| Amp | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Created by |
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| Opening theme | "Tempest" byDeepsky[1] |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Production | |
| Executive producers |
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| Producers |
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| Editor | Burle Avant |
| Running time | 60 minutes (with commercials) |
| Original release | |
| Network | MTV |
| Release | September 6, 1996 (1996-09-06) – 2001 (2001) |
Amp is amusic video program onMTV that aired from 1996 to 2001. It was aimed at theelectronic music andrave crowd and was responsible for exposing manyelectronica acts to the mainstream. When co-creator Todd Mueller (who had worked on this withV. Owen Bush, Amy Finnerty and show co-creator, on air music video DJ Burle Avant 1996–1997) left the show in 1998, it was redubbedAmp 2.0. The show aired some 46 episodes in total over its 6-year run. In its final two years, reruns were usually shown from earlier years.Amp's time slot was moved around quite a bit, but the show usually aired late at night or in the early morning hours on the weekend. Because of this late night time slot, the show developed a small but cult like following. A few online groups formed after the show's demise to ask MTV to bring the show back and air it during normal hours, but MTV never responded to the requests.
The show was possibly inspired by the underground public access show "TV w/ Ray Cathode" (later named Dizzy TV) that started airing onManhattan Neighborhood Network public access TV in 1993 and ran from 1993–1999. TV w/ Ray Cathode was an underground experimental television show created by Beau Tardy that aired abstract video imagery with electronic music soundtracks byFAX +49-69/450464,Thomas Fehlmann,Sun Electric,The Orb,Aphex Twin,Warp Records and many others. TV w/ Ray Cathode show producer Beau Tardy also worked at MTV and was a colleague of Todd Mueller but never contributed to Amp.
The format of the show strongly resembled the original MTV model of broadcasting primarily music videos, but withoutVJs to host. The show started with an intro and logo, some basic information about that week's show contents via onscreen text, then an hour of electronic music was played before the show's conclusion. Most of the video clips were created specifically for Amp.[2] Nick Philip, a San-Francisco based multi-media artist created the first video for Amp, "Meccano" bySun Electric.[3] Occasionally, non-electronic but still classic music videos were aired for the sake ofnostalgia within the electronic genre, such asOfra Haza's music video for "Im Nin'Alu," which was sampled by several electronic artists in the early 1990s.
The show was popular enough that MTV produced two compilations of songs by artists featured onAmp.MTV's Amp was released in 1997 andMTV's Amp 2 came out a year later in 1998. Both albums were released byAstralwerks/Caroline Records.