Beginnings of Music Television

United Kingdom

The long-running British TV show Top of the Pops began playing music videos in the late 1970's, although the BBC placed strict limits on the number of 'outsourced' videos TOTP could use. Therefore a good video would increase a song's sales as viewers hoped to see it again the following week. In 1980, David Bowie scored his first UK number one in nearly a decade thanks to director David Mallet's eye catching promo for "Ashes to Ashes". Another act to succeed with this tactic was Madness, who shot on 16 mm and 35 mm, constructing their clips as "micro-comedic" short films.

In 1974 the band Sparks filmed a promo video for their single "This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us" from the album Kimono My House.

In 1975, The Who released their all-music feature film Tommy, directed by Ken Russell, based upon their 1969 rock opera of the same name. Also in 1975, the band Queen ordered Bruce Gowersto make a promo video for their new single "Bohemian Rhapsody" to show it in Top Of The Pops; this is also notable for being entirely shot and edited on videotape.

The Alan Parker film adaptation of Pink Floyd The Wall transformed the group's 1979 concept double-LP of the same title into a confrontational and apocalyptic audio-visual labyrinth of stylized, expressionistic images, sounds, melodies and lyrics.

The long-running British Rock music show "The Old Grey Whistle Test" produced a number of pioneering videos made especially for the program throughout the 1970's and early 1980's. These included a video of Frank Zappa's "City of Tiny Lights" made using claymation and videos made for performers such as Television, Led Zeppelin, Genesis, Pink Floyd and Mike Oldfield. The executive producer of The Old Grey Whistle Test was Mike Appleton. Derek Burbidge and Kate Humphreys directed and videoed many of the artists. The audio was always of prime importance. Gregg Baily was the recordist for the show on location. Although many assumed the bands were playing live, due to technical issues and the need to ensure performances were controlled, the bands often recorded the performance on the day of shooting prior to taping, and then mimed to this "live" track. Other directors and camera operators were Martin Pitts in the USA, and for England, John Metcalfe and Tim Pope and many others. Location shoots all over the world were an essential part of the program. Martin Pitts Directed clips for the Bee Gees that aired on the show.

United States

American alternative punk rock group Devo created many self-produced music videos, which were included in the pioneering compilation "The Truth About Devolution", directed by Chuck Statler. Devo's video cassette releases were arguably among the first true long-form video productions. Also, one of their music videos "The Day My Baby Gave Me a Surprise" was the first to use computer and traditional animation. Shock-rocker Alice Cooper took a video of his Welcome to My Nightmare concert showcasing the intense visual performance it gave. Alice Cooper himself makes reference to making one of the first music videos on the promotional videos for his album Along Came A Spider.

Video Concert Hall, created by Jerry Crowe and Charles Henderson, launched on November 1, 1979, was the first nationwide video music programming on American television, predating MTV by almost three years. The USA Cable Network program Night Flight was one of the first American programs to showcase these videos as an art form. Premiering in June 1981, Night Flight predated MTV's launch by two months.

Two feature-length films released on the cusp of MTV's first appearance on the dial contributed enormously to the development of the form. The first was 1981's Shock Treatment, a pseudo-sequel/spin off of The Rocky Horror Picture Show principally written and scored by RHPS creator Richard O'Brien. Although it was a commercial flop, the film broke stylistic ground by being more focused and less visually ambitious – and thus easier to emulate on a tight budget – than either RHPS or Ken Russell's 1975 adaptation of The Who's music and story line from the album Tommy, or even a lower-budget affair like The Ramones' Rock 'n' Roll High School (1979).

In 1980, New Zealand group Split Enz had major success with the single "I Got You" and the album True Colours, and later that year they joined Blondie in becoming one of the first bands in the world to produce a complete set of promo clips for each song on the album (directed by their percussionist, Noel Crombie) and to market these on video cassette. This was followed a year later by the first American video album, The Completion Backward Principle by The Tubes, directed by the group's keyboard player Michael Cotten, which included two videos directed by Russell Mulcahy ("Talk To Ya Later" and "Don't Want To Wait Anymore").

Among the first music videos were clips produced by ex-Monkee Michael Nesmith who started making short musical films for Saturday Night Live. In 1981, he released Elephant Parts, the first winner of a Grammy for music video, directed by William Dear. A further experiment on NBC television called Television Parts was not successful, due to network meddling (notably an intrusive laugh track and corny gags). Billboard credits the independently-produced Video Concert Hall as being the first with nationwide video music programming on American television.