[1] Former Monkee Mike Nesmith conceived the first music-video program as a promotional device for Warner Communications' record division.
Production began in the spring of 1979 at SamFilm, a sound-stage built and operated in Sand City, California by Sam Harrison, a Monterey Peninsula College instructor with a motion picture background.
With an infinity cyclorama as the background, set flats were made from the Styrofoam packing used to ship laserdisc players and 3/4" video decks.
Besides Harrison, the production team was made up of Bruce "Buz" Clarke, Keith Cornell, Marybeth Harris, and Leslie Chacon.
The program was broadcast weekly on the youth-oriented cable television channel Nickelodeon in late 1980 and early 1981.