MTV Classic was a British

pay television Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, b ...

music channel from

Paramount Networks UK & Australia Paramount Networks UK & Australia (formerly ViacomCBS Networks UK & Australia) is a subsidiary of Paramount Global. The unit launched in 2020 and is based in London, United Kingdom, with a local office in Sydney, Australia Australia, o ...

. The channel was launched in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...

and

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...

on 1 July 1999 as VH1 Classic. It focused on music videos and music specials from the 1960s onwards, sometimes featuring music videos and concert footage from as early as at least the 1940s or 1950s, such as Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" from 1942. It also aired videos from the 2000s and early 2010s. Every November and December from 2013 until 2021, MTV Classic played Christmas-themed music branded as MTV Xmas. "

Video Killed the Radio Star "Video Killed the Radio Star" is a song written by Trevor Horn, Geoff Downes and Bruce Woolley in 1979. It was recorded concurrently by Bruce Woolley and the Camera Club (with Thomas Dolby on keyboards) for their album '' English Garden'' an ...

" by

The Buggles The Buggles were an English new wave band formed in London in 1977 by singer and bassist Trevor Horn and keyboardist Geoff Downes. They are best known for their 1979 debut single " Video Killed the Radio Star", which topped the UK Singles Cha ...

, the first video to air on the original

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

in 1981, was also the first music video to be played when the channel was rebranded as MTV Classic on 1 March 2010.

History

Since the rebrand, Viacom had rebranded other international channels as MTV Classic. On 1 May 2010, VH1 Australia was rebranded as MTV Classic and on 10 January 2011, MTV Networks Europe launched an Italian version of the same channel, replacing MTV Gold. MTV Classic began broadcasting in widescreen on 6 March 2012. On 31 March 2022, the channel closed down, and was replaced by

MTV 80s MTV 80s is a worldwide music channel, which began broadcasting on October 5, 2020. MTV 80s features music videos from the 1980s. MTV 80s has replaced VH1 Classic. History Before launch On November 30, 2004, VH1 Classic Europe featured a pr ...

. The final video played on the channel was " Goodbye" by

Spice Girls The Spice Girls are a British girl group formed in 1994, consisting of Melanie Brown, also known as Mel B ("Scary Spice"); Melanie Chisholm, or Melanie C ("Sporty Spice"); Emma Bunton ("Baby Spice"); Geri Halliwell ("Ginger Spice"); and ...

Pluto TV revival

In late 2022 a feed of archive music videos, listed on the guide under the MTV Classic name, was made available on the British iteration of Paramount Global's streaming television platform

Pluto TV Pluto TV is a free, ad-supported video streaming service owned and operated by the Paramount Streaming division of Paramount Global. Co-founded by Tom Ryan, Ilya Pozin and Nick Grouf in 2013 and based in Los Angeles, California, in the United S ...

, following shortly after the addition of other MTV-branded music video streams (film soundtrack stream MTV Movie Hits and seasonal pop-up MTV Xmas) to the lineup. The Pluto streams are available at no cost to users and are separate to the MTV broadcast TV channels.

Temporary rebrands

Viacom occasionally rebranded MTV Classic to a different name to air different kinds of music. *MTV Xmas: From 23 November to 27 December 2013, the channel was temporarily rebranded as MTV Xmas, playing only Christmas-themed music. This has been repeated every year since. After 7 years since its first launch on Sky, MTV Xmas is now also available for the first time on

Virgin Media Virgin Media is a British telecommunications company which provides telephone, television and internet services in the United Kingdom. Its headquarters are at Green Park in Reading, England. It is owned by Virgin Media O2, a 50:50 joint ventu ...

UK starting 12 November 2020 as a replacement of VH1 Christmas. From 7 November 2022, MTV Xmas moved to

MTV 90s MTV 90s is an international music television channel from Paramount International Networks that plays music videos from 1990 until 1999. The channel is available in Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, and parts of Southeast Asia (excluding ...

due to closure of MTV Classic. *MTV Summer: From 1 to 31 August 2014, the channel was temporarily rebranded as MTV Summer, playing only summer-themed music. This has been repeated from 29 June to 3 August 2015, replacing MTV Pride. *MTV Love: From 29 January to 16 February 2015, the channel was temporarily rebranded as MTV Love, playing only love songs. This temporarily rebranded channel was used as a replacement for

Viva Viva may refer to: Companies and organisations * Viva (network operator), a Dominican mobile network operator * Viva Air, a Spanish airline taken over by flag carrier Iberia * Viva Air Dominicana * VIVA Bahrain, a telecommunication company * V ...

until the rebrand to MTV OMG in March 2018. *MTV Pride: From 27 to 29 June 2015, the channel was temporarily rebranded as MTV Pride to coincide with Pride Weekend in celebration of diversity and equality which celebrated LGBT life by playing gay music icons from the likes of

Madonna Madonna Louise Ciccone (; ; born August 16, 1958) is an American singer-songwriter and actress. Widely dubbed the " Queen of Pop", Madonna has been noted for her continual reinvention and versatility in music production, songwriting, a ...

Kylie Minogue Kylie Ann Minogue (; born 28 May 1968) is an Australian singer, songwriter and actress. She is the highest-selling female Australian artist of all time, having sold over 80 million records worldwide. She has been recognised for reinve ...

Lady Gaga Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta ( ; born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She is known for her image reinventions and musical versatility. Gaga began performing as a teenag ...

Britney Spears Britney Jean Spears (born December 2, 1981) is an American singer. Often referred to as the " Princess of Pop", she is credited with influencing the revival of teen pop during the late 1990s and early 2000s. After appearing in stage producti ...

Cyndi Lauper Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper Thornton (born June 22, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and activist. Her career has spanned over 40 years. Her album ''She's So Unusual'' (1983) was the first debut album by a female artist to achi ...

Donna Summer LaDonna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948May 17, 2012), known professionally as Donna Summer, was an American singer and songwriter. She gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s and became known as the " Queen of Disco", while her musi ...

Cher Cher (; born Cherilyn Sarkisian; May 20, 1946) is an American singer, actress and television personality. Often referred to by the media as the Honorific nicknames in popular music, "Goddess of Pop", she has been described as embodying female ...

and

Pink Pink is the color of a namesake flower that is a pale tint of red. It was first used as a color name in the late 17th century. According to surveys in Europe and the United States, pink is the color most often associated with charm, politeness, ...

. This was replaced by MTV Summer on 29 June 2015 and was repeated from 24 to 27 June 2016. MTV Pride was moved to

MTV OMG MTV OMG was a British pay television music channel operated by Paramount Networks UK & Australia. It launched on 1 March 2018, replacing free-to-air sister music channel Viva. The audience profile on Sky Media showed that the channel had a 60/ ...

from 2018 to 2020 and returned from 6 to 13 September 2021. From 27 June 2022, MTV Pride was moved the new

as the first temporary rebrand of the 90s channel. *

: From 27 May to 24 June 2016, the channel rebranded as MTV 90s playing 90s music videos and select

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its networks division's Kids and Family Group. It ...

shows from the 90s like Clarissa Explains It All and

Kenan & Kel ''Kenan & Kel'' is an American buddy comedy sitcom created by Kim Bass. The show originally aired on the Nickelodeon network for four seasons, from July 15, 1996, to July 15, 2000. Set in Chicago, Illinois, the series follows mischievous Ken ...

(both of which currently air on

Trace Vault Trace Vault (formerly Video Vault and The Vault) is a British free-to-air music channel owned by Trace Group. On 1 November 2019, the channel rebranded as Trace Vault following TRACE's takeover of Sony's music channels. The first song on the n ...

). The channel was permanently launched in Europe on 5 October 2020 replacing MTV Rocks. The channel officially launched as of 31 March 2022 replacing

MTV Base MTV Base was a British pay television music channel from Paramount Networks UK & Australia that focused primarily on hip hop, R&B, grime, garage, reggae, funk, soul and dance music. It was launched as part of MTV's digital boutique of music ch ...

. *

: From 28 February to 31 March 2020, the channel rebrand as MTV 80s playing 80s music videos similar to MTV 90s and the decade- themed Now channels. The channel was permanently launched in

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island coun ...

on 6 July 2020 replacing the Australian version of MTV Classic and later in Europe on 5 October 2020 replacing

VH1 Classic Europe VH1 Classic Europe was a European music television channel from ViacomCBS Networks EMEAA. The channel primarily featured music videos from the 1970s through to the 2000s (decade), although rare live performances from the 1950s and 1960s could be ...

. The channel officially launched permanently to the UK as of 31 March 2022.

Availability

The channel was available in the United Kingdom on Sky,

BT TV BT TV is a subscription IPTV service offered by BT; a division of United Kingdom telecommunications company BT Group, and was originally launched as BT Vision in December 2006. As of the end of June 2019, BT TV had 1.9 million customers ...

and

TalkTalk Plus TV TalkTalk TV is a UK-based consumer television and video on demand service, operated by the TalkTalk Group that originally launched in 2000. In September 2012, the current TalkTalk TV was launched in partnership with YouView. Its television an ...

and in Ireland on

Sky Ireland Sky Ireland Limited is a subsidiary of Comcast-owned Sky and supplies television, internet and telephony services in Ireland. Its corporate headquarters are in Dublin which were opened by Taoiseach Enda Kenny on 18 January 2013. Sky Ireland ...

and

Virgin Media Ireland Virgin Media Ireland is Liberty Global's telecommunications operation in Ireland. It is the largest digital cable television provider within the country. As of 31 December 2014, the company offers broadband internet, digital television and d ...

. MTV Classic was previously available on Virgin Media UK but it was removed from the platform on 28 August 2010, along with MTV +1 and MTV Shows, to make room for Comedy Central HD and returned on 7 January 2020, replacing VH1 which had closed that day.

Logos

File:VH1 Classic UK.svg, Original VH1 Classic logo used from 1 July 1999 to 1 March 2010. File:MTV Classic 2010 logo.svg, The first logo of MTV Classic used from 1 March 2010 to 1 July 2011. File:MTV Classic 2011 logo.png, Second logo used from 1 July 2011 to 1 October 2013. File:MTV Classic 2013 logo.svg, Third logo used from 1 October 2013 to 5 April 2017. File:MTV Classic 2017 logo.svg, Fourth logo used from 5 April 2017 to 14 September 2021. File:MTV Classic 2021.svg, Fifth and final logo used from 14 September 2021 – 31 March 2022. File:MTV xmas logo.svg, MTV Xmas logo. File:MTV Love Logo.png, MTV Love logo File:MTV Pride Logo.png, MTV Pride logo File:MTV Summer Logo.png, MTV Summer logo MTV Classic's on-air identity was similar to MTV's international identity. MTV Classic utilised the new MTV logo along with specially commissioned idents by ICC. These idents were also used on other MTV Classic channels around the world including

MTV Classic Australia MTV Classic (formerly VH1 Australia) is an Australian subscription television music channel. The channel focused on music from the 1980s to 2000s. The channel first launched in Australia on 14 March 2004 (as ''VH1'') and in New Zealand on 1 J ...

, which launched in May 2010. On September 14, 2021, MTV Classic revealed a new on-air look and new logo as part of MTV's 2021 global rebrand.

References

External links

Official website

TV Guide

{{DEFAULTSORT:MTV Classic (UK and Ireland) Defunct British television channels MTV channels Music video networks in the United Kingdom Television channels and stations established in 1999 Television channels and stations disestablished in 2022 Classic television networks 1999 establishments in the United Kingdom Television channel articles with incorrect naming style 2022 disestablishments in the United Kingdom