activity that is both time consuming and stressful. The problem with this type of TV is that it exploits these kids and puts more unnecessary pressure on them. Newspapers in high school can be a stressful thing, combined with the other high school issues kids may face, the cameras just magnify the situation even more and a record of your faults in the most vulnerable time of you life is kept for the world to see.
At least, football players anticipate this type of attention, which is why ”Two-A-Days” worked. However, newspaper students aren’t typically the type to create compelling dramas about every day work. MTV is doing a masterful job creating characters with what they have. They have the ditzy, unlikeable boss, the likeable second-in-command and the budding relationships. It’s not fair. It’s one thing for the Real World cast to be vilified by the cameras, but a high school kid isn’t someone who deserves this.
Is MTV really that desperate for original programming? That they have to find high school drama. What’s next? High School Band Drama called ”The Band?” Choir practice? Yearbook? It’s pointless to keep rehashing the same concept – “the activity that is 1000x more difficult than it really is.”
Football? Yes. Making a newspaper in high school? No.
The funny thing is, what makes this newspaper special? They go through the same thing most high school papers go through – petty arguments that do not impact their lives. At least Hoover High was a dominant high school in Alabama.
It makes me think whatever happened to the show - ”I’m from Rolling Stone.”