It was 27 years ago...

Around 6:30 pm August 1, 1891, we all, that the first MTV staff, crew, execs, and VJ's, climbed onto a school bus  and drove to a little restaurant in Fort Lee, New Jersey, The Loft.  A school bus. Can you imagine? This is what we all took to the MTV launch. The Loft was chosen because it was the only restaurant we could find in the NYC vicinity who's cable company was taking a chance on adding this crazy new basic cable service called MTV. 

To honor the occasion, Jordan and I packed our hour with as many of the first videos as we could, we got to number 15. It's funny 'cause out of 15 it's the second Rod Stewart video. We didn't have many videos back then to when a top artist had more than one they were in heavy rotation!

One of my favorite tracks in the hour is "Little Susie's On The Up" by PhD fronted by Scottish singer Jim Diamond. It's a steamrolling old-school (and I'm talking one-room schoolhouse!) rock track. The only copy we could find was pretty poor quality but we cleaned it up as best we could, and shortened it a bit so it wasn't excruciating, but since we did include it, we have an official first 15!

Then I got the idea to try to track down Geoff Downes, keyboard player for, not just Yes and Asia, but for the Buggles. He called me from his iPhone in England. The line is a bit rough, but it's worth it to hear him share what goes through his mind when he hears "Video Killed The Radio Star" today, and what it was like for them back then to find themselves at the epicenter of the video music revolution.

August 1st always sees a flurry of MTV staffers e-mails, and here's the one I sent out. It's pretty sappy but I'll run it by ya anyway. I should mention that this was in response to one of the crew remembering they used to have Martini's with their hamburgers at the Sam's, the diner on our little corner of Hell's Kitchen.

What??? Who was drinking Martini's???

Remember that day we had no audio everybody had to come back and do all our segments
again? It's ALL MAKING SENSE NOW!!!

I can't believe it. 27 years ago we were on the school bus, heading out to Fort
Lee NJ. Jesus. I can remember being in that dark little basement watching the  blast-off,
all of us holding our breaths, "is this really going to happen?"  It was
monumental to me, and I was a newcomer, having graduated from NYU just a few weeks before. I can only imagine what it must have been like for the crew who'd been envisioning MTV for so long.
History can't repeat a moment like that. There can be more, but that one stands
tall as one of the greats. The thing I love about it the most is the thread of togetherness
it wove through us all.

Ah, getting all sentimental out here in Malibu. Sure wish I was on 33rd and 10th for
ONE OF THOSE MARTINI'S!

xoxoxoxoxo, Quinski