We can’t talk about ’80s MTV without mentioning Michael Jackson‘s “Thriller.” It’s perhaps an obvious choice, but it wouldn’t feel right to leave it out. “Thriller” epitomized the music video ...

The brilliant and cathartic release and the characters demand to finally be seen resonated strongly in the MTV era, too.

MTV flipped a switch on August 1, 1981, and gave music a face. Labels started treating videos like serious investments, and artists began competing for airtime. As viewers kept the channel on, ...

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. MTV has announced a return to its original music video format, first debuted in 1981, ahead of the 2025 VMAs. For one week, the ...

The 1980s didn’t just change music — they changed how we experienced it. Before MTV launched in 1981, music videos were afterthoughts, low-budget promotional clips that occasionally appeared on ...

MTV helped bring music videos to the masses. Artists rose to the occasion, creating timeless videos for the network to play on repeat. While we’d shy away from crowning one band as the greatest music ...

In 1981, asking someone if they wanted to watch a music video would likely get a confused reaction. The concept hadn’t ...

Since MTV launched in the early 1980s, music videos have served as both artistic expression and cultural lightning rod. What started as a new medium for marketing songs quickly became a battleground ...