VJ: The Unplugged Adventures of MTV's First Wave

by Nina Blackwood

  Sometimes I had to introduce the “Missing You” video on MTV. I never told the story, but now and then, I’d say something like “A song close to my heart.” There are lyrics in it, like “a telegraph to your soul,” that I know came from our conversations. When we were apart, I used to tell John that he should look up at the moon: I would send my wishes for him up to the moon so they would come down to wherever he was. I was a sappy romantic—but that whole experience with him dumbfounded me.

  For a while, we stayed in contact, and wrote each other cards now and then. A few years ago, Ida told me she had spoken with somebody else who said that John had told her that “Missing You” was written about her. Apparently, they had been having an affair at that time. I made the mistake of telling Mark, who asked John about the song during an interview: “Was it really written about Nina?”

  John answered, “It was written about her and a bunch of other women.”

  “I don’t think she knows that,” Mark said.

  “Oh, yes, she does.”

  No, I didn’t. I guess he said that to all the girls.

  If we had actually gotten together, who knows whether it would have worked. But to this day, if I see John, my heart starts pounding. I can’t help it.

  26

  That’s My Soul up There

  MTV Hits the Road

  Alan:

  MTV sponsored the Police’s Synchronicity tour, which meant each of us went out on the road for several of their dates to introduce the band. I was the MC in Birmingham, Alabama; that was a very satisfying night, standing in front of my hometown at the BJCC Arena. I was also onstage at JFK Stadium in Philadelphia, introducing them to seventy-five thousand people, which was a rush. It was less nerve-racking than doing an introduction in a small club, actually.

  Martha:

  I introduced the Police at Shea Stadium, and somebody in the crowd threw a tennis ball at me. It only hit me on the leg, but I was really shaken up. I felt like I was out there by myself. I think it’s trickier for a young woman to be out on her own, blazing a trail, than it is for a young man. Sometimes I wished I had someone looking out for my back.

  Alan:

  I found it odd that we didn’t ever interact with the Police. I’d fly into town and sit in the greenroom in the arena. At one venue, I asked their tour manager, “Hey, what are the guys doing?”

  “Oh, they’re getting ready. They go on in about fifteen minutes. You need anything?”

  I didn’t ask to go hang with them—I didn’t want to beg—but I did wonder, “Why can’t I go in there and say howdy? I’m not the local DJ—I’m one of five VJs, and MTV’s promoting the tour.” It felt out of sync with our popularity, and I felt dissed, but I didn’t have the balls to ask to say hello. I do have a photo of me and Sting—but only because I hung around the studio when Mark was interviewing him and stepped into the picture once the interview was over.

  Martha:

  For some reason, the Police wanted only the younger VJs to come out and introduce shows: me and Alan and Nina. I thought that was insulting to J. J. and Mark.

  Mark:

  I wasn’t even aware that was going on.

  Alan:

  The Police kept asking for Martha to come out—I think all three of them were hoping to score with her.

  Martha:

  Believe me, those guys did not feel that way. In fact, they did something really rude—although at the time, I thought it was my fault. I was interviewing them after one of their shows, and one of them said, “Well, this is kind of a bad time to talk to us. You know, we just got offstage.”

  I wish I had said, “Dude, I didn’t set this up. This time wasn’t my idea—talk to Miles.” That was Miles Copeland, their manager—drummer Stewart Copeland’s brother. What I actually did was look off camera, making eye contact with a producer to find out what I should do. And the Police started throwing drinks at each other, and then they got up and left.

  At the time, I felt horrible, thinking I had let down the company: I couldn’t control the situation and I didn’t get the interview they wanted. I wouldn’t have blamed them if they had fired me. Now I look back and think, “I was just a kid. It was crappy of them to do that.”

  Alan:

  MTV also sponsored Yes, when they were promoting 90125—the 9012Live tour. I was a huge Yes fan back in the “Roundabout” days—they played the first concert I ever went to. I had despaired over how they would translate their sound to the ’80s. My brother had been a big fan of acoustic singer-songwriters like Kenny Loggins, and there was very little acoustic guitar in the ’80s—it was mostly synths. So I had seen how a whole category of musicians could get squeezed out, “Footloose” and “Danger Zone” notwithstanding. But then Yes put out “Owner of a Lonely Heart,” which was genius. It incorporated elements of their prog-rock heyday, but the rest of it was straight Art of Noise. I saw the video and said, “Oh, they’re going to survive. I’m proud of my boys.”

  Nina:

  We did the Big Bam Boom tour with Hall and Oates. One city, I hung out after the show with G. E. Smith, the band’s guitarist, drinking and telling stories in his hotel room. Nothing else went on—I always feel like I have to say that when I hang out with a guy, because everyone assumes that only one thing can happen between a man and a woman.

  Alan:

  I introduced Hall and Oates one night, but they didn’t run on right away. So I returned to the side of the stage. I was real close to the stairway that led to the dressing room. John Oates came by at a moment when I was holding up my hand—and I whacked him right in the face. He said, “Goddamn it, what the fuck?” The stage manager was trying to figure out what was going on—it was really dark, and nobody could see anything. Oates walked onstage, rubbing his head. When the lights went up, everybody looked at the stage manager, figuring it was his fault, because he was standing around there. I just tried to disappear.

  Martha:

  I had to introduce Hall and Oates, and I had a huge case of stage fright. I didn’t know what to say, and I was worried that people were going to boo me.

  G. E. Smith told me, “Just go out and have fun. Don’t worry about it—you can say anything.”

  I went out and started talking to the crowd, and after a while, G. E. came up to his microphone and said, “Hey, Martha?”

  “Yeah?”

  “There’s a phone call for you.”

  “G. E., I can’t take a phone call right now—I’m talking to these people!”

  He smiled and gave me a look: See? You can say whatever you want. Later that night, G. E. tried to convince me to sleep (“Just sleeeep”) in his room at the hotel we were all staying at, but I wasn’t that stupid. I declined.

  Lineup on the first day of the 1982 US Festival (September 3):

  Gang of Four

  The Ramones

  The English Beat

  Oingo Boingo

  The B-52s

  Talking Heads

  The Police

  Lineup on the first day of the 1983 US Festival (May 28):

  Divinyls (eight years before “I Touch Myself”!)

  INXS

  Wall of Voodoo

  Oingo Boingo

  The English Beat

  Missing Persons

  A Flock of Seagulls

  Stray Cats

  Men at Work

  The Clash (the last show they ever did with Mick Jones)

  Mark:

  I got tapped to do the ’83 US Festival. J. J. had done it the year before, when it was a smaller affair. I think he felt miffed that they didn’t send him out again when it became a bigger deal.

  The ’83 US Festival was basically a three-day festival. The metal day was the highest attendance: That was Woodstock numbers, like five hundred thousand people. It was all in San Bernardino, California, which was hot and dusty and nasty—they were hosing the crowd down. We drove in the night before and hit the ground running: We had three days of nonstop coverage. It was a madhouse, but I
don’t believe anything really bad happened: Nobody OD’d, nobody got trampled.

  Outside of New Year’s Eve, it was the first time MTV had done a live broadcast. We filed multiple reports and did several live updates a day. I don’t remember sleeping. I was constantly exhausted and smoking a lot of pot. I wasn’t doing any coke—maybe I should have been. And I was very glad to be “talent,” because other people on the crew not only had to follow me around, they also had to go back to our trailer, where we had an edit suite, and put together finished pieces.

  That weekend was the first time I met U2. I spoke with Bono, who was a serious guy, even back then. You could tell that he was taken with the United States—they came to conquer. Bono was pissed off at the Clash, who were being total dicks at the festival. Bill Graham was running the show, and he was a notorious stickler for staying on schedule. Everything was on time until the Clash, who showed up an hour late for their set. Bono felt the Clash were poseurs. Talking about them, he told me, “We didn’t come here to hide behind our haircuts.”

  We were planning to do a live hit just before Ozzy Osbourne’s set, with me onstage, bringing him on. I was waiting by the side of the stage, looking at a crowd of five hundred thousand people, and waiting for the signal to go, because we were going to be live—no tape delay. I got the word, walked out onstage, and did my usual thing to whip the crowd into a frenzy—which was pretty easy, since it was metal day. I went through my big rabble-rousing, make-’em-nuts speech, and then I said, “All right, everybody, Ozzy Osbourne!” I looked around, and no Ozzy. I walked off and found out they held him back because we were too early to hit the satellite for the live feed. They told me I had to do the introduction one more time. And again, there were half a million people.

  So I walked out, and said, “Take two!” Live television, everybody. But the metalheads were good. They got into the same frenzy again—they had commitment.

  I also interviewed Ozzy in his trailer. I wanted to smoke pot with him, but Sharon, his wife and manager, was really terrifying. She was in rare form that day, having a huge argument with Bill Graham, and I didn’t want her to focus on me instead. Ozzy was nearly incomprehensible, but also funny and lovable, like a whacked-out uncle. In the middle of our interview, there was a power failure, and every light in the trailer went out. Sitting in total darkness but not missing a beat, Ozzy shouted, “Keep pedaling, Sharon!”

  27

  I’ve Seen You On the Beach And I’ve Seen You On TV

  The Cultural Impact of MTV

  Martha:

  I was young enough when MTV launched that I thought the Police were great—but I was an adult, so they couldn’t be my first teenage love the way that the Beatles had been, or James Taylor. I still acted like a kid sometimes, but there was a crucial gap of a few years between me and the teenagers who were watching MTV. When people ask me how much I loved Duran Duran, I’m not quite there with them. When MTV started, I was already a college graduate, a half-step out of the demo.

  Alan:

  What I miss most about MTV was the innocence of ’80s music. I’ll hear something like “The Safety Dance” now, and I’ll say, “You know, that’s a crappy song, but it sure was fun.” We presented this vision of American culture, which was tolerant of sincerity and tongue-in-cheek self-deprecation at the same time: We could play Bruce Springsteen and Culture Club right next to each other. It wasn’t an era of body piercing yet, but we had flashy clothing and crazy hair. The message was acceptance, which was counter to the politics of the day.

  Mark:

  Even when MTV played the exact same songs as a top 40 station, it had a different visceral impact. Seeing different skin colors and different musical tribes right next to each other was powerfully inclusive, even if you muted your TV set.

  The ideal party in an early MTV video had as varied a guest list as possible. For example, the video for “Heart and Soul,” by Huey Lewis and the News, takes place at a loft party. There’s some diversity in ethnicity and age, but the real range comes in the types of characters we see: a shirtless guy in glittering shoulder pads and headband, a black dandy under a parasol, a midget in a gaucho hat, a new-wave guy in visor sunglasses, a bearded dude with a top hat and monocle, a punk rocker who looks like Ron Howard despite the Mohawk and leather jacket, a harlequin in white face paint, and a belly dancer. The News themselves include a preppy, a cowboy, and a vampire.

  Martha:

  When I started working at MTV, I weighed 110 pounds, which may not sound like a lot, but I’m only five foot two. I was still a bit chunky from all that college food—ice cream and bagels every meal—so I started jogging and going to aerobics classes. But workout culture was new, especially in the music world. I hate when I see period pieces set in the old rock world, and the guys have shaved chests or are buff. Like Almost Famous—Cameron Crowe should know better. Go watch The Song Remains the Same and see what Led Zeppelin looked like: They might have been super-thin, but the only six-packs were on the tour bus.

  Nina:

  MTV’s a big part of the reason that all changed. Musicians got more visually conscious. Or self-conscious.

  Alan:

  The biggest metamorphosis was Bruce Springsteen. I grew up with him being a geeky, skinny guy, with his jeans falling off his ass. Then the “Dancing in the Dark” video came out, and wow, he had muscles. I think he watched some videos and said, “Oh, I gotta look good in these things if I want to compete.”

  Mark:

  I voted for Reagan in 1980. I wasn’t traditionally Republican, and I wasn’t sure what type of politician he might end up being, but I appreciated the fact that he was able to galvanize the country, which I thought was important. I did not vote for him for a second term—by that time, I realized what an idiot he was. Trickle-down economics sounded so right, but was so wrong.

  Alan:

  I voted for Reagan over Carter, but I soured on him, because when he came on board, he slashed the NEA, and arts funding dried up. Before I moved to New York, I had an NEA grant to do theater, and Reagan ended that. Now I think the country could really use somebody like Reagan, but at the time, I took it personally.

  Nina:

  I didn’t track on politics at the time, but when I heard Reagan speak, I thought it was ironic that everybody called him “The Great Communicator.” I just heard a phony actor. Studying acting, you learn when somebody’s speaking from their soul—the Method calls it being connected. I never felt that Reagan was connected at all, which is why I did not like listening to the man speak.

  Alan:

  The ethos of the ’80s was very conservative—Middle America voted for a Republican president, and he supported austerity measures and the religious right. And then this irreverent entity called MTV came along and stuck its finger into the conservative eye. There were plenty of right-wingers shutting off the cable after they discovered that MTV was flashing tits and ass in their religious faces all day long. But that conflict just created a pent-up demand for MTV, especially if kids had to go to a friend’s house to watch it. People needed a 24/7 bubble called MTV so they could forget about whatever bullshit was going on with politics. MTV and the Moral Majority needed each other to thrive.

  Mark:

  I thought MTV would stick around, but I never imagined it would have the cultural impact that it did. I think that shocked everybody at the channel, all the way up to Bob Pittman.

  Martha:

  We could see MTV’s influence everywhere. Even commercials got edited differently after we launched. Miami Vice was commissioned with the two words “MTV cops.”

  Mark:

  I don’t think there will ever be another equivalent to MTV in the music business, just like there will never be another Beatles. Even if the world’s greatest band came along today, there wouldn’t be the same pandemonium. People love their iPods, but they don’t relate to them the same way they did to MTV.

  Alan:

  MTV was all about change; we trained the audience t
o expect it. If a graphic felt stale after six months, MTV changed it, and if they needed to hire a new team to do that, they would. They went through a lot of creative people to make that visual environment happen, and they gave them a lot of freedom.

  Mark:

  We’re the reason you have no attention span. And you can pin reality TV on us too. You’re welcome.

  28

  I Want to Be the One to Walk in the Sun

  The Most Unusual Miss Cyndi Lauper

  Nina:

  Soon after I moved to New York, I went to the Ritz to see Blue Angel, the band that Cyndi Lauper was in before she went solo. And she was so good, she freaked me out. I got on a pay phone and called Danny in California, saying, “You would not believe this girl!”

  Martha:

  Cyndi had this Betty Boop speaking voice. Then she would open her mouth to sing, and it would be this staggering sound.