VH1 - Classic Songs + Great Music Documentaries! (VH-1)

Member Name: Dave Robinson

Product:	VH-1
Date:	07/12/00 (1049 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great classic hits, brings back memories, lots of shows, great documentaries

Disadvantages: Not many of the latest chart hits, quite a lot of adverts

VH1 is a great music channel. It shows a lot of older songs from the 60s, 70s, and more prominantly, the 80s and 90s. It also shows some recent chart songs, but tends to have a few particular favourites, which at the moment seem to be "Overload" by the Sugababes and "Black Coffee" by All Saints, which are great tracks so I don't mind them being on a lot. There are all sorts of different programmes on it ranging from straight song/video shows in which they just play a mixture of songs back-to-back ("Non-Stop Video Hits" and "Solid Gold Hits") to excellent documentaries.

These documentaries cover major stars such as Shania Twain (this was on recently and was excellent, a fascinating insight into her life), Madonna (brilliant - was on recently), Celine Dion, etc. These documentaries are called "Behind The Music". They are usually an hour long and feature interviews with the stars, their families and friends, clips of their hits, unseen backstage footage, concert footage, pictures of them in newspapers and magazines etc. They are narrated and the commentary is excellent. These shows are really worth watching, even if you are not a huge fan of the star.

Another show currently on every day on VH1 is the "Millennium Classic Years". This is basically a nostalgic look back on a particular year from the 70s, 80s or 90s. It is an hour long and is presented well, with the presenter commenting on the hits from the particular year, and major news events which happened. In between the commentary, you get to watch a music video, and information on it scrolls along the bottom of the screen whilst it is on.

Another great programme on VH1 is "Greatest Hits". This is half an hour long and features a particlular band/artist, and shows all of their greatest hits! Quite self-explanatory, really.

"So 80s" is another good programme. It is on every day fro
m 5-6PM, and featires loads of hits from the 1980s. It is great to see these, and there is also commentary at the bottom of the screen which is very good for finding out about the songs and the artists.

Overall, if you want the latest chart hits, watch The Box or MTV, but if you want mainly older, classic songs, and the occasional quality recent chart hit, then VH1 is a great channel.

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