MTV is shutting down 5 dedicated music channels on December 31st. Truly end of an era.
My favourite story on the network's peak influence was when Beavis & Butt-Head helped to blow up Radiohead.
In 1994, the duo reviewed the "Creep" music video with Beavis asking about the chorus: "How come they don’t, like, play that cool part through the song?"
Butt-Head's incredible response: “If they didn’t have a part of the song that sucked, the other part wouldn’t be as cool.”
"Creep" was the debut single for their 1993 album “Pablo Honey”. It was a commercial flop in the UK because BBC and other leading radio stations thought the song was too depressing.
However, the bit from Mike Judge’s uber-popular cartoon show took the song to another level in America. The band's US label (Capital Records) even marketed the single with the tagline, "Beavis and Butt-Head Say They Don’t Suck."
"Creep" is still Radiohead's most commercially successful song but the band hated its popularity.
They didn't think it represented their best work. Their next three albums — "The Bends" (1995), "OK Computer" (1997), "Kid A" (2000) — were all-timers but fans still kept clamouring for "Creep" when they performed live.
Radiohead stopped playing it live for years but eventually brought it back and people were again able to hear the "cool part of the song" in person.
Kid outside Garden “Tracy!
Tracy Morgan “Yo!…You wit your pops?
Kid “Yeah
Tracy “Take care of him. You only get 1
Kid “Yeah
Tracy “He love you. No way in the world you could possibly know how much
Kid “OK
Tracy “…Listen to me we’re friends. I’ll holler at you
“Go Knicks