MTV in ’93: Watch PJ Harvey tear through a Willie Dixon cover on ‘120 Minutes’
It’s probably not an exaggeration to say that thousands of Americans inserted a blank VHS tape into their VCRs on Boxing Day night, 1993, and scheduled it to record the latest episode of MTV’s late-night alternative rock programme, 120 Minutes, which aired from midnight to 2am every Sunday (or Monday morning, technically).
There would have been extra incentive for preserving this episode, as it was the last one of 1993, and would thus serve as a year-in-review, compiling various noteworthy live performances from artists who’d been guests on the show over the past 12 months.
Forget the 1980s; this was MTV at its unimpeachable, peak coolness. As 120 Minutes host Lewis Largent starts to list off the people who’d recently stopped by and played in the studio, it sounds impressive by 1993 standards, but downright legendary by nostalgic 21st-century standards. We’re talking about a newly solo Björk, a newly emerging Smashing Pumpkins, plus Suede, Bad Religion, Juliana Hatfield, They Might Be Giants, Paul Westerberg, Victoria Williams with Lou Reed, Afghan Whigs, Violent Femmes, and a vibrant young visitor from the UK named Polly Jean Harvey.
The vast majority of people who recorded this broadcast for later viewing probably wound up taping over it a week later (if you’ve never used a VCR, ask your parents). But fortunately, at least a handful of folks slapped a label on the tape, wrote ‘120 Minutes best of 1993’ on it with a magic marker, and put it on a shelf somewhere.
Out of those people, at least one or two eventually retrieved that dusty tape and uploaded its contents to YouTube 20 years later. This allows us to enjoy the marvellous wonder that was prime ‘90s MTV, complete with adverts for LA Gear and Panasonic’s long-forgotten 3DO gaming system. It also provides a rare chance to see PJ Harvey playing a deep cut from her early days, a rollicking cover of Willie Dixon’s blues classic ‘Wang Dang Doodle’.
“It takes a long time for people to come to grips with what we’re doing,” Harvey told the Pasadena Star-News around the same time in ‘93, when she was touring with the PJ Harvey trio, “It’s best seen on a small scale to start off with, for people to get their heads around the sound that we’re making…I’ve never really enjoyed playing large places to people you can hardly see.”
That might explain why the 23-year-old Harvey looks so comfortable in her 120 Minutes appearance, playing in a small studio to a mostly empty room. She doesn’t even have her bandmates to worry about. It’s just Harvey’s voice, a rather noisy guitar, and a song first made famous when Howlin’ Wolf recorded his version in 1960.
A few years ago, film director Ryan Coogler was listening to Wolf’s version of ‘Wang Dang Doodle’ when he suddenly got the germ of the idea for his Oscar-nominated film Sinners.
Perhaps somebody else can get a similar burst of inspiration by watching PJ Harvey, still at the beginning of her career, performing the same song with her own completely unique energy. All hail the VCR, and all hail the curated music television format.
