On Sky Arts, a documentary type program reliving the memories of the music video directors and the bands, talking about the influential beginning of the music video era. I have noted down some of the quotes throughout the program
"It's Harder to come up with something original now, back in the 80's it was all original!" Trevor Horn - The Buggles
"Nobody really knew what it was supposed to do, but the possibilities were endless." Kevin Godley
Bohemian Rhapsody - Queen, Directed by Bruce Gowers
'Bohemian Rhapsody' is widely regarded the visual extraviganda that kick started the music video revolution
"For our generation, Bohemian Rhapsody, was hugely important, firstly it was number one for weeks and weeks, and we all got to see it because we didnt have any music channels back then, and not really until the 80's, and that had a big impact the first time you'd seen a band make an effort for a song" Nick Rhodes - Duran Duran
"When it came out, people were really talking about it, it had broken a mould and challenged everybody to come up and suprise everybody, both musically and in video" Steve Barron
"We did quickly realise the power of the video because it was on top of the pops week after week after week" - Roger Taylor - Queen .
"when your given a track and someone says make a video, sometimes its absolutely dead easy and it comes to you like that, other times you fiddle around for a week and you can't think of anything" David Mallet
Video Killed the Radio Star - The Buggles, Directed by Russell Mulcahy
We felt something about video but I don't think we were aware then that it was going to be as huge as it did become, the thing that actually kick started the video era was emergence MTV" Kevin Godley
"'Video Killed The Radio Star' opened up MTV, and no one realised the impact that this would have." Russell Mulcahy
Vienna - Ultravox, Directed by Russell Mulchay
"A lot of my videos try to tell a little story, i wanted it to have a very noirish mystery about it." - Russell Mulchay, Director
"'Ultravox - Vienna' changed the landscape of what was possible for a band to do, you didn't actually have to play your instruments on screen, you could be an actor on it" Gary Kemp, Spandau Ballet
"The joys of making a music video in that era was that you just did it, there was no commisioning editor, there was noone you had to explain it to and no one you had to write the idea down to, and then no focus group twho would then have a meeting about the idea, you just turned up and did it" David Mallet
"There was that period in the 80s when we made those videos where there was a freedom, a visual freedom." Russell Mulchay, Director
Making of Elton Johns, I'm Still Standing "At that point I realised you can be creative on the spot if you have to be" Russell Mulchay
Queen - I Want To Break Free
"It was the most fun of any video we ever made." - Roger Taylor - Queen
"I laughed for 3 days straight, we all were, we were just histerical" David Mallet
"it was a measure of the thinking at MTV, that they thought it was discraseful and didnt show it and banned it." Roger Taylor - Queen
Billie Jean - Michael Jackson, Directed by Steve Barron
"I saw enough to see that this was something phenomenal"
"Then we heard that MTV wouldn't play it, because he was black. There was a very difficult 3-4 weeks" negotiation with the head of CBS who was really going to go to the supreme court and get MTV to reverse this decision." Steve Barron, Director
Rockit - Herbie Hancock, Directed by Kevin Godley
"nobody had done anything quite like what they did with Rockit" Herbie Hancock
"I saw an artist who made these extraordinary neumatic robots, a few weeks later we got this track from Herbie Hancock, and it was a natural pairing, that sounded like this looked." Kevin Godley
"The big problem back then was getting a black artist on MTV, because it was a big issue back then" Kevin Godley
They put us on low rotation, and after a week or two we were put on heavy rotation, skipping out medium. we had the most MTV awards that year, the year of the first MTV awards." Herbie Hancock
Cry - Godley & Creme, Directed by Godley & Creme
"In like cry we didnt want to be in it at all... we just felt like it was a kind of song that anybody could sing, and it turned out to be correct, and we're just in there with everybody else."
"Soft wipe, allows you to get from one face to another using a shape that opens up, what happens is it reveals a part of the incoming of the face over the out-coming face"
"It wasn't new technology, I think it was just because we were using faces, makes it seem more magical"
- All Kevin Godley
Dancing in the Street - Mick Jagger & David Bowie, Directed by David Mallet
Filmed in one 24 hour session, with the aim to premier it at Live Aid to an estimated global audience of 40 million.
"We literally made something up as we went along"
"There was one scene which is definitely Davids (Bowie), one scene I can look at now and know that it was mine, and a whole lot of other scenes which were sheer desperation"
- All David Mullet
"Earlier on I think it was much easier because you had such a small budget you just had to get it done." Nick Rhodes - Duran Duran
Close To Me - The Cure, Directed by Tim Pope
"I got this idea of wanting to shoot it all in this very very confined space to give that feeling to the song. - a wardrobe"
"what was interesting was, i think the video completed the song, we then which is very rare to do these days, which is remix the song to fit the video... So in a way the video had an influence on the song itself" Tim Pope
"A great video definitely helped a song at that point, but if you didn't have a great song, you could have a fantastic video and it really wouldn't make a lot of difference." Nick Rhodes - Duran Duran
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