When I was your age... VH1 aired music videos

My room mates were watching VH1 today, the show was 40 Dumbest Celebrity Quotes which included the Governator himself saying "I think gay marriage should be between a man and woman" at number 1.  

Some of the quotes were slightly entertaining but it mostly got me thinking about the recent content of VH1, that is, Video Hits One, something I admit I had to look up.  VH1, who used to boast the slogan "music first" seems to have jumped off the music bus somewhere along the way to reality land.  At one point, they must have decided that music videos were boring.  Solution: Pop up video.  When pop up video became obsolete it seems that reality tv was the next logical step...somehow.  Now, one can only enjoy a show that has to do with watching a former celebrity's dramatic downfall and and dating pitfalls, or making a fame thirsty idiot into a celebrity (shows like "I love money" come to mind).  It is quite the balance they have working over there at VH1 headquarters.  With the scales going either one way or another, music videos have been stuck in the middle.  I don't watch too much television but out of the top of my head I can think of two shows they have that are still dedicated to music.  One are the between show blurbs about artists on the rise called "You oughta know" and a music video program called "Nocturnal State" aka early morning programming filler.  

I don't really go out of my way to watch music videos but I do enjoy them when they are on.  Music + a director's visual interpretation of that music always interested me.  Its fun seeing how the meaning of a song sometimes can change a little when you watch the music video.  Or, even if it doesn't change, many music videos are just flat out cool to watch.  For instance, I'm not a huge fan of the white stripes or Okay Go but the video to "Fell In Love With a Girl" and "Here It Goes Again" are freaking sweet. They are so original and visually stimulating.  

I know music videos aren't extinct, but they are just heavily niched in the internet now, which pretty much means you have to go look for them.  You can't just stumble across them while channeling surfing anymore.  Instead, you get half naked girls with retarded nicknames vouching for celeb studs like Flava Flave.  I'd rather get a music video, thank you.  I suppose I'm going to have to start poking around the web to see what's going on with my favorite artists in the visual world.  Two common (but not all) approaches I've seen are the animated, like M. Ward's Chinese Translation.  Or the artist featured choreography type of video like in Greg Laswell's How the Day Sounds (note the apperance of Elijah Wood...huh?).  Another common video is obviously the live taping of a show with omniscient views of backstage activities and such like in Kings of Leon Use Somebody.  Why do I have to stay up till 3 in the morning in order to watch these, or go bounty hunter on them on the internet?  Lets get back to the game plan VH1 (and MTV....)