It all began on 1^st August, 1981, at the stroke of 12:01 a.m., when MTV aired its very first video — Video Killed the Radio Star by The Buggles. A line from the song — “we can’t rewind, we’ve gone too far”, couldn’t have been more prophetic. Because in that moment, the world of music changed forever.

MTV didn’t just play songs. It built legends. It turned names like Madonna, Michael Jackson, and Prince into larger-than-life icons, not just because of their music, but because of the images that went with it. Music suddenly had a face, a story, a mood. You didn’t just listen anymore, you watched, you felt, you lived it.

And then came the masterpieces. Jackson’s Thriller, with its iconic zombie dance and cinematic grandeur (directed by none other than Martin Scorsese) wasn’t just a video, it was an event. November Rain by Guns N’ Roses played like a tragic opera. R.E.M.’s Losing My Religion felt hauntingly strange and beautiful.

When MTV India launched in October 1996, it felt like the world had finally arrived in our living rooms. We suddenly had our own rock stars - Alisha Chinai, Colonial Cousins, and our own mischief-makers like Cyrus Broacha on Bakra. We’d rush home, flip through channels, and land on MTV, because that’s where the cool lived. It made us feel connected to something bigger, the sound, the style, the rebellion of being young.

But like every great love story, the magic slowly faded. The internet came. Music streaming came. Short videos took over. MTV, the brand that once defined youth culture somehow lost its rhythm. It became less about music and more about everything else. The music video, that perfect marriage of sight and sound, became an artifact from another time. Much like Nokia or Kodak, the iconic brand couldn't manage to keep up with the changing times.

And now, as MTV shuts down many of its music channels across the world, it feels like saying goodbye to a part of ourselves. To the late nights of discovery, the endless replays, the goosebumps when your favourite video came on.

“I want my MTV,” sang Dire Straits once, a line that now feels less like a demand and more like a whisper from another era. For many of us, it’s not just nostalgia. It’s a longing for a time when music felt communal, magical, and young, when it lived on screen, in colour, in our hearts.

So, here’s to MTV. The pulse of our youth, the soundtrack of our growing up, and the memory we’ll never quite stop replaying.

By Meraj Hasan

Meraj Hasan ‘meem’ is a Dubai based business and marketing consultant, poet and a music journalist. He also has a wide range of vinyl in his collection ranging from jazz, blues, classical, rock, pop and old Hindi film albums. Meraj's first book of poems, ‘Khyaalon Ki Tapri’ was an instant bestseller and he has just released his second book of poems, 'Boondon Si Baatein'.