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Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
It started fading fast in 94 and its final show in Jan. 95. It actually went grunge in 92-93. It had to. By the time 94/95 rolled around, simply not enough metal/rock bands in existence for MTV to keep the format. Hell, Rikki Rachtman started poking fun and rolling his eyes at hair metal videos. 
KInda pathetic since he's from that scene! They should've got a new host at that point.
I think MTV started playing 120 minutes in HBB's slot after it was canceled.
SG.....Soundgarden didn't catch on with Badmotorfinger until late 91. They caught on around the same time as Nirvana.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
I gotta give MTV props for devoting 2-3 hour blocks to this music. They didn't have to do it. People in general would've been fine with GNR, Metallica, etc. just getting sandwiched between pop and rap videos. MTV really catered to its target audiences back in those days. I used to think they were just force feeding various bands/genres down our throats but they were really giving everything a chance. By the time grunge hit full swing, yes they forced it....but it was on an audience that wanted it forced.
I no longer blame them for the change. Playlists in hindsight don't lie. When you're giving stuff like.....
Cycle Sluts From Hell - I Wish You Were A Beer
King's X - We Are Finding Who We Are
Motorhead - No Voices In the Sky
Anthrax - Who Cares Wins
Pantera - Psycho Holiday
Sepultura - Dead Embryonic Cells
Primus - Jerry Was A Race Car Driver
White Trash - Apple Pie
Smashing Pumpkins - Siva
......airplay, you're really giving your audience a smorgasbord.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
I'm signing up for Spotify for a month to test drive some albums.
I put together playlists for the Headbangers Ball shows that James mentioned.
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May 4th, 1991
July 6th, 1991
Sept. 7th, 1991
Sept. 21st, 1991
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Not on Spotify (YouTube links):
Album version unavailable, replaced with Live version in Spotify playlist:
I gotta give MTV props for devoting 2-3 hour blocks to this music.
How much of it was Rikki Rachtman having suction at MTV? Seems like experts on genre had free reign back then.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
HBB existed before him. They also had the show Hard 60 in the afternoons. He also claimed he had very little influence on what got played. I believe him. If he did, Faster Pussycat would've been in heavy rotation due to his friendship and work relationship with Taime(they owned The Cathouse).
The playlist a good idea. It would be like going back in time.
I kinda liked that Apple Pie song. Bad timing. That's the kinda song that explodes under the right circumstances.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
Yeah as much as we hated MTV it did lead us thru some pretty good era's of music. Even earlier stuff like VH, INXS, U2.
I remember 'Alternative Nation' too, not sure what time slot that was or what the real difference was from that & 120 minutes. I think it was on daily at midnight, aiming to more of a college rock audience up late each night. Remember the host chick Kennedy? Ashame, would be cool if they began airing their old shows & catalog streaming somewhere.
- tejastech08
- Rep: 194
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
Yes Alive is played out. Appetite still sounds fresh to me. I also thought Bush's debut album was awesome but now it seems ordinary.
I still think Bush's debut album is great. But I was only around 10 during that time and I have very fond memories of all those 90's alt rock bands. I look at the state of rock music today and pop music...it's a pretty sad situation. But what the hell, I never get tired of visiting old favorites like GN'R, Zeppelin, Floyd, Beatles, Stones, and yes the 90's stuff I grew up with as well...
...heck, I am very grateful to my parents for listening to the oldies station a lot. Back then they still legitimately played oldies from the 50's and early 60's. Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison, Elvis, Sinatra, and Chuck Berry are some of my favorites. Now they consider anything earlier than 1990 to be oldies, lmao.
Appetite is probably the best hard rock album ever and one of the very best rock albums period. It's going to continue standing the test of time. Been listening a lot to Fleetwood Mac's Rumours lately. I'm with James. That one definitely belongs in the same category with Appetite. Fucking killer album. "The Chain" might be the best song in rock history.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
Indeed. The Chain blew my mind as a small child and still blows it today.
I remember 'Alternative Nation' too, not sure what time slot that was or what the real difference was from that & 120 minutes.
Those two took the place of HBB as THE show(s) to watch for Gen-X. HBB had become an afterthought.
I need to get that book about MTV. It really was a magical time and since what they were doing was unprecedented, they got to make the rules and influence our culture.
Sex in the 90s, The Real World, Rock the Vote, Spring Break, MTV News segments catered specifically to our age group, etc.
We'll never see anything like it again.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
I was watching old wrestling clips and I have to give MTV credit for something that seems to be getting lost to history to an extent....
Their role in wrestling going mainstream. The Lauper videos and showing a wrestling event on MTV that helped set up Wrestlemania is what set the tone for what was to come.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
You're seeing MTV schenangins in mainstream culture and everyone pushing same message of drug culture, black culture, women, and LGBTXYZ.
I will be the resident grandpa of the group and say Appetite is generally disinteresting to me nowadays. It's So Easy makes my skin crawl and Rocket Queen's orgasm makes me roll my eyes. Thought that bit was great when I was a hopper, proper titilaing and such to bootsy but now, a bit on the nose and generally embarrassing. Jungle and Paradise I've heard so many times they're just a blur of sound. I don't processs them. Football. A touch Pavlovian yeah? The whole party ethos doesn't do much for me. Never did. Find a lot of old Guns morally reprehensible. Not a surprise I like pour your heart out Axl better. But top tier musicianship and band cohesion no doubt.
Damn Fleetwood and Nicks solo depressed the shit out of me I had to get some hee hee's with the crown prince of Gary Indiana to perk me tits up
I'm only 1.25 playlists deep of these. Been distracted on other stuffs.
Re: Headbangers Ball, Hair Metal & Grunge
Out of the albums I consider the greatest of all time, AFD is the only one I don't actually listen to. MASSIVE burnout in my youth. Before the reunion, I had literally went over a decade without listening to it. Listened to it a couple times when that happened(along with TSI) but after that...nada.
Hell...when I look up the reunion on youtube...I search the CD title track.
It will always be on my list but like you, it doesn't offer me anything now. Well...maybe nostalgia but so does other music. Its take on drugs is from a more juvenile perspective. I cant relate to it anymore in that regard. The sex/party thing is also from a late teen perspective. So is the paranoia of OTGM.
While the music itself may be timeless, its lyrical content is not.
