Comment on David Bowie Criticizes MTV for Not Playing Videos by Black Artists | MTV News

fiendishplan@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

• RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  MTV ignored black music because most radio stations did. MTV was a big risk and the financiers weren’t looking to take risks on pushing a new genre of music that wasn’t mainstream with most audiences at that time.

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  • SpacetimeMachine@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    That’s a poor excuse that doesn’t justify anything.

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    • RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      Have you ever run a business before? You need to make money which at the time meant stadium rock and “Top 40” pop radio.

      MTV was not started to provide access for smaller acts to break into the mainstream especially at a time when hiphop was very localized.

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      • HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        Part of the reason that New Wave became big in the early 80’s is because New Wave bands came from more affluent beginnings, so those bands could afford to make music videos at a time when they were relatively rare.

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    • DaveyRocket@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      People have trouble criticizing things they like. Fact of the matter, America is racist and if you don’t cater to racist you run the risk of “outrage” and “scandal”. Listen to the Vanilla Ice interview where he’s asked if he thinks it’s weird that he’s the face of rap…

      Woke is an insult somehow, but listen to how cringe these unaware people sound.

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      • RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        Or in 1981-83 when this conversation happened hip-hop really was underground and limited to a handful of cities. There really wasn’t a ton of interest there at he time so the for profit business known as MTV chased down profitability.

        Why do you think MTV should have aired the videos Bowie was finding interesting compared to the ones the larger audience was interested in?

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