Many musical artists made their careers a big hit by employing music videos. As a very important part of the music business, music videos not only showcase an artist’s singing talent but also how they perform. The history of music videos shows how the employment of the videos transformed the music industry. Premiering in 1974, the Australian Television show ‘Countdown’ played a very important role in the development of the promo video industry. Promo vid clips were used as a system of promoting acts that were to appear on the show. As the admiration for the video clips grew, the music business started to realize the selling potential of these music clips. One of the most outstanding video clips features was the AC / DC hit, “It’s A Long Way to the Top.” in the 1980s, ‘Countdown’ aired in 22 states.

In 1980, the New Zealand group Split Enz became one of the first bands to form a whole set of music promo clips and market them on video cassette for each song on their album, ‘True Colors.’ Predating MTV by just about 3 years, ‘Video Concert Hall,’ was the 1st across the nation video music program on American TV.

Premiering in June 1981, one of the first US programs to play music videos was the United States Wire Network program ‘Night Flight.’ Night Flight predated MTV’s launch by just one or two months. In 1981, the U.S. Video channel MTV was launched and it commenced the age of twenty four hour music TV. They launched the channel with the video, “Video Rubbed out the Radio Star.” across the 1980s, MTV expanded to become a vital tool employed in music marketing. Vocalists like Madonna not only used music videos to plug their albums, but to make their pictures. In 1983, the about 14-minute-long video for Michael Jackson’s song “Thriller,” was released. It became the planet’s most successful and influential video in promo vid history.

In 1985, MTV launched the channel VH1 which featured softer music for an older audience than the common young MTV audience. In 1987, MTV Europe was launched and in 1991, MTV Far East was introduced. In 1988, the MTV show, Yo! MTV Raps was launched. The show helped bring hiphop music to a country wide audience. 2 of the videos that are most noted for being a couple of the 3 most dear music videos ever are Michael and Janet Jackson’s “Scream,” which cost $7 million to supply, and Madonna’s “Bedtime Story,” which cost $5 million.

“Scream” is still the most expensively video ever made.