In this section of The 120 Minutes Archive, you'll find site news, music and media musings, and related ramblings each and every time we update our vault of alternative music television.

More adds, loose ends, and lament

Week of August 3, 2009

Believe it or not, we're still alive! There's not much to add to the archive these days, but we have some corrections and one additional classic episode. In this latest update, we also talk about the current state of MTV and its sister channels, and how you can stay on top of new music.

Updates to the archive

I think the archive has begun to plateau, because we have so many episodes (over half of the entire series of 120 Minutes), I doubt we'll get many more in the future. If it existed, we probably already have it. Nevertheless, we have one new addition to the mix this summer, and some corrections.

The new episode is one from September 3, 1989, featuring some videos from Big Audio Dynamite, Hodoo Gurus, The Cure (a world premiere at the time), and an entire Cult Classic block of stuff.

Most of those videos from the show are just one click away from viewing, as usual. If you missed the news, at the beginning of this year, we added instant YouTube search links to all 5,000+ music videos in the archive. Just click on any video in the archive and you'll be taken straight to YouTube to watch it. Even better, it works for about 90% of the videos we have listed.

We've also updated some classic listings, including the episode for June 14, 1992, and the ones bordering it. We corrected some information about the videos played and guests interviewed.

The loose ends

It can be difficult to stay informed and up-to-date about new music these days, but I've found a helpful place you can go. It's within the iTunes Store, called What's Hot. Just go to the Music section of the iTunes store and scroll down until you see the promotional image for it. What's Hot lists the new singles added to the store in all genres, including alternative and electronic. It's a good, easy way to find out what's new. Where else do you go? Let us know.

Meanwhile, let's talk about what's up with MTV and its related channels these days. Somewhat surprisingly, MTV2 still airs a weekly block of videos called Subterranean, but of course, it's totally automated and not an actual show. MTV2 has been airing a feature called "MTV2 Legit" on the weekends, which is a weird blender of clips from old '90s MTV shows — the good ones, along with early '90s videos. Pretty cool, but of questionable usefulness. Over on VH1, Jim Shearer is still with us, but let's face it, those videos on the Top 20 Countdown are a snoozefest.

Of course, MTV is totally unrecognizable anymore. Their only live programming, a daily talk show called It's On with Alexa Chung, is a decent show with a likable host, but it has nothing to do with music videos. But for a few days in June, one event transformed MTV for a few days.

As promised, the lament

Back in June, as the world knows, we witnessed the tragic death of Michael Jackson, who was known as the king of pop. But he might have also been the king of MTV and music videos. He pioneered music videos as an art form, crafting true short films, not just cheap promotional clips.

The events immediately following Jackson's death were interesting to us, particularly because of MTV's reaction to the news. Obviously, the channel is no longer Music Television, but if you watched the few days after Jackson's death, you would've thought MTV never changed.

After the news came in, MTV began playing Michael Jackson videos, non-stop for many hours. These video blocks were followed by many hours of live specials and news updates featuring Kurt Loder, John Norris, and some other faces not seen on the channel in years.

This temporary return of Music Television culminated the following Tuesday with their coverage of Jackson's memorial service, anchored by a full slate of former MTV VJs, including Jim Shearer, now of VH1, and most impressively, Mark Goodman, original MTV VJ from the 1980s.

That's right, Mark Goodman returned to give his unique perspective as one of the first VJs. MTV also broke out some old clips that hadn't been seen in over 25 years, including an MTV commercial for the world premiere of the "Thriller" video, and Goodman's introduction of the premiere itself.

It was a very sad time, of course, but MTV was simply top-notch; the best it had been in a long, long time. It was probably also the last time we'll ever see such an impressive gathering of MTV's former talent, and certainly the last time they'll ever be together LIVE on Music Television.

Just goes to show how important Michael Jackson was to MTV. Rest in peace, Michael.

Back to the future

That's all we've got for now; thanks for reading this summer's update. Remember, you're always invited to contact us via the links below. We'll see you next time, whenever that might be!

Another new year, another update

Week of January 12, 2009

Well, here we are, it's 2009, and The 120 Minutes Archive is still alive and kickin'. We welcome in the new year with an amazing 17 new episodes into the vault, our largest update in a long time.

Videos, Videos, Videos

We have finally gotten with the 21st century. Now, all 5,000+ music videos in the vault have links to their YouTube results. That's right, all of them, so you're just two clicks away from any video. It took a damn long time, so you better enjoy it! Start by browsing the MTV2 episodes (2001-2003), or the Pinfield era MTV episodes (1995-2000), or the classic era MTV episodes (1986-1995). I am labeling it a "beta" feature, but many of the links actually work. Anyway, here are the new playlists:

January 5, 1992 – Top 20 videos of 1991
April 29, 1990 – host Dave Kendall
April 22, 1990 – host Dave Kendall
April 15, 1990 – host Dave Kendall
April 8, 1990 – host Dave Kendall
May 28, 1989 – Tom Tom Club
May 10, 1987 – host Alan Hunter
May 3, 1987 – host Alan Hunter
 

For those of you paying really close attention, head over to the archive index and note the following changes, mostly correcting some wrong dates, and one guest-related update as well:

July 19, 1998 – replaces July 12, 1998 (was an incorrect date)
December 7, 1997 – replaces November 2, 1997 (was an incorrect date)
November 16, 1997 – replaces October 12, 1997 (was an incorrect date)
May 21, 1995 – new comment on the Henry Rollins and Jerry Lee Lewis episode
April 1, 1990 – replaces April ?, 1990 (was an incorrect date)
March ?, 1990 – replaces April ?, 1990 (was an incorrect date)
June 4, 1989 – updated with guests Marky Ramone and Dee Dee Ramone

R.I.P. Music Television

Since we last left you, a lot more music also left television. MTV cancelled TRL in November, and although some would claim that show was D.O.A. anyway, it was MTV's last daily music video program. Now, it can truly be said, MTV doesn't play music. You'd even be hard-pressed to find the early morning blocks of videos on the channel anymore; most of the time, they're just not there.

Meanwhile, the Internet continues to make a joke out of any TV channels' attempts to play music videos. With the launch of MTV Music (which would have been a redundant name had "MTV" still stood for "Music Television"), the majority of MTV's music videos are now available on the Internet. At the same time, YouTube is also ramping up their efforts to organize and promote music videos.

These days, MTV doesn't even make pop stars; MySpace does. If you want to find new alternative music, especially, your search will start and end on the Internet. Given the current climate, is music on TV finally dead? With very few exceptions these days, yes, it is. Viva la Internet!

If there's one place where you might still see some music videos on TV (pop videos, but whatever), it's the VH1 Top 20 Countdown. Apparently, our friend Jim Shearer is now the new host of the show, making him the second former host of 120 Minutes to get on board at VH1. Matt Pinfield hosted the show for a few months back in 2006. How long will Jim Shearer stick around at VH1? We'll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, have a great 2009, everyone.

Meet our new home, same as our old home

Week of September 1, 2008

Well, folks, altmusictv is dead. After a proud 4 1/2 years, the name of the site has been retired, and nothing more will ever come of altmusictv. As it turns out, the world of alternative music television is pretty non-existent these days. Music videos themselves are on the way out. MTV is dead as a music network, so altmusictv has died with it. R.I.P. altmusictv 2004 – 2008.

But it's not all bad news. This site's new name is "The 120 Minutes Archive." The sole purpose of the site will be to keep alive the playlist archives, videos, and interviews from the history of 120 Minutes. This big pile of information isn't going anywhere; in fact, this change will help preserve it forever. We all loved that show and this will remain the place to come and get your nostalgia.

Speaking of which, the Playlist Archive has one new addition this time: Another episode with Henry Rollins (I've learned over the years that he sure was on the show a lot) from April 5, 1992, and a corrected date on the episode preceding it. Thanks to Justin H. for all that.

Now as "The 120 Minutes Archive," the site has a new home as part of ATRL, as you can see in the new web address of the site, http://www.atrl.net/120/. ATRL is a music community that also serves as home to "The TRL Archive," at http://www.atrl.net/trlarchive/, another big pile of information about MTV's longest-running pop music show. By joining ATRL, the history of pop and alternative will live together. Quite an odd couple, if I say so myself.

If you haven't been around this place forever, you probably don't know that our name was "The unofficial MTV2 Subterranean site" for most of 2003 until February 2004, when we became altmusictv. And before that, we first launched back in April 2003 as "The unofficial 120 Minutes site." What was our original home as the unofficial 120 Minutes site? You guessed it: ATRL. So in some ways, things have now come full circle.

With all that said, I hope you enjoy coming back here every now and then to get your 120 Minutes nostalgia on. I'll continue to update the playlist archive every couple of months as new ones roll in. Beyond that, it's off to bigger and better things for me. Adieu to altmusictv and welcome to The 120 Minutes Archive!

MTV is dead; long live MTV

Week of July 21, 2008

Are music videos dead? Not if MTV has anything to say about it—wait, what? The channel has now debuted a new video premiere show, FNMTV, and we offer our commentary. Plus, we've learned some sort of program named Subterranean is still on TV. Also, what the heck does altmusictv have to do with Camifox, a theme for Mozilla Firefox 3 that has been making its way around the web?

cover story

It's clear to anyone with a television that the MTV era is over. It was a great era while it lasted, but those times are now gone. Beyond a few exceptions, music is once again something that you hear, not something you see as well. That's why I was surprised to find out MTV still bothers to play any music videos at all anymore. As I'm sure most of you have heard by now, MTV is hyping up the fact that it's premiering about five new music videos every week for an event called FNMTV, hosted by Pete Wentz of Fall Out Boy.

The idea behind FNMTV is to make an event out of music video premieres, like it used to be in the '80s and '90s. Everybody gather around at a specific place and time to see what new videos are premiering each week. I know there are a lot of diehard classic era MTV fans who would laugh at this move, but in the era of the Internet, I think FNMTV is a great idea.

Anybody who actually wants to watch a one-off music video anymore will go to YouTube and look it up, or they'll be browsing the Internet elsewhere and click on the video to watch it. Nobody is going to sit around for hours waiting for a video to come on MTV anymore. No one. Just how nobody is going to sit and wait for a specific song to come on the radio. Those days are over, and that's why we're never going to see uninterrupted hours and hours of music videos on MTV or MTV2 ever again.

FNMTV, on the other hand, is different. It's once a week, at a specific time, Fridays at 8 PM eastern time. The videos each time are premieres, and only premieres. No time wasted on anything you've already seen before. If you want to see any of them again, head off to MTV.com or YouTube or somewhere else on the Internet.

It's so over the top—when a video is premiered, lights chase around the massive studio, smoke gets set off, and the camera slowly zooms into a giant jumbotron type screen that plays the video. I think those effects are intended to be tongue-in-cheek, to play up the fact that they're making an event out of a freakin' music video.

Speaking of which, the name of the program itself is FNMTV. It officially stands for Friday Night, but if you pay close attention, you'll notice that all music video programming on MTV now carries the FNMTV title, even the few remaining video blocks in the morning. It's FNMTV; it's freakin' music television.

Should MTV actually keep this up and keep FNMTV on the air, I think it'll prove to be a great way to showcase new music in a new age; music television beyond the MTV era. MTV is dead; long live MTV. But for all we know, it'll be cancelled next month.

Odds and ends

Apparently, some kind of program named Subterranean is still on the air. I don't receive MTV2 or digital cable anymore, so I can't tell you exactly what's on it, but I'm guessing it's just the same old random collection of 9 or 10 alternative music videos, with 20 minutes of commercials, and without any kind of host. It has moved to Saturdays at 11 PM eastern time, as part of the catch-all rock block, between Saturday Rock The Deuce and Headbangers Ball, which if I remember correctly, is also a ghost town style video block with no host or content.

We've updated the 120 Minutes playlist archive with another entry; this time thanks to Rick L. and from September 5, 1993, hosted by They Might Be Giants. Head over to the archive for that one and many more (a total of 376 now), as well as to contribute your own playlists.

Finally, let's face it, the world of alternative music television is rather sparse these days. As such, I've begun to use this altmusictv.com domain name to house whatever other random projects I've come up with, and the latest one is called Camifox, which is a bright, colorful theme for Mozilla Firefox 3. If you use Firefox 3 and you're sick of the rather ugly and monolithic buttons, give Camifox a try. It's been making its way around the web for a little over a month now, so I wanted to explain why it's hosted here on altmusictv. There you go.

See you all for the next post whenever I have something to talk about, at which time, we'll see if FNMTV is still on the air or if it's been scrapped. Any bets?

Summer gold, new and old

Week of May 26, 2008

On this Memorial Day, 2008, we unofficially welcome the summer and take a look at some of the season's best new music according to us, including Santogold, as you can see over there. Also, we made a pretty big deal about Pitchfork.tv a few months ago, so we'll see if the service has lived up to the hype. Plus, it just wouldn't be an update without a new batch of 120 Minutes playlists.

THIS WEEK'S NEWS

It's been a few months since we last talked about the new stuff we've discovered, and there has been a ton of noteworthy new music since then. Here are several of our newest favorites:

Santogold has received quite a few comparisons to M.I.A., based on her collaborations and influences. Her vocals in "Creator," the single that you might have heard on a TV commercial, sound much like Maya herself. But when you explore the rest of Santogold's self-titled debut album, you'll find it sounds less like M.I.A. and more like a modern take on '80s pop music. Santogold has made a point that her music has nothing to do with hip-hop or R&B, despite the color of her skin. Tracks like "L.E.S. Artistes," "I'm A Lady," and "Lights Out" are wonderfully charming.

Nine Inch Nails released The Slip to the Internet for free, completely bypassing any further attempts at payment for music. Trent Reznor has been known to give away tracks for free in the past, and now he's doing it with entire albums. In this case, you get much more than you pay for, with infectiously loud new tracks like "1,000,000" and "Letting You" that I can't stop playing. Critics have also responded well to the new album, rating it at least as good as last year's Year Zero. If you haven't gone to download this album yet, why not?

Coming soon: The Hold Steady will return in July with Stay Positive. We've heard an advance copy of the album in all its storytelling glory. Meanwhile, Ladytron will return in June with their new album, Velocifero, a welcome new release from the English electronic pop band.

Still relevant: Death Cab For Cutie prove they've still got it with Narrow Stairs, including the epic 8-minute "I Will Possess Your Heart." Moby might be overlooked in the U.S. these days, but we're certainly excited about his new release, Last Night, which is another must-have mix of electronic music. Also, Madonna has released another enjoyable album with Hard Candy, eschewing the European influences of Confessions on a Dancefloor for modern American producers.

New names: An Horse is a two-person Australian band that has been touring in the U.S. with Tegan and Sara. Their EP, Not Really Scared, is highly recommended. Discover them before everyone else does! Another new name, Lights, you have probably heard in Old Navy commercials. If her self-titled EP doesn't warm up your day at all, you might just have no heart.

Rock and then some: My Morning Jacket was on SNL a few weeks ago, and their new album, Evil Urges, is a concert in a box. Finally, I can't forget The Raconteurs, whose new album Consolers of the Lonely is one of the best albums I've heard all year.

Now onto the topic of Pitchfork.tv, the new service that launched in April, as we covered in our last entry. I've been to the site a few times, and the video content they have is compelling and fresh. There isn't much of it to go around, though. Further, I'd say the biggest problem is that they haven't properly merged the site with the rest of Pitchfork, so you can find yourself somewhat at a loss if you're browsing the regular Pitchfork site and looking for video content. It's still promising, but it's not yet the return of "Music Television."

120 MINUTES PLAYLIST ARCHIVE

Enough with the new, let's talk about the old. The very old. You know the drill: 120 Minutes may have ended five years ago, but the playlist archive at altmusictv never dies. This week, we're finally playing catch-up for the past few months with 8 newly submitted playlists:

June 5, 1994 – Juliana Hatfield
September 25, 1993 – Lewis Largent
September 18, 1993 – Lewis Largent
June 9, 1991 – Dave Kendall in Manchester

With those new ones, that brings us up to 375 playlists! If you have any more, full or partial, from anywhere in the history of 120 Minutes, e-mail us using the link at the bottom of the page.

what's on your mind?

That's all for this week on altmusictv. Enjoy the beginning of the "summer," and if we don't see you for a while, the summer. If you have any new music discoveries of your own, or if you have an old music video in your head and you can't figure out the artist or title, feel free to comment about it here. We'll see you again in a few weeks or so.

To find previous updates, start with the recent updates at the top of this page. For a complete overview of our site's content and special features, go back home to The 120 Minutes Archive.