Bob Dylan's 'Subterranean Homesick Blues' in the 1960's is seen to be one of the first music videos. Compared to music videos these days, the promo is very uncoventional as Bob Dylan doesn't sing throughout the whole video. The lyrics are on boards and he throws them on the floor in time with the song.
Top of the Pops was a weekly show that began in 1964 that promoted the singles from different artists. It was chart based with different artists playing their song live or mimed in the position of their single in the chart. If the artist was unable to feature on the show, they would often send in short films of the band, with the song playing over the top.
The rise of MTV
MTV was established in 1981 with the simple idea of broadcasting music promos for 24 hours a day on a TV channel. Not only would it promote the bands that were played on the channel but it was also something a young generation wanted to see. It was a time when music was rapidly evolving with many different genres and popular artists and having a channel dedicated to showing the latest singles was a great decision from a business standpoint.
MTV grew rapidly in the US with a large dominance of white male rock artists being played but rap was becoming very popular in the 80's but because it contained alot of controversial language and content, it was not played much. The Aerosmith and Run DMC 'Walk this Way' provided the crossover of rock and rap which led to the white dominance being broken and a much wider range of genres being played. Music promos were a great way to help propel artists to megastardom as it gave them much more publicity and recognition around the world.
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