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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 6, 1997)
i irnmm New channel returns to MlYs roots By Ann Stack Senior Reporter So you say you want your MTV... the way it used to be. Nothing but music videos, 24 hours a day. No silly game shows, no movie specials, no fashion, no celeb rity ball games. Just music, the way it used to be when the giant cultural con glomerate first peeked its trailblazing head out of the depths of cable televi sion that fateful day some 15 years ago. The day is at hand, music lovers — if you can afford-a satellite dish. On Aug. 1, 1996, at 12:01 a.m. EST, MTV (Music Television) launched a sister cable channel, M2: Music Television. The channel that set trends, started fads and made and broke careers seems to have taken on the task of dictating all aspects of pop culture in the past few years. M2 is now offered to replace what MTV lacks most of the time: music. “M2 is different from MTV in the fact that it is 24 hours of music pro gramming,” MTV publicist Ariana Urbomt said. Targeted at 12 to 34-year-olds, M2 uses an unstructured musical format with a playlist composed of the broad est mix of genres available, she said. A few of the groups that grace the channel’s playlist include Bjork, Soul Coughing, Cake, Tricky, Howie B„ R.E.M., Republica, Luscious Jackson, Offspring, Tori Amos and Silverchair. The channel has three VJs: Jancee Dunn, an associate editor at “Rolling Stone” magazine; Kris Kosach, host of a morning radio show at rock sta tion KPNT-FM in St. Louis; and Matt Pinfield, host of MTV’s “120 Min utes.” But M2 is riding the Third Wave into the 21st Century. A new technol ogy called Intercast, developed by INTEL, combines computers and music to create interactive viewing, Urbomt said. This allows viewers to receive information about the artist they’re watching on M2, from fun facts and tour dates to polls and con tests, she said. Urbomt said that the original MTV / wouldn’t change its format because of the added channel. V “Our music to non-music ratio will \ remain 80 to 20 percent,” she said. So when will Lincoln get its MTV — er,M2? “We’re in negotiations with cable operators,” she said. “Hopefully within tViA riAvt fnu; mnntho u/a’11 havA cnmA Murphy inspired by blues, jazz I I ._ By Ann Stack Senior Reporter Matt “Guitar” Murphy is a busy man. He plays in four separate projects, tours constantly and cranks out albums on the side. But that's not what immediately comes to mind when speaking of the guitar virtuoso — most audiences know him as the guitarist from the “Blues Brothers” movie. What they don’t realize is that Murphy also nearly embodies blues history. Bom in 1929 in rural Mississippi, Murphy grasped the neck of his first guitar at an early age. “I must’ve been 4 or 5 when I picked up my first guitar,” he said. “I just always loved the guitar. It was three or four years later when I could really hold it and mess around on it.” ( So while Murphy cut his teeth on Delta country blues, he was later in fluenced by artists like T-Bone Walker and jazz guitarist Tfcl Farlow. The jazz bug bit hard, infusing his bloodstream with a love of chord pro gressions and jazz arrangements that left an imprint on his blues playing. “I love chords; chords have a nice structure that give the music charac ter,” Murphy said. “If it’s put together Please see MURPHY on 14 _ Jim Mehsung/DN Former NU wrestler adds bass to Chronic Bliss By Ann Stack Senior Reporter Eric Josephson is trading in his wrestling suit and letter jacket for a guitar and an amp. The NU wrestler-tumed-rock star is the bass player for Lincoln's Chronic Bliss. They play tonight and Friday at the Royal Grove, 340 W. Comhusker Highway. “We started about a year ago,” he said. “We started with original material—I was surprised at what good players they were.” Josephson had been in several local bands, when a former team mate toldhim about Chronic Bliss, which was searching for a bass player at the time. The UNL senior interdiscipli nary engineering major from Dodge City, Iowa, wrestled for the Huskers for three years—until his eligibility ran out. It was tough juggling wrestling, a full class schedule and Chronic Bliss, he said, hit the band mem bers stuck with him and kept plug ging away. “It came together really well,” he said. “I was surprised at how we were able to slap it together.” Chronic Bliss recently finished recording a CD, which will be re leased in March. They’re planning a summer tour after Josephson graduates, where they’ll do the Midwest circuit and then hit the West Coast. “We’re coming together from all different angles,” he said. “We like to keep improving. The last thing we want is to stand still, get stagnant.” Chronic Bliss is a band with some lofty goals, and the drive to take them to the top, Josephson said. “Our goals are to have a plati num record and do a world tour,” he said. “From where we started to where we are now, we’re on the right track.” Chronic Bliss will play at 9 p.m. at the Royal Grove. They’ll be with Secret Skin and Witness Tree to night, and with Wide and Far From Nowhere on Friday.
