''PopClips'' is a

music video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a m ...

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

program, the direct predecessor of

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 ...

. Former

Monkee The Monkees were an American Rock music, rock and pop music, pop band, formed in Los Angeles in 1966, whose lineup consisted of the American actor/musicians Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork alongside English actor/singer Davy Jones ...

Mike Nesmith Robert Michael Nesmith or Mike Nesmith, (December 30, 1942 – December 10, 2021) was an American musician, songwriter, and actor. He was best known as a member of the pop rock band the Monkees and co-star of the TV series ''The Monkees'' (1966� ...

conceived the first music-video program as a promotional device for Warner Communications' record division. Production began in the spring of 1979 at SamFilm, a sound-stage built and operated in

Sand City, California Sand City is a city in Monterey County, California, United States, located on the shores of Monterey Bay, and surrounded on most sides by the larger city of Seaside. Sand City is located northeast of Monterey, at an elevation of 72 feet (22 m). ...

by Sam Harrison, a Monterey Peninsula College instructor with a motion picture background. The series was produced by Jac Holzman. With an

infinity cyc In theater and film, a cyclorama (abbreviated cyc in the U.S., Canada, and the UK) is a large curtain or wall, often concave, positioned at the back of the apse. It often encircles or partially encloses the stage to form a background. It was popu ...

lorama as the background, set flats were made from the Styrofoam packing used to ship laserdisc players and 3/4" video decks. The first " VeeJay" was Jeff Michalski. The director was William Dear. Besides Harrison, the production team was made up of Bruce "Buz" Clarke, Keith Cornell, Marybeth Harris, and Leslie Chacon. The program was broadcast weekly on the youth-oriented

cable television Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broa ...

channel

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television television channel, channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its List of assets owned by Param ...

in late 1980 and early 1981. The channel's owners at the time, Warner Cable, wanted to buy the name and idea, but instead, according to Dear, "they just watered down the idea and came up with

." ''PopClips'' was preceded by the video '' Elephant Parts'' (which won the first ever

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...

for

Music Video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a m ...

),The New Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll (1995) and followed by a second series titled '' Television Parts'', both of which Nesmith hosted and produced.

References

External links

Mike Nesmith of the Monkees
Ian Watson, first published in ''

Melody Maker ''Melody Maker'' was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. It was founded in 1926, largely as a magazine for dance band musicians, by Leicester-born ...

'' {{Michael Nesmith 1980s American music television series 1980 American television series debuts 1981 American television series endings 1980s Nickelodeon original programming Television series created by Michael Nesmith