This may well be David Bowie Appreciation Week so buckle down and get ready to honour one of music’s greatest sons.

Back when MTV actually played music videos, rather than reruns of Teen Mom and Ridiculousness, they tended to stick to a rather narrow selection of musicians.

They came under fire back in 1983 when even Rick James’ megahit ‘Super Freak’ couldn’t make it onto the air, something David Bowie pressed MTV veejay Mark Goodman on. That exchange below courtesy of BusinessInsider:

David Bowie: Why are there practically no blacks on the network?

Mark Goodman: We seem to be doing music that fits into what we want to play on MTV. The company is thinking in terms of narrowcasting.

David Bowie: There seem to be a lot of black artists making very good videos that I’m surprised aren’t being used on MTV.

Mark Goodman: We have to try and do what we think not only New York and Los Angeles will appreciate, but also Poughkeepsie or the Midwest. Pick some town in the Midwest which would be scared to death by… a string of other black faces, or black music. We have to play music we think an entire country is going to like, and certainly we’re a rock and roll station.

David Bowie: Don’t you think it’s a frightening predicament to be in?

Mark Goodman: Yeah, but no less so here than in radio.

David Bowie: Don’t say, ‘Well, it’s not me, it’s them.’ Is it not possible it should be a conviction of the station and of the radio stations to be fair… to make the media more integrated?

Those poor Midwest towns scared to death by black musicians having their videos played on MTV – shaaaaame, imagine the terror of seeing an actual black person on your TV screen?

Well played Bowie, calling MTV out back in the day was pretty far ahead of the curve.

[source:businessinsider]