THE BUGGLES – “Video Killed The Radio Star”
Cheap Eighties Nostalgia right? You listen this to remind yourself of high school.
But it is deeper then that, it is about the relentless push forward modernism. He listens to the wireless and then those songs are rewritten “by machine on new technology.” This music was listened to by the young, but the children grow old and by the second verse he is talking to the children of those children. The wireless is played back in an abandoned studio. This new technology got the kids excited, but led to the destruction of everything they held sacred (the authenticity of the artist.)
This is the start of the “abandoned studio”.
This is the start of A Life in Plastic.
Although like most people blessed with prescience, the details make it sound a bit out of date. The chorus has the nostalgic sadness of 1950s popular mechanics. When the future was sexy and there was something dangerous about it. We cannot rewind to an age of guitars. Welcome to the wondrous world of the synthesizer.