While I was installing and rebooting and updating and rebooting this evening, I popped in a VHS tape makred “MTV.” It turns out that the tape is about half of the top 100 videos of 1995 (100-50ish). It was great to see some old videos and hear some old songs. It made me remember the days of flannel and long hair.
1995 was the year that I saw David Bowie and Nine Inch Nails from the mosh pit. I was in a band. At our first practice, we tried horribly to cover Soul Asylum’s Misery.
What struck me most wasn’t the videos, it was the commercials. The commercials told more about 1995 than anything else on that tape. Sure it was a big year for REM, Hole, Collective Soul and Hootie and the Blowfish. The thing that intrigued me most is that the Sega Saturn was being advertized for “Just $299.” I saw a few ads for Super Nintendo games. That annoying ad for the overpriced retro store down the street (which closed down several years ago) played a few times.
Today we’re so quick to skip the commercials, TiVO that stuff right out of our viewing experience. I think that if you still have a functioning TiVO eight years from now, you won’t skip the commercials when you watch that old show.
They’re a wonderful snapshot of who we are.