"You're my Butterfly, Sugar Baby": How the music channel VIVA shaped my youth

Founded 30 years ago - "You're my Butterfly, Sugar Baby": How the music channel VIVA shaped my youth

I was eleven when I was sucked into music television. It was the same daily ritual: after school, my backpack flew into the corner and my butt onto the worn-out family sofa. In search of my favorite artists, I manically switched back and forth between Viva, MTV and Viva II while Mirácoli burned in the kitchen. I only had a few hours before my stepfather would come home and snatch the remote. He found it no matter how deep I pushed it into the sofa crevices. My stepfather had no understanding of the desires of a teenage girl. If he zapped to a soccer match on principle, my body went into pop culture withdrawal.

It was 1999 and I was eagerly awaiting the video for the Echt song "Denn du trägst keine Liebe in dir". Before the invention of YouTube, which condemned us to permanent on-call availability, we had to wait. Lots of rappers, pseudo-rockers and rhinestone-clad women flickered by. And when what we had been longing for for hours finally arrived, we were sitting on the toilet. What did teenagers whose parents rejected private television actually do all day long?

Tingling premonitions and dry sex

Later, I got my own small tube TV and watched Viva and co. undisturbed in my room, often late into the night. The mini movies showed things that were far removed from the reality of my life, but which interested me more and more in the early noughties: big city life. Cool clothes. Sex. I was particularly taken with music videos in which people made out; they were a tingling premonition of what could one day be. I found the oily tattoo boys from "Crazy Town" sexy and didn't mind lines like "You're my butterfly, sugar baby". In the video for the Maroon 5 hit "This Love", Adam Levine had dry sex with a model, which left plenty of room for interpretation. In "Are you in?" by Incubus, there is an orgy, which could almost pass for porn in times without home internet. I didn't question the fact that the focus was on very young, half-naked women. I concentrated on the brown-eyed lasciviousness of singer Brandon Boyd, who is seduced by a mermaid-like beauty at the end of the clip.

Through music television, I knew what kind of guys I liked, even if they weren't out there. I knew what I wanted to be like, even if they were unattainable ideals of beauty. I wanted the bright red hair of presenter Enie van de Meiklokjes, secretly dyed my hair red and got scolded by my mother for it. I plucked my eyebrows into thin lines, just like Gwen Stefani wore them, rehearsed her poses from the No Doubt video "Underneath It All" and took photos of myself with a self-timer. My first selfies. I took the films from the camera to "Schlecker" to have them developed, one of the photos recently fell out of an old diary. Any resemblance to Gwen Stefani? Well, yes. Fortunately, growing up in a small town in the farthest corner of East Germany doesn't preclude you from dreaming big. Thank you, music television.

Who the fuck is Dirk?

Over the next few years, I became a snob who despised mainstream music and thus a very lonely teenager. The alternative little sister of Viva, Viva II, was to blame. I admired Charlotte Roche, who looked and spoke so differently and seemed to skillfully combine old clothes - "vintage" was not yet a concept to me. I fell in love with 90s bands like Oasis and Tocotronic after a slight delay, although I had no idea who "Dirk" was or what he was thinking about "Seattle". I found the melancholy milk carton in the Blur clip for "Coffee and TV" touching and loved not only the song "Playground Love" by Air, but also the idea of the talking chewing gum.

If someone bumps into me in the pedestrian zone today or if I'm in a rowdy mood myself, I'm reminded of Richard Ashcroft rampaging through the neighborhood in "Bittersweet Symphony". On a trip to Helsinki, I was disappointed that no man looked anything like Ville Valo in "Join Me in Death" or at least wore a fur coat on his bare upper body. When I walk past a strip joint, I think of the most erotic pole dancer of all time: Kate Moss in "I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself" by the White Stripes.

Everything has its time. Just like hipster pants

Music television planted images in my head that have taken root there forever. It drove away my boredom, opened up new worlds for me and inspired me in terms of fashion. Today, when I listen to music on Spotify, there is no longer a movie playing, I don't know what new artists look like unless I specifically search for them. Nevertheless, I don't miss Viva. Everything has its time. Just like hipsters. And my mother's relationship with my stepfather.

On my last vacation, noughties clips were playing on the hotel TV in a continuous loop. Christina, Britney and Beyoncé were dancing around the room with their bellies bare, Nickelback still sounded like a sore throat. I had long since forgotten most of the videos. I didn't leave the room that day.