Is it living in the UK that make me put apsolutely no
emphasis on MTV or what?
I remember hearing Jello Biafra Shouting 'MTV get off the
MTV get off the MTV get off the air'. At this point i hadn't
actually seen MTV, and i still haven't watched more than a
couple of minutes of it in total now.
Living in the UK, i realise that satelite TV has been
growing and so has Cable, but i only know a couple of people
who are hooked up, and no one i know watches MTV even if
they've got satelite.
However people have told me that in the US it's a much
bigger deal, i'm going on other peoples words now and from
what i've heard on the list so far it seems to go along with
the conception. Anyway, i feel that Robert Miles etc... are
Likely to be a fashion. Trance has been around for ages,
and Robert Miles happened to become commercially acceptable.
I don't think that this is likely to trigger MTV to be
showing Autechre vids at prime-time MTV slots alongside the
Jackons etc.. of this world.
As for drum'n'Bass, well Alex Reece's latest is sure to
become a chart-type affair (IMO), and i wouldn't be
surprised if it turns up prime-time at all. However most
Drum'n'Bass is white-labels/ 1,000 copies run off by small
shops and minor labels, most of which can't afford to make a
video even if they wanted to. the only way the Underground
of drum'n'Bass/Techno could ever make it on MTV at all is if
either a) They had a DJ hour, but i think the visuals of
watching someone between two/three decks moving a crossfader
isn't really what they'd have in mind, unless it was a club
hour with shots of dancing/crowds and dj's etc.. or b) they
actually made videos for the tracks in which case they'd
have to shell out a whole load of money.
Photek, mu-siq, alex reece have all signed major label
contracts, and therefore are similarily likely that they'll
appear on MTV at some stage, but i'm assuming here that if
you care about music you don't actually care about MTV, and
will judge the music rather than the airplay it gets.
Nick.