-
Talkes, Soundies and Shorts
With the arrival of "Talkies" many musical sort films were produced. Many bands, vocalists and dancers were featured in these and could be considered the first of the music video. In the early 1930s cartoons featured musicians performing their hit songs during the cartoon was playing. Eairly Disney films such as Fantasia used animation over the top of classical pieces. The Warner Brothers fashioned Looney Tunes around specifc songs from upcoming Warner Brothers films. -
Early Music Clips
Tony Bennett claims that he created the first music video when he was filmed walking along the Sepentine in Hyde Park in 1956. The clip of him walking was aired in the U.K and U.S on shows such as Dick Clark's American Bandstand. -
The Late 50s
In the late 1950s the Scopitone, a visual jukebox, was invented in France and short films were produced by many French artists, such as Serge Gainsbourg, Françoise Hardy, Jacques Brel, and Jacques Dutronc to accompany their songs. Its use spread to other countries and similar machines such as the Cinebox in Italy and Color-Sonic in the USA were patented. -
The Beatles
In 1964, The Beatles starred in their first feature film A Hard Day's Night, directed by Richard Lester. It was presented as a mock documentary, it interspersed comedic and dialogue sequences with musical tones. The musical sequences furnished basic templates on which countless subsequent music videos were modeled. -
The Beatles Continued
The Beatles began making promotional clips for distribution and broadcast in other countries primarily the US so they could promote their record releases without having to make in-person appearances. By the time The Beatles stopped touring in late 1966, their promotional films, like their recordings, had become highly sophisticated. -
Early 70s
During late 1972–73 David Bowie featured in a series of promotional films directed by pop photographer Mick Rock, who worked extensively with him in this period. Mick Rock directed four clips, the re-release of "Space Oddity" and the 1973 release of the single "Life On Mars". The clip for "John, I'm Only Dancing" was made with a budget of just $200 -
MTV- Music Videos Go Mainstream
In 1981 MTV launched, airing "Video Killed the Radio Star" and beginning an era of 24-hour-a-day music on television. With this new outlet for material, the music video grew to play a huge part in popular music marketing. Many important acts of this period, most notably Adam and the Ants, Duran Duran and Madonna, owed a great deal of their success to the skillful construction and seductive appeal of their videos. -
Thriller
Voted as the most influential pop music video of all time. The original video was 14 minutes long. The budget had been rumoured around $500,000-1 million dollars. The video was directed by John Landis, who directed American Warewolf in London. The impact of the video was huge and has insipred many artists and helped to push the music video into the mainstream. -
Music Videos Become More Common
Another important development in music videos was the launch of The Chart Show on the UK's Channel 4 in 1986. This was a program which consisted entirely of music videos the only outlet many videos had on British TV at the time, Without any presenters. Instead, the videos were linked by then state of the art computer graphics. The show moved to ITV in 1989 -
Directors Become More Successful
In November 1992, MTV began listing directors with the artist and song credits, reflecting the fact that music videos had increasingly become an auteur's medium. Directors such as Chris Cunningham, Michel Gondry, Spike Jonze, Floria Sigismondi, Stéphane Sednaoui, Mark Romanek and Hype Williams all got their start around this time; all brought a unique vision and style to the videos they directed. Some of these directors, including, Gondry, Jonze, Sigismondi and F. Gary Gray, went on to -
Youtube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, Created February 2005 and owned by Google since late 2006, on which users can upload, view and share videos. This really helped music videos progress as it pushes them more into the modern age. People were able to upoad their music videos online for free. This way we can see both professional and independant music videos. -
Gangnam Style
Gangnam Style utilised Youtube with its strange video it managed to reach 1 billion views becoming the most watched video on Youtube.
