Blogpost 3: The Early Era

1895: The “first” music video is filmed at Thomas Edison’s studio

The oldest known film with music was made for the Kinetophone, a device developed by Thomas Edison’s lab that showed moving pictures and was also fitted out with a phonograph.

Early 20th century: Illustrated songs capture moviegoers’ eyes and ears

First introduced in 1894 as a publicity stunt for marketing sheet music, illustrated songs consisted of photographic images painted in color and projected from glass slides, sometimes interspersed with silent moving picture clips.

1920s: Sound-on-film ushers in the era of musical shorts

In April 1923, New York City’s Rivoli Theater presented the first motion pictures with sound-on-film, a system that synchronized movies and their soundtracks.

1925: Audiences learn how to follow the bouncing ball

A year after their animated sound-on-film series entitled “Song-Car Tunes” debuted, brothers Max and David Fleischer released a cartoon featuring a bouncing ball, which hopped over lyrics to encourage in-theater singalongs.

1940-1946: Soundies put coins in jukeboxes across the United States

Direct precursors to the music video, soundies were three-minute films featuring music and dance performances, designed to display on jukebox-like projection machines in bars, restaurants and other public spaces.

1959: The Big Bopper coins the term “music video”

According to some music historians, singer and songwriter Jiles Perry Richardson, who went by The Big Bopper, became the first person to use the phrase “music video” in a 1959 interview with a British magazine.

1960s: The Beatles marry movies and music

Perhaps more than any other band before them, The Beatles harnessed the power of film to market their records and express themselves as artists. In addition to starring in full-length features such as “Help” and “A Hard Day’s Night,” the Fab Four recorded dozens of promotional clips—some with narratives and others composed largely of psychedelic images—that were broadcast in their native England and overseas.

1974: Australia paves the way with “Countdown” and “Sounds”

Two weekly teen-oriented music programs premiered in Australia in 1974. Both prominently featured music videos, some of which were created especially for the shows.

The Birth of MTV (1974-1992)

1974 – Bohemian Rhapsody (Queen):

The music video that practically invented MTV 7 years before its launch. This song is “widely credited as the first global hit single for which an accompanying video was central to the marketing strategy.”

1981 – MTV LAUNCHES – Video Killed the Radio Star (The Buggles)：

The first music video aired on MTV prophesizes the impact that it will have in the music industry. Music videos become one of the main platforms for new artists to gain attention and for consolidated artists to show their latest works。

1983 – Thriller (Michael Jackson)：

Premiered worldwide on MTV, Michael Jackson and John Landis bring back the idea of blending films with music video.

The rise of the directors (1992-2004)

Spike Jonze

1994 – Sabotage (Beastie Boys):

Beastie Boys didn’t feel like going through a major production and opted instead for Spike Jonze and his low budget idea of going around LA in a van shooting a music video without any license. The result is one of the most iconic music videos from the 90s in a throwback to the traditional cop American television series.

1994 – Buddy Holly (Weezer):

Weezer in Happy Days (a tv show from the 70s)?  My favorite Spike Jonze music video. Mind bending in the 90s and still today.

1997 – ElektroBank (The Chemical Brothers):

If one video clip was to sum-up the intermingling between Jonze’s influences and main themes this would be it–the perfect american imagery boiled-up with the body movement as a form of liberation.

1999 – Praise You (Fatboy Slim):

The body movement as the main vehicle of expression! Jonze literally cuts to the basic putting himself in front of the camera together with the invented Torrance Community Dance Group.

2000 – Weapon of Choice (Fatboy Slim):

Lately I’ve been researching a lot about music videos and thought it might be interesting to post a small and incomplete history of the wonders of this medium. The objective of the post is to briefly outline its evolution and provide visual references to better comprehend where we are today.

The Youtube Era （2004 - present）

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