Jay: "It’s just a thing, like a radio station or anything else. Unfortunately it’s the biggest one ever. It’s so big, it is omnipotent. It is the Big Brother of music. It forces you to consume what they decide you consume. I personally like MTV when I want to watch it but I’ll always turn it off. I’m never force-fed anything I don’t like. I hated the Poison, White Snake, Warrant era. I find myself watching MTV more and more because all the bands on it are my friends! (...) MTV is in business to stay in business. They are not a college radio station and they don’t play what they feel like playing. It’s a cyclical thing. They play what’s selling in retail stores. And because they play it, radio plays it. And as more radio plays it, retail sells more, and MTV plays it more. See how that works? It’s the chicken before the egg theory, it just goes around and around. So when you have Green Day and the Offspring selling multi-platinum records you see them a lot more on MTV. It’s just an unfortunate by-product of retail sales. Metallica was the first band to get a platinum record with zero exposure, which I always thought was great. I thought that was really cool that they could do that. (...) The only thing that I can really say about MTV is that if you don’t dig it, then turn it off. If you don’t like what they’re saying or what they’re playing, then turn it off. One thing I can’t stand is when someone comes up to me and says “you fucking sell-outs! I saw you on MTV!” What the fuck were you watching it for? If you consider every band on MTV a sell-out then you’re a sell-out for watching it. It’s like anything else: it’s a book, a record, a television show. I’m not gonna force anybody to sit down and watch Rush Limbaugh. I don’t force anybody to sit down and watch MTV. It’s just an entertainment program, nothing more. There’s nothing to read into it. It doesn’t really matter to us. It doesn’t affect us one way or the other."[1]
Brian: "People blame the fact that bands like Green Day and The Offspring are on MTV and say these kids are coming to shows because they're getting this stuff shoved down their throats. But, I don't think the 12-year-olds at BR shows are MTV 12-year-olds. I think you're just watching another generation of the whole scene. And just from talking to kids at shows it seems like, no matter how young they are, they really seem to know BR and their story. It's not just 'hey, it's punk night, let's go to a show!," and that's kind of heartening. I think it's great that we still manage to set ourselves apart somewhat".
The European The Gray Race Tour was sponsored by MTV. The channel used to show a commercial regarding The Gray Race. The A Walk video was the first from The Gray Race and was first played in 120 Minutes. They were in 120 Minutes again on 4.26.1996 (where once more Greg said The Gray Race is their best album). They were also on MTV Europe's 3 From 1. On the commercial for MTV Live they show Greg on a coach laughing.
In early 1998 they were on MTV Sports; they showed small bits of their live performance on the Air & Style Skateboard Festival and footage of BR members trying to snowboard.
On the 2000 MTV Movie Awards, before it cut to commercial, the guitar riff from the start of New America was played. At the second MTV Sports and Music Festival, in-line skater Marco Hintze skated to Incomplete, and one of the BMXers rode to American Jesus. MTV had a website about the state of rock where they had the opinions of 40 rock musicians. One was Jay.
| 03/11 | moved Brian quote to this article - By Stinger66 |
| 01/26 | added headlines - By Stinger66 |
| 07/23 | reference added - By wrong planet |