The first music video to cost $1million
The history of music videos dates back to the late 1800s, when ‘illustrated songs’ became popular, which involved still images being projected alongside live musical performances. However, it wasn’t until the introduction of ‘talkies’ – movies with synchronised sound – in the late 1920s that short films resembling early music videos emerged.
Classic musicals from the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s aided the development of the music video even further, with audiences given rich visual accompaniments to music within movies. It’s widely believed that Czechoslovakian filmmaker Ladislav Rychman created one of the first promotional videos with ‘Dáme Si Do Bytu’ in 1958, using techniques that closely resemble the abstract narrative structures of modern music videos.
Meanwhile, many French musicians released music with accompanying videos for use on the newly invented Scopitone in the 1950s. However, by the following decade, the type of music videos we’re familiar with today began to emerge, with artists like The Moody Blues and The Beatles releasing promotional clips that were highly stylised. The Fab Four’s mockumentary A Hard Day’s Night aided the development of the modern music video through director Richard Lester’s use of montage and fast cutting. In fact, MTV, which would launch in 1981, called the filmmaker the ‘Father of the Music Video’.
With the advent of MTV, music videos hit the mainstream, with The Buggles’ ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’ becoming the first to receive airplay. Soon, pop music’s biggest stars were releasing music videos, with budgets quickly increasing as these projects became full-blown productions akin to short films. Artists like Madonna and Michael Jackson defined this period with dramatic, visually rich music videos costing staggering amounts of money.
The most expensive music video of all time is Michael and Janet Jackson’s clip for ‘Scream’, directed by Mark Romanek, which cost an estimated $15million in total. In second and joint third place are three Madonna videos, including ‘Express Yourself’, directed by David Fincher. The top ten most expensive videos list also includes artists like Limp Bizkit (‘Rollin”) and Gwen Stefani (‘Make Me Like You’).
However, before these artists started making multi-million dollar videos, one English band set the record by releasing the first music video to cost $1million. Created in 1984, Duran Duran’s ‘The Wild Boys’ was the most expensive music video at the time, trumping the $582,000 cost of David Bowie’s ‘Ashes to Ashes’.
Duran Duran frequently starred in costly, dramatic music videos, becoming pioneers of the medium. Directed by Russell Mulcahy, who directed ‘Video Killed the Radio Star’, the video was shot at the 007 Stage in Pinewood Studios, one of the biggest soundstages in the world.
The video is incredibly dramatic, with the band members strapped to various structures, like Simon Le Bon, who was placed on a windmill blade that dunked him in water as he sang along. Moreover, the video features many extras wearing prosthetics and makeup, fire effects, computer graphics, and extensive set design.
The song was based on William S. Burroughs’ The Wild Boys: A Book of the Dead, which Mulcahy was interested in adapting into a film. After telling Duran Duran his plans, he suggested they create music for his project, resulting in ‘The Wild Boys’. Although Mulcahy used the music video as a chance to emulate some of his ideas for the film, it never came to fruition.
Still, the finished result is one of the most daring and impressive music videos of the 1980s, demonstrating the possibilities for musicians to create expansive, big-budget videos alongside their songs.
