At the time, I didn’t know these music videos were sparking a flame in the deep recesses of my mind. It was the early days of MTV, and as a teenager, I watched the show “120 Minutes” like it was my classroom.  (If you’re of this era, skip this next sentence.)  Videos from every ’80s-’90s “alternative” “indie” or the now quaintly labeled “college” band played on the show — The Smithereens, The Cure, Depeche Mode, you name it. The show filled oh-so-many of my weekend nights, along with USA Network’s “Night Flight” and TBS’s “Night Tracks”. It was the pulse of what was cool outside of my small, Iowa town.  Fast forward to 2010, and, thankfully, “120 Minutes” is back — now on VH1 Classic.  (It’s time slot is 3-5 in the morning, which can be easily fixed by DVR.) But now, it’s better. It spans the entire gamut of my teen years and bundles the videos up with a tidy little bow. One minute, Kurt Cobain is swinging around by a chandelier encouraging me to “Come as I am” and the next, Romeo Void is telling me “That she might like me better if we slept together”. Excellent.

Watching the show takes me back and in a strange way, forward.  It was the beginning of MTV so directors were going all out with a new medium.  Have a 13-year-old do skateboard tricks in an abandoned house for R.E.M.’s, “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” video and not show the band? Sure!

Paint an actual city block red for a Human League, “Fascination” video? Why not? Run playback at 33% while wearing giant heads of William Allen White so They Might Be Giants will have one of the most frenetic videos ever made? Hell and yes.

Now, these videos still spark the flame of creativity.  If you look beyond some of the technical tricks that don’t stand the test of new technology and the time period’s limitations, the spirit of many of the images is still cool. The video for “Burning Down the House” is an unbelievable 27 years old, but it still works.

I watch the show now for nostalgia and to help turn on that creative spigot; it’s amazing what a 25-year-old clip can inspire, all the while knowing that whatever creativity it stokes, it will need to be packaged into a 2010 marketing message.  That’s ok, that’s what we do, make artful commerce.

Videos –

Come As You Are, End of the World, Fascination, Don’t Let’s Start – They Might Be Giants, Burning Down the House.