What was the first MTV Unplugged performance?
There was a time, long before the network’s descent into reality dross, when MTV actually had an innovative impact on music. Whether it was late-night binges exposing yourself to the latest alternative happenings on 120 Minutes, Beavis and Butt-Head’s juvenile commentary on the videos of the moment, or every metalhead’s first port of call on Riki Rachtman’s Headbangers Ball, the iconic astronaut’s first lunar fix of the MTV flag upon the cable channel’s launch in 1981 set the music industry’s course in its own revolutionary making.
There was no ‘unplugged’ in the musical lexicon before MTV’s seminal acoustic show. Developed by producers Jim Burns and Bob Small and originally conceived as a low-key programme for minor stars, Bon Jovi’s stripped-down performance of ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’ and ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ at the 1989 MTV Video Music Awards inspired the team to consider the project’s prime potential.
“The show wasn’t meant to be a thing that went on to win Grammys and sell albums,” longtime showrunner Alex Coletti told The Ringer in 2017. “That all happened. But it was meant to be a Sunday morning, cup of coffee, just something different than the Milli Vanilli world that we were living in.”
He added: “You remember, 1989, people didn’t have amazing-sounding speakers built into their TVs. But something acoustic actually cut through, and it sounded good. And again, with that Milli Vanilli kind of backdrop, getting people who can actually sing and play—there’s no hiding it, you’re doing it in front of me—was very special.”
As MTV’s Unplugged grew across the 1990s, so did its reputation for offering artists a chance to display their pedigree to an intimate audience, a unique proposition that hadn’t been seen in the MTV age. Eric Clapton and Tony Bennett both won ‘Album of the Year’ Grammys for their respective unplugged sessions, and artists as diverse as Lauryn Hill, Mariah Carey, Alice in Chains, and Jay-Z all featuring Unplugged live albums celebrated as much as their studio LPs.
Ask a Nirvana fan their favourite album and chances are they’ll say MTV Unplugged in New York, the show’s defining performance and Kurt Cobain’s haunting eulogy. Serving as many young music fan’s gateway to Lead Belly, The Vaselines, and Meat Puppets, the lauded set became inextricably linked to Nirvana’s tumultuous story and in the eyes of many, grunge’s final document.
Who was the first band on MTV Unplugged?
The very first act booked for Unplugged was an unlikely gem from the UK’s new wave. Taped on Halloween in 1989 at New York’s National Video Center, Glen Tilbrook and Chris Difford played a brief Squeeze set performing their 1980 hit ‘Pulling Mussels (from the Shell)’ followed by Frank‘s ‘She Doesn’t Have To Shave’. Presented by Jules Shear and scheduling three artists in one go, the evening also hosted Syd Straw and The Cars’ Elliot Easton.
A jewel in MTV’s crown and winning the prestigious Peabody Award in 1994, Unplugged built a bridge between generations, introducing artists of yesteryear to a new audience and presenting pop’s biggest names away from the glossy artifice. Never quite going away, with reboots and one-offs sporadically airing, Unplugged‘s simple and pure conceit stands as MTV’s most enduring legacy.
