[Bobblehead]

From what I see, MTV and Much don't really play that many videos anymore.

Although I wonder if when MTV started there wasn't a huge shift in the music industry. Suddenly the marketing of artists became vital. Bands and artists needed a "look", and that became as important as the music. There were some UGLY artists in the 60s and 70s, but since the only way you ever really saw them was in concert the only thing that really mattered was the music. Sure, the ability to get commercial radio airplay was critical, but you still can't see people on the radio. Then MTV became another outlet and the look became as important as the music.

I don't believe all commercial music is crap, but there are a lot of artists who didn't have a "look", and I'm sure a lot of those artists never got a fair shot from record companies.

Now artists have a chance at distribution outside of the traditional channels no matter what they look like (or sound like).