80s Music Videos
The 80s music videos that mattered most include Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and "Smooth Criminal," David Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes," Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer" and "Big Time," Run-D.M.C.'s "Walk This Way" and Herbie Hancock's "Rockit." MTV launched in August 1981 and turned the video itself into part of the song, not just an ad for it.
When the video became the song
Before August 1, 1981, a music video was a promotional afterthought, something a label shot cheaply to send to a handful of TV shows. MTV changed that overnight. Bands were suddenly judged on their look and their concept as much as their sound, and a great video could turn a good song into a career-defining hit, the way "Thriller" and "Take On Me" did.
This page sits alongside our best 80s songs hub, but it ranks a different thing entirely: not which songs were biggest, but which videos actually changed what a music video could be.
How this ranking works
Twenty-seven videos are ranked here for their visual ideas, their technical firsts, or the cultural moment they created, from David Bowie's early morphing effects to "Eat It"'s shot-for-shot parody of "Beat It." Every blurb is about the video, not the song's chart run, which is covered elsewhere on the site.
Every song plays in the free player above, in the order listed below. All picks follow our song selection rules.
- 1
Ashes to Ashes — David Bowie (1980)
At the time the most expensive music video ever made, shot on a Kent beach with a solarized sky and Bowie in a Pierrot clown costume, backed by New Romantic club kids including Steve Strange. Director David Mallet built the effect by filming the negative and hand-processing it in reverse.
- 2
Kids in America — Kim Wilde (1981)
A simple, performance-heavy clip built almost entirely around Kim Wilde's cool stare into the camera, cut with quick, jagged edits that matched the song's new wave urgency. It became a template for how British female pop singers were shot on early MTV.
- 3
Centerfold — The J. Geils Band (1981)
A cheeky high school fantasy shot like a yearbook come to life, with the band as teachers and models as students. It was one of the first videos MTV played into heavy rotation, and it helped push the single to No. 1 in early 1982.
- 4
Freeze-Frame — The J. Geils Band (1981)
The J. Geils Band followed "Centerfold" with a video built around flash-photography effects and freeze-frame edits that literally illustrated the title. Its stop-motion camera flashes became one of the more technically playful clips of MTV's first year on air.
- 5
Goody Two Shoes — Adam Ant (1982)
Adam Ant's pirate-dandy image, swordfights and all, made him one of the first stars whose look was inseparable from his videos. "Goody Two Shoes" is packed with sight gags and costume changes, and it won him one of the earliest MTV Video Music Award nominations.
- 6
I Want Candy — Bow Wow Wow (1982)
Built on a Bo Diddley beat and a boombox aesthetic, the video for "I Want Candy" leaned into the group's teenage energy, with 15-year-old singer Annabella Lwin front and center. Its bright, cassette-culture look captured the DIY side of early MTV before big budgets took over.
- 7
The Metro — Berlin (1982)
A moody, blue-lit performance clip that leaned on Berlin's cold, synth-driven sound and singer Terri Nunn's stare-down-the-lens presence. It is one of the clearest examples of how a simple, atmospheric video could sell a new wave band's image on MTV before their bigger hits arrived.
- 8
Rock the Casbah — The Clash (1982)
Filmed in the Texas desert with a camel, an oil pumpjack and band members in Arab headdress alongside a rabbi, the video plays the song's satire of censorship as slapstick. It helped "Rock the Casbah" become The Clash's only US Top 10 hit.
- 9
Shock the Monkey — Peter Gabriel (1982)
Years before "Sledgehammer" made him an MTV fixture, Peter Gabriel used dark makeup, intercut jungle animal footage and unsettling close-ups to build a video as strange as the song's title suggested. It set the template for the visual experimentation he would push even further later in the decade.
- 10
The Look of Love (Part One) — ABC (1982)
Director Julien Temple shot ABC in gold lamé suits against theatrical, Hollywood-glamour sets, matching producer Trevor Horn's lush production. The video helped sell the band's whole concept: New Pop as old-fashioned showbiz glitz updated for the synthesizer age.
- 11
Bang Your Head (Metal Health) — Quiet Riot (1983)
A straightforward concert-and-crowd video, but its heavy MTV rotation helped push Metal Health to No. 1 on the Billboard 200, the first heavy metal album to top the chart. The clip's arena energy sold a genre MTV had barely touched before.
- 12
China Girl — David Bowie (1983)
Shot on an Australian beach with Bowie and model Geeling Ng, the video was one of MTV's biggest hits of 1983 and drew criticism for its racial imagery even as it helped the song reach the Top 10. Director David Mallet gave it the same glossy, cinematic look as Bowie's "Let's Dance."
- 13
Rockit — Herbie Hancock (1983)
A surreal parade of robotic mannequin legs and disembodied limbs, directed by the British design group Godley & Creme collaborators at Kevin Godley and Lol Creme. It won five MTV Video Music Awards in 1984 and introduced turntable scratching to a mainstream audience who had never seen breakdancing on television before.
- 14
White Lines (Don't Don't Do It) — Grandmaster Flash (1983)
A stark anti-cocaine video shot in gritty, documentary-style black and white, showing the drug's toll rather than glamorizing it. It was one of the first hip-hop videos to get meaningful MTV airplay, at a time when the network rarely played Black artists outside of Michael Jackson.
- 15
You Spin Me Round (Like a Record) — Dead or Alive (1984)
Pete Burns' towering hair, leather and eyeliner made the video as much a spectacle as the song's spinning hook. Its flamboyant, gender-bending presentation was unusual for American television in 1985 and helped make the British import a surprise US Top 20 hit.
- 16
Eat It — "Weird Al" Yankovic (1984)
"Weird Al" Yankovic shot-for-shot recreated Michael Jackson's "Beat It" video, down to the choreography and the warehouse set, swapping in a food fight for the gang fight. It won the first Grammy for Best Concept Music Video and remains the most famous music video parody ever made.
- 17
Cry — Godley & Creme (1985)
Kevin Godley and Lol Creme, the directors behind "Rockit," turned the camera on themselves for a video built on an early morphing technique: dozens of faces dissolving into one another in unbroken sequence. It was a genuine visual-effects breakthrough years before digital morphing became common.
- 18
California Girls — David Lee Roth (1985)
David Lee Roth's first solo video after leaving Van Halen was a glossy, tongue-in-cheek beach-party spectacle, full of bikinis and self-aware rock-star mugging. It leaned all the way into MTV excess and helped establish Roth's solo persona as pure showman.
- 19
Big Time — Peter Gabriel (1986)
Peter Gabriel followed "Sledgehammer" with another stop-motion animation showcase from the same Aardman-adjacent team, this time built around exaggerated scale and claymation food. It won another armful of MTV Video Music Awards and cemented Gabriel as the decade's most video-forward art-rock star.
- 20
Walk This Way — Run-D.M.C. (1986)
The video literally breaks down the wall between Run-D.M.C. and Aerosmith, who perform on either side of a studio partition until Steven Tyler smashes through it. It helped the collaboration reach No. 4 on the Hot 100 and is widely credited with bringing hip-hop into rock radio and MTV's regular rotation.
- 21
I Love Rock 'n Roll — Joan Jett & the Blackhearts (1981)
A raw, low-budget performance clip filmed in a dive bar, with Joan Jett glaring straight into the camera through most of it. Its lack of polish became part of its appeal, matching the song's snarling simplicity on its way to five weeks at No. 1.
- 22
This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody) — Talking Heads (1983)
Filmed for the concert film Stop Making Sense, David Byrne dances with a floor lamp as though it were a partner, a simple idea that became one of the most-imitated images to come out of the film. Jonathan Demme directed the movie, and this sequence is still its most quoted moment.
- 23
Smooth Criminal — Michael Jackson (1988)
Michael Jackson's 1930s gangster fantasy is best remembered for the anti-gravity lean, a stunt made possible by specially rigged shoes and hidden slots in the stage floor. The full-length "Moonwalker" film version runs nearly ten minutes and remains one of his most technically ambitious productions.
- 24
Leave Me Alone — Michael Jackson (1989)
A dense stop-motion fantasy ride through a carnival built from tabloid headlines about Jackson himself, including the Elephant Man's bones and a rocket to the moon. It won a Grammy for Best Music Video, Short Form, one of Jackson's few videos to directly answer his own press coverage.
- 25
Nikita — Elton John (1985)
Directed by Ken Russell, the video imagines Elton John as a Western tourist falling for an East German border guard watched through binoculars across the Berlin Wall. Its Cold War romance, filmed the same year as "Nikita" became a hit, gave the ballad a cinematic scale beyond a simple performance clip.
- 26
Dancing with Myself — Billy Idol (1981)
Shot with Generation X, Billy Idol's pre-solo band, on a platform surrounded by reaching zombie-like fans, the video's grainy, post-apocalyptic look matched Idol's sneering punk image. It became a staple of early MTV and helped introduce the singer to American audiences ahead of his solo breakthrough.
- 27
Close to Me — The Cure (1985)
Robert Smith and the rest of The Cure are crammed into a tiny wardrobe that eventually tips off a cliff into the sea, a claustrophobic visual joke that matched the song's anxious lyrics. It became one of the band's most recognizable videos and a defining image of goth-pop's playful side.
Frequently Asked Questions
What was the first video ever played on MTV?
"Video Killed the Radio Star" by The Buggles, at 12:01 a.m. on August 1, 1981, when MTV launched. The song's title turned out to be prophetic about the effect the channel would have on the music industry.
What is considered the greatest music video of the 1980s?
Michael Jackson's "Thriller" (1983) is named most often. Directed by John Landis at a reported cost of around $500,000, its 13-minute short film premiered on MTV in December 1983 and became the first music video inducted into the National Film Registry in 2009.
Which 80s video won the most MTV Video Music Awards?
Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer" (1986) swept nine awards at the 1987 VMAs, still the record for most wins by a single video. Its stop-motion animation, made with the studio that later became Aardman Animations, took weeks of frame-by-frame filming.
How did MTV change what songs became hits?
A striking video could push an unknown act into heavy rotation regardless of radio airplay, which is how a-ha's "Take On Me" and Duran Duran became stars in the US. It also meant artists without a strong visual concept could struggle even with a good song.
Did MTV play Black artists in its early years?
Rarely, at first. MTV's early playlists leaned heavily toward white rock and new wave acts, and executives cited format reasons for excluding most Black artists. Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" and "Beat It" broke that pattern in 1983, and hip-hop videos like Run-D.M.C.'s "Walk This Way" and Grandmaster Flash's "White Lines" pushed the network further through the mid-80s.
Last updated: September 29, 2026