I want my Polyphonic TV

It has to be cathartic to be able to use Steamboat Willy unedited now that its in the public domain

Hey, film student here. We learned about "The Little Lost Child" in an editing class a few months back, and I was completely unaware of how far back the concept of images and music had gone and definitely didn't expect to see it in a YouTube video. Nice work.

"St. Louis Blues" looks like the first modern music video to me.

2:52 oh thats so cute they used to sell sheet music instead of records I’m giggling

Did a “Whoop” when you said there would be seven episodes. Great stuff!

Would an illustrated song be closer to Karaoke than a music video? :face-fuchsia-poop-shape:

4:46 Oh shit.. For a moment I thought I was in a Vsauce video hahaha
Wonderful essay video, as always

Pieces of musical performances are not videoclips, per se. In your case, I would investigate the influence of the visual jukebox machines  like the scopitone and the cinebox. The Scopitone, introduced in France in the late 1950s, was a visual jukebox that played short films featuring popular songs. These machines were primarily found in bars and aimed to attract patrons with vibrant, Technicolor films. Each film typically lasted about three minutes and often included creative storytelling elements, making them visually engaging for an audience that might not be directly focused on the screen.

I wrote an essay on this topic when I was in film school: many of the pre-WWII Vitaphones were being shown across the USA on a sort of jukebox, which even predated the use of jukeboxes for audio-only records. Fascinating stuff.

There was a "DJ Set" to 40,000 music fans in Heaton Park, Manchester in 1919....maybe the first ever mega "rave" (albeit with classical / opera music 😊).

We needed at least a mention of Al Bowllys recordings with Pathe 😭

A series about the music video by Polyphonic?! … amazing

You're telling me the original music video was... a lyrics video

My answer to that beginning was old cartoons.

In his song, "Walking in Memphis," Marc Cohn mentioned someone named W.C. Handy.  "Put on my blue suede shoes/And I/Boarded the plane/Touched down in the land of the Delta Blues/In the middle of the pouring rain/W.C. Handy/Watching over me/Yeah, I've got a first-class ticket/But I'm as blue as a boy can be."  I didn't know who that was, until you mentioned him.  Thanks for explaining that reference! And thanks for the video! It's very informative.

One of the clearest(cinematic like) best done early videos......THE ANIMALS DOING " HOUSE OF THE RISING SUN"......HANDS DOWN

Great idea for a series, thank you.

Hell yeah, love when you do series like this and Axe to Grind. Fantastic documentaries they are

Great video! I cant wait for the next one!