4Music and the death of the prime-time music video

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

For the last month or so I've been mourning the loss of Hits!TV. Since Channel 4 took it over and rebranded it, whenever I've flicked over to see some pop music videos I've been confronted by Shipwrecked: Battle Of The Idiots or some dudes with trendy haircuts talking to each other. There are NO music videos being played at prime time, only during the day (I'm at home right now and am enjoying some classic Nelly Furtado and the new Leona Lewis, hurray).

So that's the last of the freeview video channels to soundtrack the evening's washing up then (TMF never really showed videos except at weekends anyway). It's definitely meant the amount of new pop I digest properly (as opposed to a once-over on Youtube if it enters the charts) has diminished. As has the number of Ultimate Hardcore Party Classics adverts I see - I've missed seeing Cascada's face merge into Basshunter's every ad break. I'm even missing the dreadful list countdowns (Fall Out Boy's top 20 Legends Of Brat-Rock, Worst Boybands '88-'08 etc).

I know WHY they've done this of course. We've got Youtube and newfangled on-demand telly now so Shipwrecked is meant to bring back the viewers (hmmm). Perhaps it's just me? Do you lot even watch music telly at all these days? Did you ever watch it in the first place? If you pay for telly do you bother watching The Box and its ilk? Or would you prefer to watch Miquita Oliver giggling on a sofa for four hours?

Comments

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

youtube = worse quality audio/video (altho the gap is closing, judging by how compressed digital channels continue to get) and nowhere near good enough content filter/retrieval/delivery system. you should be able to say 'play me all videos similar to this' etc. and it does it automatically instead of having to do all the work yourself. apart from that it's obv. great!

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

"all the work" = typing in name of act + song into text box??!! and it does have that "similar videos" function down the side.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

yes but you have to know what to look for and youtube isn't very good at that. it needs to be more like last.fm in that respect. i actually want 'programming' based on my preferences and to do as little clicking and typing as possible.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I don't believe any automated programming, even based on my 'preferences', would be adequate though - I don't trust anything or anyone other than myself to "know" what I want to hear!

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

does that mean you don't listen to radio shows either? at least you can look at the playlists before hearing the show now thanks to the internet. such dark days before this...

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

This is exactly why I don't listen to the radio! That, plus radio presenters all annoy me.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

even Westwood? i thought you listened to some 1xtra stuff tho. i listened to Wiley interview on 1Xtra via youtube the other day and they kept doing Westwood-style explosion sound effects for every second comment Wiley made. yes it was a bit rubbish.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

The only 1xtra stuff I've listened to this year = the archived Footloose sets. As mp3s. I check their playlist regularly though and check stuff out based on it. Have hardly ever listened to Westwood at all. I really have 0 desire to hear music interrupted by human voices.

[mcarratala.livejournal.com]

The point is that if one is a standard adult consumer of music, then you do have to have somebody else doing the donkey work for you. YouTube is great, but only for stuff you already know about. That's why you need the radio or TV channels. Obviously, this doesn't apply to The Lex, but it does to many other people. Like Kat, I very much relied on The Hits to give me a feel for what was around, and am now somewhat lost...

[koganbot]

I rely on The Lex to give me a feel for what is around.