In My Footsteps: A Gen-X Nostalgia Podcast

Episode 187: The Office Turns 20, 1980s Music Video TV Shows, Odd Musical Collaborations, Mr. Rogers(3-19-2025)

• Christopher Setterlund • Season 1 • Episode 187

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The 20th anniversary of the debut of The Office. Some of the man music video shows of the 1980s. A few of the strangest musical collaborations ever.

Episode 187 of the podcast opens up the buffet of nostalgia and pop culture in time for the first of spring.

Very few shows have had the kind of impact that The Office has. Countless memorable episodes, characters, and quotes are just the beginning. Michael, Jim, Pam, Dwight, Angela, Andy, and all of the rest will be there as we do a deep dive in celebration of The Office's 20th anniversary. Office Theme in the segment by MasterofTrainz on SoundCloud.

The 1980s saw the dawning of MTV. Videos became an important part of music as a whole. Luckily if you grew up then there were plenty of choices of where to watch music videos. We go way back in the day to look at some of the music video television shows of the 80s.

Some musical collaborations go together like peanut butter and jelly. On this week's Top 5, we will look at ones that went together more like peanut butter and sardines. These are some of the oddest musical collaborations ever.

There is a brand new This Week In History and Time Capsule centered around the birthday of children's television legend Fred Rogers, aka Mr. Rogers.

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Speaker 00:

Hello, world, and welcome to the In My Footsteps podcast. I am Christopher Setterlund, coming to you from the vacation destination known as Cape Cod, Massachusetts, and this is episode 187. Spring is arriving. It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood. And I've got a buffet of nostalgia to feed you. We're going to kick it off with a look back 20 years. I can't believe it's been that long. And the debut of the TV show, The Office, one of my favorites of all time. We're going to go way, way back in the day and look at some of the music video shows of the 1980s. There were a lot of them. There'll be a brand new Top 5. These are the Top 5... So what are we going to talk about this week, besides spring being here? Maybe we'll talk about my adventures of my car failing inspection and needing two new front tires. But I'll be taking care of that when I finish the podcast. Or we could talk about my very own found footage adventure. That is a wild story. So seven years ago this month, there was a major Nor'easter in the Northeast. And it decimated Nauset Beach in Orleans. It ruined it. It changed it forever. I went out there in the middle of the storm because of course I did. 90 plus mile an hour winds, super dangerous storm surge. So of course it's a perfect time for me to go out in my car and shoot some video. I decided to go live on Facebook and basically document the destruction of Nauset Beach as it happened. I figured this was my attempt at being one of the Weather Channel people that shows up where the hurricanes are. So I'm live. I'm filming. It's awful seeing the beach getting destroyed before your eyes. But the problem was I had an iPhone 6. And because it was cold, windy, the battery died on my phone. I had assumed the found footage was lost. Because I never had a chance to officially save it. And I could not find that footage for years. And I looked all over Facebook. So this week, I was looking for something else. Another... post in my archives. And I happened upon a tab that said live video and I clicked it just for the hell of it. And there was the found footage. There was my live video from Nauset Beach. What I did was I edited it. I fixed the sound as best I could. I put some captions with it. It's now up on my YouTube channel and it says found footage because I figured that might get some people to click out of curiosity. No, there's no monsters in it. It's just the ocean destroying Nauset Beach. But you should go check it out. It's pretty neat. So there was my story of the week. Let's get ready to start this podcast off. I can't get into it without thanking my Patreon subscribers. Lori, Mary Lou, Ashley, Kevin, Leo, Marguerite, Neglectoid, Crystal, Matt. Thank you all so much for being my biggest backers, my biggest supporters. If you enjoy my content and you want to become a Patreon subscriber, $5 a month gets you access to bonus podcasts. It gets you now access to the remastered live streams that I used to do when I first did the podcast without a map, they were called. In fact, the second remastered one went live a couple of days ago when this podcast goes up. So go check that out, Patreon subscribers. So we did a little story time. We did a little thanking of my Patreon subscribers. Let's jump right into the podcast with a segment I've been waiting years to do. I have said many times that in my opinion, nothing is nostalgic until it passes 20 years old. Well, this week, one of my favorite TV shows of all time passes that threshold, and we're going to do a deep dive into it coming up now as we look at the 20th anniversary of The Office. Oh man, I've been so excited in anticipation for this segment of the podcast. We're going back months when I realized The Office would be hitting its 20-year anniversary. It was then that I started mapping out the episodes of the podcast leading up to it, just so I could remind myself to talk about this. Because my memory for nostalgia is pretty solid, but my memory as far as putting things in to talk about on the podcast is spotty. I mean, what can be said about the American version of The Office? Nine seasons, 200 episodes, so many famous characters, famous quotes. It's one of the most famed, most beloved American sitcoms ever. The overview is it's a sitcom, but it's a documentary style, looking at a small paper company named Dunder Mifflin in the town of Scranton, Pennsylvania. The boss, Michael Scott, played by Steve Carell. Tons of famous characters. Jim Halpert, Pam Beasley, Dwight Schrute, Ryan Howard, Kelly Kapoor, Angela Martin, Creed Bratton. I mean, I could just keep naming things. I got to keep this on point because I might ramble. If you know The Office and you're a fan of The Office, very little that I'm going to say in this segment is going to be news to you. But I also don't want to assume that all of you listening watched The Office or like The Office or even know about it. Maybe some of you like the British version better. So let's go back to the beginning with The Office and the British version. The series originally was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, and it premiered in 2001. It was a mockumentary style sitcom. focused on the mundane office environment, focusing on the cringeworthy antics of the office manager David Brent, who was played by Ricky Gervais. It had the dry British humor, a lot of painfully awkward moments, and realistic portrayals of workplace dynamics. Incredibly, for the influence that it had, the British version of The Office only lasted for two seasons and 14 episodes, and a Christmas special. It became a cult classic, inspiring a lot of different adaptations, with the most successful one naturally being the American version. The pilot debuted in March 2005, created by Greg Daniels, who some of you might know from King of the Hill, which that's another one. If you haven't watched the King of the Hill show, you should probably go watch that as well. Just binge on King of the Hill in the office. You'll be fine. The Office Ladies Podcast And they talk about how even through the second season, they were assuming they were going to get canceled. However, once it found its footing, The Office became a phenomenon. One big thing that made it stand out was the mockumentary format. It featured a lot of handheld camera work, direct-to-camera interviews, like breaking the fourth wall. There was no laugh track. And for all of the humor and sometimes ridiculous things that would happen in The Office, there was also a lot of humanizing of characters, emotional storylines. I mean, the story of Jim and Pam and their friendship turning into romance, that's probably the biggest through line for the show. I think a big part of what made The Office a success was the ensemble cast. Obviously, Steve Carell as Michael Scott was the star, at least through the first seven seasons. And his well-meaning, although cringeworthy and somewhat foolish personality made Michael Scott one of the most famous characters of the 21st century on TV. There were so many more than just him. You had John Krasinski as Jim Halpert, who he's gone on to become a renowned director, a quiet place. And you've got Rainn Wilson as Dwight Schrute, Jenna Fisher as Pam Beasley, Mindy Kaling as Kelly Kapoor. There were just so many characters that would get their time to shine. So even if you didn't like Michael Scott or if you didn't like the Jim and Pam dynamic, there were things in there for you. I won't go too in-depth with specific storylines and moments because now that The Office has officially crossed over into nostalgia territory, I am highly likely going to be doing more segments about my favorite storylines or the funniest moments, all that stuff. So if we get to the end of this segment and you're like, wait, you didn't talk about when Kevin spilled the chili all over the floor and rolled around in it. Well, I will be talking about it more, but I just gave you that vision. Because for all of the funny and foolish moments like Kevin and his chili, or the bat flying around in the office having to catch it, or the fake fire drill, or Jim and Pam staying at Schrute Farms, the bed and breakfast, the reality is the show was based on character interactions, real-life-type topics. So even if you couldn't relate to Shroot Farms or a bat loose in the office, you could relate to the basic human interactions. Especially in season three, the office started to gain traction. Steve Carell was becoming a movie star. He was in The 40-Year-Old Virgin in 2005. And season three is when the Jim and Pam romance finally comes to be, well, at the very end of it. It became kind of like a primetime soap opera, wanting to see what would happen next between the two of them. I remember back when the show was going on first run, and I was huge into the Jim-Pam storyline. I wanted to find Pam to my gym. And I will say, for a while there, where I worked, I actually had a similar situation where there was a girl that I was so into. We were quote-unquote work spouses. But she had a boyfriend who was very much like Roy, a big meathead. Which meant I had to be careful with what I said and did because I didn't want to be choked out. So in my mind, I'd be like, well, if Jim and Pam got together, maybe me and this girl will get together. I thought life would imitate The Office on TV. It didn't for me, but hey, whatever. I still love the Jim-Pam storyline. That's a big part of what made The Office different from most sitcoms. is allowing the emotional moments, the emotional connections with the characters. If you didn't like the Jim and Pam storyline, you might relate more with Michael and his misadventures in love or him always saying the wrong thing, although he means well. Or maybe you related more to the Dwight and Angela romance. Or maybe it was more of the toxic love like Kelly and Ryan had. I'm not going to judge. You out there who love The Office, who watch The Office or binge it now, you've probably got your own favorite episodes. I said I wouldn't dive too deep into specifics like that because I want to save them for future podcast segments. But if you're asking me my favorite Office episode, it's The Dinner Party from season four. It might be at least one of my favorite television show episodes of all time. For those that don't know the show, the dinner party is when Michael and his former boss, now girlfriend Jan, who have a very toxic relationship, invite three couples from the office over for a dinner party at their condo. And it is a crash course in cringe where it seems like Michael and Jan are trying to make all their guests as uncomfortable as possible as their terrible relationship comes to light. It is so funny. If you've never seen it, I definitely recommend you finding at least clips from it and checking it out. Steve Carell left the show after season seven. I mean, he had gotten to be such a big movie star that it was hard for him to keep up on the TV show. Depending on where you land on the spectrum, you may think that the show should have ended when Steve Carell left it. I will admit season eight is kind of the low point for the show with the final season, season nine being better. But it's also a show that I can just pick an episode out, whichever one, and I'm usually going to find at least a few things to laugh about. I am such a big fan of The Office that long-time listeners of the podcast, you know I did a six-day, 2,100-mile road trip in the late fall of 2019. And one of my big stops on that road trip was Scranton, Pennsylvania, home of The Office. Even though The Office was filmed in Southern California, they were very much connected to the real city of Scranton. So I was able to go to Scranton and go get a drink at Poor Richard's Pub. It's a real place. I went and got pizza at Alfredo's Cafe. Which there's an episode where Michael orders from a different Alfredo's that's Kevin says the pizza's like a hot circle of garbage. But Alfredo's Cafe, you walk in and it literally has a sign that says Home of the Good Pizza from the office. And the pizza was good. I burned the hell out of my mouth on it, but that's fine. I got to go to the Steamtown Mall, now known as the Marketplace at Steamtown. But I went in there because that's where the official welcome to Scranton sign that's at the beginning of every Office episode is located. I've got pictures of me standing next to it. That's a prized possession. They do Scranton tours, office Scranton tours, if you go there. So it's not like you have to be like me and do it on your own. You can go and be led around to all the places that are featured on The Office. After nine seasons, The Office ended its initial run in 2013. Despite that, it keeps being found by new audiences thanks to streaming, Netflix, Peacock. The show is as popular or more popular than it was during its initial run thanks to the streaming, and thanks to the Office Ladies podcast. The influence of The Office cannot be understated, because it paved the way for other mockumentary-style sitcoms like Parks and Recreation, Modern Family... And there's always a clamoring for a reboot or a new season, even 12 years after the show ended. And you never know, the vast majority of the cast are still really close friends. So a potential reunion is always right around the corner. But you can always binge on it. There's so much merch. There's memes. The office is intertwined with 21st century pop culture. The American version always tips its hat to the British version because obviously the American version of The Office would not exist without Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant, and the British version. In season seven, they even had a segment where Michael Scott and David Brent meet. Ricky Gervais was a guest star. I'm so excited that The Office finally passed that threshold 20 years later. so I could put it into my nostalgia-based podcast and not feel like I was kind of jumping the gun. Don't worry, there will be more Office-themed segments, top fives, best ofs, all that, coming up in future episodes. But right now, you should go to Netflix or Peacock or YouTube and just find a few segments of the show and just laugh. I know I do it most days when I need a laugh. It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood, and this week in history, we're going back 97 years to March 20th, 1928, and the birth of the one and only Fred Rogers. Fred McFeely Rogers, better known as just Mr. Rogers, was a beloved television host, musician, and advocate for children's education. His impact continues to resonate decades after his passing. Those of us that grew up with Mr. Rogers' neighborhood remember his gentle voice, his cardigan sweaters, and his unwavering commitment to make the world a better place. Fred Rogers was born in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, and was a shy and introverted child, often spending time alone playing with puppets and music. Interestingly, Fred Rogers initially planned to become a minister. but he found himself drawn to the emerging medium of television. It was way back in the early 1950s he began working at NBC, but soon moved to WQED in Pittsburgh, and that's where he helped develop The Children's Corner, which was a precursor to his own show. Even though he didn't become a full minister and go into that career path, he was ordained as a Presbyterian minister in 1963. with a mission to use television as a tool for positive influence. This led to the launch of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood in 1968, and that show ran for over 30 years. I am thinking that almost all of you listening have watched Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. Think about it. If you were a kid in the late 60s through the early 2000s, Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood was a staple on PBS. The show was different. It was more slow-paced, thoughtful, and reassuring. Each episode of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood followed a familiar structure where he would come home, change into his cardigan and sneakers, talk to us, talk to us kids through the camera, and it was always calm and comforting. But underneath that, Mr. Rogers would tackle complex subjects like divorce, death, self-acceptance, with honesty and sensitivity. It was a safe space for kids that needed to process their emotions. There was also the land of make-believe with puppets like King Friday and Daniel Striped Tiger. Beyond Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, Fred Rogers was an advocate for children's welfare. In 1969, he testified before the U.S. Senate to defend funding for public television. Throughout his long career, Fred Rogers emphasized the importance of emotional intelligence, reminding parents, educators, and policymakers that children's feelings and experiences matter. The vast majority of you out there I'm sure are my age or older, 40s, 50s, but even though we're so far removed from childhood, I'm sure you can remember Fred Times when your feelings weren't validated or times that they were and how that made you feel. And Fred Rogers was a big advocate for that. It was and is hugely important for a child to feel heard because if they don't, they grow up with emotional issues that are a lot harder to untie. Fred Rogers passed away February 27th, 2003 at the age of 74. But his legacy lives on through the continuing influence of his work. Fred Rogers' show, his message, it's still as relevant, probably more relevant today in today's climate. Which is ironic because it started in the turbulent late 1960s. Fred Rogers, through his gentle demeanor and unwavering belief in the goodness of people... proved that a simple message of love and compassion could change the world one neighborhood at a time. And that man, Fred Rogers, entered this world 97 years ago this week in history. Oh, we're going to keep the beautiful day in the neighborhood going. We're going back 57 years ago this week to March 20th, 1968. So it would have been Fred Rogers' 40th birthday. I picked this date because it would have been the first birthday he celebrated while Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood was on the air. So there was a method to my madness. What was going on in the world of pop culture back then? Well, let's find out. The number one song was Sitting on the Dock of the Bay by Otis Redding. Otis Redding finished recording this song just three days before his death on December 10th, 1967 in a plane crash. It became the first posthumous number one single ever. And even though it was technically finished and released, the story is that the famed whistling at the end of the song was actually supposed to be a placeholder by Otis Redding to come back and put more lyrics to the song. But obviously he passed away before he could do that, and that has become an iconic part of this song. The song was released as a part of a posthumous greatest hits compilation called The Dock of the Bay, and the single itself sold more than 4 million copies upon its release. The number one movie was No Way to Treat a Lady, and you could get into the theater with a ticket costing $1.31. This is a psychological thriller with a hint of black comedy about a crafty serial killer playing a cat and mouse game with a detective. It stars Rod Steiger, Lee Remick, and George Siegel, and it's 89% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, which gives a pretty good indication that it was a success. I couldn't find anything about the budget for it, but it made $3 million at the box office. The number one TV show was The Andy Griffith Show. This is like the all-famous whistling time capsule we had sitting on the dock of the bay. Now The Andy Griffith Show, theme with that famed whistling. It starred Andy Griffith, Don Knotts, and little Ronnie Howard, and the adventures of widowed Sheriff Andy Taylor and his family and friends in the town of Mayberry. The show was on for eight seasons and 249 episodes from 1960 to 1968. In fact, the final episode of The Andy Griffith Show aired only two weeks later on April 1st, 1968, so this was nearing the end of the show. And if you were around back then, March 20th, 1968, maybe you and your friends wanted to make your own radio shows. Well, you're in luck if you go to the Radio Shack catalog. A company called Realistic has a deluxe, full-featured cartridge tape recorder. Boy, you can tell this was new technology back then. This tape recorder, which looks like something you would have gotten at the dollar store for about $2.99, very, very basic, back then cost $69.95. When adjusted for inflation to 2025, that means that basic tape recorder would cost you $638. Just close your eyes and imagine the most basic bare-bones cassette recorder you could find, and then imagine spending more than $600 on that. Back then in 1968, that was the price you paid to make your own radio programs with your friends. But that'll wrap up another Time Capsule, another This Week in History. We go from talking about you making radio shows with your friends to some of the oddest musical collaborations you'll ever find. So let's talk about those. Some musical collaborations go together like peanut butter and jelly. But on this week's top five, we're going to talk about the ones that go together like peanut butter and sardines. We're going to talk about some of the weirdest musical collaborations you could possibly think of. Now, I kind of make the joke peanut butter and sardines. That doesn't mean all these collaborations are bad. They're just between artists that you wouldn't expect to work together. Either different genres, different ages, different musical stylings, whatever it is. This segment came about from a few weeks ago on the podcast where I talked about the 35th anniversary of one of my favorite movies, House Party. And I mentioned that the bullies in that movie, they're an R&B group called Full Force. And how I found out that Full Force had actually sung backup on a Bob Dylan song. So that's where this came from. I said, that's a pretty weird collaboration, but I bet there's more that are just as weird or maybe weirder. As with many of these top fives, there are some honorable mentions, and they are in no particular order. I would say some of these songs would be worth checking out. There are others that I'd say I don't know. And there are a couple of them that I actually have on my iTunes on my laptop. But enough teases. Let's start with the honorable mentions. We'll see if you agree that these are some odd combinations. Honorable mentions for oddest musical collaborations include Coldplay and Jay-Z, Britpop and a little more hardcore hip-hop. They did a version of Coldplay's song Lost. Another honorable mention is Eddie Murphy and Michael Jackson. They did the song Was Up With You on Eddie Murphy's 1993 album. Eddie Murphy was a bad boy of comedy, so his collaborations with Rick James in the 1980s party all the time, that didn't seem as weird as 1993 Michael Jackson, full of plastic surgery and controversies, and then there's Eddie Murphy. Another honorable mention is Billy Joe Armstrong from Green Day and Nora Jones. So punk or pop punk and soulful jazz piano. They did a song called Foreverly in 2013. Another honorable mention is Paul McCartney and the surviving members of Nirvana. They did a song called Cut Me Some Slack in 2012. The song is actually really good, but there's no denying what a weird combination that is. And the final honorable mention for weird musical collaborations is Snoop Dogg and Willie Nelson. Yes, they have weed in common, so it's kind of ironic that their song is called My Medicine from 2008, but hardcore gangsta rap, at least that's what Snoop was, and country music, it's a weird combination. So those are the honorable mentions. Have you heard of any of those songs? Well, let's really get weird now. We'll start the actual top five with the one that got this idea started in the first place, and that's number one, Bob Dylan and Full Force. I couldn't not include this song in here. As I mentioned in episode 185, this is off of Bob Dylan's album Down in the Groove. It came out in 1988, and the song that Full Force sings backup on is called Death Is Not the End. The reviews at the time were overwhelmingly negative for this album, although one of the reviews I read said said that the collaboration with Full Force was highly anticipated, but it actually ended up being an outtake from an older album. So they were upset that it wasn't a new song that Bob Dylan wrote with Full Force. It was more of a B-side that he had them sing back up on. But like I said in the episode a few weeks ago, Bob Dylan, one of the most influential musicians ever, and Full Force, the hip-hop group that were the bullies in House Party, getting together and making music, it just blew my mind. Number two is Bone Thugs-N-Harmony and Phil Collins. The hip-hop group known for The Crossroads, which was a big song in my high school days. and Phil Collins, who was more adult contemporary pop, especially in the 1980s. The song they collaborated on was called Home. This was off of Bone Thugs-N-Harmony's 2003 album Thug World Order. The song features samples of Phil Collins' song Take Me Home. He gave them permission to use the song as samples, but the collaboration came when they started talking about making a video for the song. And they actually went to Switzerland and made the video with Phil Collins. The song was not a success. It did not chart, at least not in the US. It charted over in the UK and was popular enough that Bone Thugs-N-Harmony inducted Phil Collins as an honorary member of their group, calling him by the nickname Chrome Bone. Number three. is Weird Al Yankovic and Kate Winslet. Yes, the king of parody songs, parody music for the last 40 plus years, and the actress from Titanic. The song they collaborated on is called I Need a Nap from 2005. The album is called Dog Train, and it's more of an audiobook from children's writer Sandra Boynton. This is a combination so out there that if you research it, you'll find a lot of people that thought it was an April Fool's joke. Obviously, just because you're an actor does not mean you can't be a singer as well. Some that do it don't do it well. I mean, we look at Eddie Murphy or Don Johnson. But this combination feels like they were just trying to find the most polar opposite personalities. I could think of a million other combinations for Weird Al Yankovic to sing with before I'd come up with Kate Winslet. Oh, and by the way, you can find the song online. All these ones I'm talking about, you can literally punch in and listen to. But the hits just keep on coming with weirdness. As we move on to number four, Ozzy Osbourne and Jessica Simpson. The dark king of heavy metal music. And what I could only say is a B-level teen singer. No offense, but when you think of the late 90s, early 2000s of those female teen singers, you think of Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera, and then next level down is Jessica Simpson and Mandy Moore. But it gets even better. They do a cover of Winter Wonderland. They sing a Christmas song together. It's from 2003. It's from the television show The Osborne Family Christmas Special. The video is all over YouTube. It's incredible to think that this is real. Although, in 2003, Jessica Simpson was still at the height of the fame she had. I don't know if Ozzy was trying to cross over to find more of the young pop demographic to listen to his music, but it was definitely weird. But it doesn't top the original weird collaboration and the original weird Christmas collaboration as we get to number five on the oddest musical collaborations. And that is David Bowie and Bing Crosby. These two collaborated on Peace on Earth, The Little Drummer Boy, Christmas Songs on a 1977 Christmas special, Bing Crosby's Merry Old Christmas. This was Bing Crosby's last recordings before his death. The famed crooner and then Ziggy Stardust himself, David Bowie. Incredibly, the story of this is that Bowie showed up. He was promoting his new album, Heroes, that was released in October 1977. And Bowie showed up to the studio with bright red hair, full makeup and an earring. So just imagine someone like Bing Crosby, the traditional values type guy. And here's David Bowie showing up like that. They said people told them to take the makeup off and the earring out and then they could record the song. But there you have it. Some of the weirdest musical collaborations I could find. Which of these was the weirdest to you? I'm still going to go with Weird Al and Kate Winslet. But any of these, including the honorable mentions, they're up there because I put them on this list. Some of these collaborations had music videos. And if you enjoyed music videos in the 1980s, boy, you had plenty of shows to choose from that would quench your thirst for music videos. So we're going to go way back in the day now and look at music video shows of the 1980s. The 1980s was definitely an amazing decade to grow up in. You've heard me say it so many times on this podcast. Another example of why I love the 80s so much was the abundance of music, music videos, music television. I often make the joke now that MTV should have to change its name because it hasn't featured music in over 20 years. Yeah, they may have a video or two at 2am, but the days of MTV being music television died while I was in college. That being said, there's no denying the impact MTV had on the world. When it debuted in August of 1981, it changed everything. Music videos, which had been very, very rare in the years leading up to the creation of MTV, became everything. The videos themselves were every bit as important as the music to showcase the artists or to get a song popular. If you had a unique music video, your song might not be that great, but people will watch because the video is unique. To this day, they still make music videos. They're basically regulated to YouTube, where the artists themselves will post it on their official channel. And that's a good thing. That means you don't need others to get your music out there. You could be just some random Joe off the street and you could make a video for your song and possibly get it seen by thousands of people. The 1980s was different though. You had MTV, which was the king of featuring music videos, but they weren't the only one. This segment came about when I started thinking of All of the different TV shows in the 1980s that featured music videos. So I decided to go back and see how many I could find. And obviously, this segment means we're going to go through a lot of them. I've got 10. Now, I might gloss through some of these. They might not be the deep dive you want. Because there's a few that I think deserve their own segment. So just so you know, in the future, I will probably be doing a standalone segment for a few of these different video shows. The first one that popped into my head, and it just shows my age where I was at in the 1980s, was a show called Nick Rocks.

Unknown:

Nick Rocks. Nick Rocks. Nick Rocks.

Speaker 00:

It was a video show on Nickelodeon. The show was 30 minutes long. It was hosted by a guy, quote-unquote, Joe from Chicago. It was on from 1984 to 1989. At first, it was on three days a week, and then it became part of the Daily Rotation. A big claim to fame for Nick Rocks was in 1987, the group The Monkees became involved in a dispute with MTV. So MTV pulled all their music videos. This was when they were starting to make a comeback. So the Monkees music videos became exclusive to Nick Rocks. I don't know if that helped their sales, seeing as how most of the Nickelodeon people that were watching were my age, so I was about 9 or 10 years old at the time. If you were to stop and think of music video shows from the 1980s. The first one you might think of was Friday Night Videos. This show was on NBC from 1983 all the way up through 2002. It originally started as a 90-minute block of videos that would come on at 12.30 a.m. Despite its time slot not being great for younger people to watch music videos, Friday night videos was necessary because in the early days of MTV, through the mid-80s, it wasn't available everywhere because not every home had cable television. I know, young people listening, we had no cable TV. I think we got it in 1985, which meant before then we had whatever the dial would give you, 10 channels. The most popular feature of Friday night videos was the video vote. This was where two videos would be played back to back and you could call in and get charged and vote for your favorite and the winner would go on to face a new challenger next week. A show that might be a cheat, and you'll have to let me know if it is, it's Solid Gold. Do you remember Solid Gold? Now, this, they didn't, play music videos, it was more like they played music and they had the solid gold dancers that would dance to the songs. It's a musical variety show, I guess would be what it was technically classified as. It was on for eight seasons from 1980 to 1988. The show was hosted by Dionne Warwick, Marilyn McCoo, Andy Gibb, What's interesting is I always liked watching the show. Maybe because I just liked hearing the music or watching the solid gold dancers. But the reviews of the show weren't usually good. A lot of people saying the dance routines didn't match up with the songs. Or that the dance routines added up to little more than just aerobic training videos. Although it did have the memorable theme performed by Dionne Warwick. One music video show that I got into later, probably in middle school, was 120 Minutes on MTV. This show was dedicated to the alternative music genre, and I wasn't into it until Nirvana came out. Or at least until I heard Smells Like Teen Spirit in the summer of 1991. The show ended up being on for 17 seasons with Matt Pinfield being the host that I remember. Anyone who was anyone in the alternative genre in the late 80s through the mid 90s was on that show. Their videos were on that show. I think another reason why I wasn't into 120 Minutes when it first came out was that it was on at 1 a.m. I was not staying up as a 10-11 year old till 1am unless it was to watch King Kong vs. Godzilla, which that is a true story. Kind of the other side of the same coin of 120 minutes was the show Headbangers Ball. The show began in April 1987. It would feature well-known metal artists, up-and-coming artists. The original version of the show lasted for eight seasons. Those of you that remember the show will probably remember Ricky Rackman being the one who hosted it. That's who I remember. It was canceled in the mid-90s as the mainstream rise of grunge, alternative, pop-punk kind of made Headbanger's Ball less relevant. Do you remember Dial MTV? That was the precursor to Total Request Live. It was the call-in show.

Speaker 03:

Call now. Call now. It's Dial MTV. Give us a buzz and we may take off. Thank you so much for calling. And tonight at 6 p.m. Eastern, we'll play back the top 10. I hope someone else calls. I hope someone else calls.

Speaker 00:

It debuted in February 1986 and what they played was determined by you who called in. They had certain rules with the show. The videos were only eligible to be on there for 30 days after their release. This is because of something called the Crew Rule, where Motley Crue's song Home Sweet Home was voted number one on Dial MTV for 90 days. I guess they wanted to make sure that other artists had a chance for their songs to be the most popular on Dial MTV. Interestingly, even though Dial MTV was canceled in 1991, the 800 number remained in use all the way through TRL. A lesser known 80s music video show was Night Tracks.

Speaker 01:

Welcome to Night Tracks, America's favorite music video show. Wall-to-wall excitement coming your way, including exclusive interview footage with...

Speaker 00:

This was kind of like an answer to Friday Night Videos, except it was on TBS. It was on from 1983 to 1992, and it was late nights on Friday and Saturday. There would be three-hour blocks of videos, so no different than any of these other ones. Nick Rock's Friday Night Videos. All the same sort of template. But as the popularity of music video programs started to wane, that's when Night Tracks was canceled in the early 90s. During the 80s, it seemed like everybody, every network got in on the music video show craze because the USA Network had their own show, Radio 1990.

Speaker 01:

This 30-minute

Speaker 00:

music video show did not exist in 1990. It was on from 1983 to 1986. This was on during prime time on the USA Network. I guess they didn't have much else to put on there. It was a companion show to another show called Night Flight, which featured music videos, interviews, stand-up comedy. I say every network had its own music video show. Every genre seemed to have its own music video show. We talked about alternative, metal. What about Yo MTV Raps?

Unknown:

Yo.

Speaker 00:

Ed Lover and Dr. Dre. No, not the one from NWA. That was always confusing to me as a kid in the late 80s, early 90s. There was a fat Dr. Dre that actually spelled out doctor. And then there was the NWA Dr. Dre that was DR period. I don't know how they figured that one out. Yo! MTV Raps was on from 1988 to 1995. It was a two-hour block of rap and hip-hop videos originally hosted by Fab Five Freddy. I'll definitely be doing a deeper dive into Yo! MTV Raps because I still, to this day, I think in my mom's basement, have a small collection of the Yo! MTV Raps trading cards. That's how I knew a lot of the hip-hop artists of the early 90s was they had trading cards of theirs. How else would I know Father MC and Big Daddy Kane if I didn't have trading cards? The last music video show of the 80s I wanted to talk about, we go to cable TV, subscription TV, and HBO, and their show Video Jukebox.

Unknown:

Video Jukebox

Speaker 00:

This show started in December 1981, so MTV was on the air a few months earlier. But interestingly, HBO is the originator of playing music videos, as they would usually have one or two videos as bumpers between movies in the late 70s. So yes, MTV was the original music television, but HBO was giving a platform to music videos in the years before MTV existed. This was a half-hour show, Video Jukebox, and when it first debuted, this show was in more households than MTV. So for the first year of Video Jukebox, a musical artist would get more exposure being on this show than on MTV, which is wild. The show had no host until its final season in 1985 when New York City DJ Dennis Elsus came in and did voiceover work until the show was canceled in 1986. So there you go. Ten music video shows of the 1980s. Are you amazed there were that many? Are there some that I missed? I'm thinking I missed some. The reason I say that is we'll pull back the curtain on my research efforts. I have in my notes 10 music video shows listed. Little did I know, I had Headbangers Ball listed twice. So as I'm going through my notes and recording this, I look and I'm like, oh crap, I only have 9 and I said 10. So I did quick research and I found USA Network's Radio 1990. So research on the fly to make sure I'm not a liar to you about my count on this segment. And let me know if there's any of these that you want me to do a deep dive into. I'm sure Nick Rocks, Solid Gold, Yo MTV Raps, I'm going to do deeper dives into in the future. But until next week, that's going to wrap up episode 187 of the In My Footsteps podcast. Thank you all so much for making it to the end. Thank you for making it a part of your week. The weather's getting better, so I'm hoping some of you are out walking in the sun listening to this. Warm sun on your face, warm nostalgia in your heart. Man, it sounds like a Hallmark card. Next week, we're going to keep the fun going with episode 188. I'm going to dive into the return of 3D movies in the early 1980s. Some that were good, some that were not good, like Jaws 3D. And we're going to look at the biggest television fails of the 1970s. I was not alive through most of the 70s, but even if I was, I probably wouldn't have watched any of these shows. If you enjoy my work, if you want to support me, you can become a subscriber on Patreon for $5 a month. It's literally like giving up one Starbucks coffee a month or Dunkin' Donuts or wherever the hell you get coffee from. You could always buy me a coffee, not Starbucks and sending it to me, but actually on the website. That's as little as a dollar, which won't buy me a coffee, but hey, it shows support and I appreciate all of that. Of course, there's lots of other ways that you can support me besides money. You can share my work. That's the big thing. My YouTube channel, I've got hundreds and hundreds of YouTube videos that I've been putting up for 15 years. I've got hundreds of blogs and obviously almost 200 episodes of the podcast. Sharing this costs nothing. It takes two seconds of your time. And you never know when what you share is going to create new lifelong fans of my work. You can find me all over social media. Check out my Etsy shop, my photography shop, CJ Sederland Photos. I add... A couple new photos every weekend, trying to increase my inventory and also entice people to come back. If you go to the store and you don't see a photo you like, you can come back the next weekend and you never know. New England, Cape Cod, scenery. I have got thousands of photos, so I can keep putting new photos up until long after this podcast is done. Happy birthday when this podcast goes live on this day to my friend Sue. We go all the way back to Monsieur Welsh's French class over 30 years ago. Happy early birthday out in Vegas to my cousin Patrick. And next week on the podcast, I may have some fun news because this weekend is my hike out to Race Point with my friend producer Frank Durant. The weather looks okay. It looks great. mid to upper 40s, but at least sunny. I'm likely to have a lot of content coming from this weekend. Interviews. I'll be on set of the movie that I had my first acting role for, Frank's low-budget indie horror film. I'm going to try to get some interviews. I'm going to try to get some behind-the-scenes footage, but I'm also going to try to stay out of the way of the director. I don't want to have it where I'm instantly seen as a problem on set. It has been a fun process. It's been a little bit nerve-wracking. As I've said, I'm not an actor, at least as far as doing things that other people have scripted. I've done my own skits over the years. I do research and notes for this podcast, but learning other people's lines and directions on how to do scenes, it's kind of new to me, but it's fun to learn a new skill. I'm going to look for other small parts in other productions because you never know. Maybe this is the only film role I ever have, but if I think that way, it's definitely going to be. So be on the lookout this weekend on my social media. I'm sure there'll be clips of me and Frank wandering out in the beach, miles from civilization, going out to the lighthouse. Thank you all again for tuning in. Remember, in this life, Don't walk in anyone else's footsteps. Create your own path and enjoy every moment you can on this journey we call life because you never know what tomorrow brings. This has been the In My Footsteps podcast. I am Christopher Setterlund. You already knew that. And I'll talk to you all again soon.

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Christopher Setterlund

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