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Sto caricando le informazioni... VJ: The Unplugged Adventures of MTV's First Wave (originale 2013; edizione 2013)di Nina Blackwood (Autore)
Informazioni sull'operaVJ: The Unplugged Adventures of MTV's First Wave di Nina Blackwood (2013)
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Iscriviti per consentire a LibraryThing di scoprire se ti piacerà questo libro. Attualmente non vi sono conversazioni su questo libro. Totally crap! Having remembered when MTV came on and that I watched it as much as possible, I was excited about the topic. Unfortunately I found it tedious and uninteresting. At least it is a quick read. ( ) "If you grew up when MTV was a logical acronym instead of a cruel joke, you probably had a similar epiphany." This book is a compilation of interviews with the first five (American) MTV VJs, weaving a tale of make-up-as-you-go-along and a lot of laughs and a lot of sorrow. All in all though, they're not (very) bitter, and even though this is a large collection of anecdotes, there are some very honest, wonderful and damn-the-1980s-were-sweet words on all that happened, from the days of when MTV was cobbled together by a few minds, where it was found to be a pillar of racism (where videos were concerned, at the very least) into becoming the behemoth that it is today. A few weeks later, I came home from some other audition, about to go work at the bar. I hadn’t heard a lot of good feedback that summer—I had been in the Bowie video and Annie, and that was about it. Rejection, that’s the actor’s life. I checked the messages on my answering machine. Sue Steinberg had left a message, saying they wanted to offer me the job. It made no sense at all. In a state of total disbelief, I went to meet with Sue. It didn’t appear to be a joke or a mistake: She told me how much they would pay me and gave me an envelope with five hundred dollars cash in it to buy some clothes. Totally overwhelmed, I walked home to Jan. I shuffled across the room like a zombie, collapsed on the bed, and said, “Oh my God, Jan, this is fucking real.” We both cried: I had a steady gig in New York. The weight of the world was off our shoulders. We could buy a new couch. I found out many years later that they cast us as types. According to Sue Steinberg, my niche was that I was the hunk. Which I didn’t necessarily agree with, but thank you for the compliment. J. J. was the benign black guy, Nina was the video vamp, Alan was the jock, and Martha was the girl next door that every executive wanted to fuck. Meg Griffin told me that the day she was supposed to sign her contract, she overheard Bob Pittman on the phone in the next room, only his list was a little different: “We’ve got our black guy, our Jew, our vixen, and our jock.” Alan: One of my first interviews was with Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel, when they reunited for a free concert in Central Park. I was excited—I used to listen to my big brothers’ Simon and Garfunkel albums and I dug their music. I studied, and wrote questions with the producer. When they sat down, Paul Simon pegged me right off the bat as a twenty-four-year-old pup. Every question I asked, he answered yes or no or “Why do you ask that, Alan?” I was sweating, and Art was embarrassed because Paul was beating up on me so bad. He kept saying, “Come on, Paul, be nice.” Seems like interviewing Frank Zappa wasn't easy at times: Nina: My worst moment was interviewing Frank Zappa. There’s nothing else even close to it in my whole career. Five entertaining things about Billy Joel’s “Pressure” video, which seemed spooky and portentous in 1982 and is pants-wettingly funny now: Some words of the racism of MTV: Mark: Before Let’s Dance came out, David Bowie did a press junket in a hotel room. It was one of those deals where interviewers file in one at a time. I had interviewed him before, on the radio, but I’m sure he didn’t remember me. I said, “I have some tough questions for you, David—I hope you’re ready.” And he said, “Ha, great, because at the end I’d like to ask you some punishing questions as well.” That comment just blew by me. At the end of the interview, he started asking me why there was such a dearth of black music on MTV. I said, not trying to toe the corporate line but honestly, “Listen, if this was a radio station, we’d be a rock station. It wouldn’t make sense for us to play stuff that isn’t in our format.” The conversation got around to Bowie saying, “Don’t you think there are black kids in the audience who would like to see some of these videos?” I said, “Well, I guess so, but this is what we do, and we have to think about the audience that has cable.” A lot of times we were finding that cable’s heaviest subscribers were in rural areas where they couldn’t get any television reception at all, out in Oklahoma or whatever—not usually your biggest fans of urban music. Bowie was hammering me, and I was trying to defend the network—but it was an awkward position, and I was looking around for some help. Gale Sparrow in the talent department was there, as was John Sykes, one of our big executives, but nobody was stepping forward. Ultimately, they cut that part of the interview out. I think they did air it years later, which is okay with me. What irritated me was that I felt like a pawn. I had no say over what MTV played—I wasn’t an executive. And Bowie knew what the situation was. He knew John Sykes, and he knew a lot of the other principals. He was just using me to bring this issue into the forefront. I felt like an idiot, and I felt used, and I felt insignificant to David Bowie—which I probably was, anyway. It wasn’t my finest moment. As I thought about it afterward, I worried that I looked stupid to Bowie, and to the people around me. And I wondered if there actually was an issue. J. J. and I talked about it. He was a rocker, but what he said to me—which I hadn’t really thought about—was that we were playing white people who were basically doing black music. Even Bowie, to some extent. Why wouldn’t we play black artists doing music in the same style? 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!” Nina: I was lucky that during our time in the public eye, it wasn’t like it is today with all the cameras and TMZ. I wouldn’t have survived that. MARTHA QUINN: “What kind of audiences have been coming to the shows?” Mark: The craziest promo I did was “Asia in Asia,” where you went to see the band Asia play at the Budokan arena in Japan. It was a very, very long flight to Tokyo, and I was sitting next to the winner, this girl from somewhere in the middle of America, who I hooked up with in the bathroom. When I traveled around the country and went to shows, sometimes I would see a good-looking girl, and I could see she was the prettiest girl at her high school, and there was something really charming about that—an innocence that wasn’t there with girls from New York or L.A. This girl was like that: She was cute, she was funny. I got to know her for a couple of hours, and I’m sure a lot of alcohol was involved. We were in first class, so we got free drinks and felt like we were getting crazy, like the rock stars. I said, “Why don’t you go back in the bathroom, and I’ll meet you back there.” We casually slipped into the bathroom—at least, I think we were casual—and started to grope and unbutton and unzip. We tried to have sex, but our balance sucked, and we kept bonking our heads on mirrors and getting leg cramps. It was kind of fun, but incredibly uncomfortable. The mile-high club is great in theory, but not in practice. That was just the beginning of the insanity. We stayed at the Akasaka Prince hotel, which was beautiful. But nobody in Tokyo spoke English, and all the signs were in Japanese, so I felt even more disconnected, like I had wandered into a scene from Lost in Translation. I was there with the MTV crew and executives—the A&R guy from the label knew a geisha house in the Kawasaki district. They said it was the one that the mayor of Tokyo would go to. I wanted to go—not necessarily because I wanted to get laid, but because I wanted to have the experience of a geisha house. And at the end, an executive put the whole thing on his card, which was a great joy to me. MTV picked up the tab for my first hooker! Martha: In the beginning, everyone told us MTV wouldn’t last. As it turns out, they were right—our MTV doesn’t exist anymore. There’s no videos on the channel now: It’s Jersey Shore and Teen Mom and My Super Sweet 16. Recently, I was shopping at my local farm stand, and the farmer introduced me to a teenage girl. He told her, “This is Martha Quinn—she used to be on MTV.” She said, “Really? What show?” Mark: We’re the reason you have no attention span. And you can pin reality TV on us too. You’re welcome. My Review of “VJ: The Unplugged Adventures of MTV’s First Wave” By: Nina Blackwood, Mark Goodman, Alan Hunter, and Martha Quinn with Gavin Edwards August 7, 2014 I can remember August 1, 1981 like it was yesterday. Watching “Video Killed the Radio Star” by The Buggles opened up a new door for me that became a large part of my life that in reality helped to shape the person that I am today. I can remember being excited to see World Premiere Videos by my favorite bands and just sitting there waiting with anticipation was like the world was going to explode if I didn’t get to see the video. I was certainly obsessed with MTV and couldn’t live without it. When the catch phrase of “I Want My MTV” was spoken by my favorite bands/singers I was like yes they understand me. I was so envious of Nina, Martha, JJ, Alan, and Mark being able to meet “my” favorite performers and have conversations with them. However, at the same time I was in awe of them and wanted to be their friend. In reality whether you wanted to be a VJ or just date one you were glued to MTV. I wanted to hear about all of about their adventures. Of course everyone had their favorite VJ’s and I would say that my favorite male VJ was J.J. Jackson. I thought he was cool and would be an overall nice person. My favorite female VJ was Martha, as I felt like I could relate to her. I loved this book as it gave you the “good, bad, and ugly” of what it was like to be a VJ. I felt like there wasn’t any sugar coating of the reality they experienced. MTV was so important to me that I can remember “playing” sick one or two days just so that I could watch MTV all day. I am guessing that of my MTV generation others did the very same thing. Video really did “kill the radio star” as MTV gave the fans an outlet to be closer to their idols. The connection that one could feel by watching a video; instead of just hearing the song over the airwaves was simply “priceless”. I fell “in love” with Duran Duran every single time I saw one of their videos. In my MTV days, I wanted to be a VJ; as well as Ann and Nancy Wilson from Heart. However; when MTV starting changing and playing less music the fans could feel the experience dwindle. As each of the original five VJ’s left MTV; it felt as if a friend was leaving. To me when MTV basically went “reality show” central I felt like it was the end of an era for me. It was very much like the song “It’s The End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)”, but in my case I didn’t feel fine. I can look back fondly on being able to experience the very first Live Aid without ever leaving home; as well as seeing the first mini movie video in Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”. I would like to thank Nina, Martha, Alan, Mark, and the late J.J. for allowing me to come along for the ride. I recommend this book to anyone who ever watched MTV when it gave us videos 24/7; as well as our “friends” Nina, Martha, Alan, Mark, and J J who was with us for this journey in history. "VJ: The Unplugged Adventures of MTV's First Wave" really felt like a lost opportunity. It was good for what it was, but really seemed to miss the boat on what would have been a great book. Maybe there are lot of people clamoring of a biography of MTV's first five VJ's. But I'm sure more readers would have the same expectations that I did... that this was going to be a great book with inside stories about artists of the 80's. The first chapter -- with stories from the VJ's about David Lee Roth really nailed what this book should have been. Instead it was really a biography of the VJs with a few tidbits about artists thrown in. If you want to know more about the VJ's then this is definitely the book for you. Otherwise you won't miss anything by skipping it. VJ follows the story of the original 5 MTV video jocks (unfortunately, JJ Jackson died before the book was written; his presence is felt strongly throughout the reflections of his colleagues), from when they were first hired to host the never-been-done-before Music Television to their departures. The book is written interview format, so each chapter has a different topic or issue which the four VJ’s then discuss. Having been a teenager in the 80’s, this book was especially interesting to me as it chronicled the early days of MTV, when the network was on the cutting edge of the music and TV businesses. Ironically, though the studio was in New York City, the show was not even broadcast there until later. The VJ’s grew into their roles quickly, not without some missteps along the way, and eventually became a media powerhouse for several years, with each VJ enjoying fame and notoriety, sometimes even greater than the artists they covered and interviewed. Their ride ended abruptly as the intended format of playing music videos, interviewing artists, and reporting music news soon morphed into what would become reality TV. Overall, a fun read, especially for those who was fascinated by the music video genre. - Jeff, Faculty- nessuna recensione | aggiungi una recensione
"The original MTV VJs offer a behind-the-scenes oral history of the early years of MTV, circa 1981 to 1985, when it was exploding, reshaping the culture, and forming "the MTV generation."MTV's first VJs (along with the late J.J. Jackson) had front-row seats to a cultural revolution--and the hijinks of rock stars from Adam Ant to Cyndi Lauper. Their worlds collided, of course: John Cougar invited Nina Blackwood to a late night "party" that proved to be a seduction attempt. Mark Goodman partied with David Lee Roth, who offered him cocaine and groupies. Aretha Franklin made chili for Alan Hunter. After Martha Quinn interviewed Bob Dylan, he whisked her off to Ireland in his private jet. While the book has plenty of dish--secret romances, nude photographs, incoherent celebrities--it also tells the story of four VJs growing up alongside MTV's devoted viewers. Using MTV as a focal point, the book tells the story of the 1980s, from the neon-colored drawstring pants to the Reagan administration. Readers don't just get the inside scoop on music stars like Bob Dylan, Madonna, and Duran Duran, but a deeper understanding of how MTV changed our culture. Or as the VJs put it: "We're the reason you have no attention span.""-- Non sono state trovate descrizioni di biblioteche |
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