As most people know I consider myself a connoisseur of the creative medium of music videos, having amassed a collection beyond the one thousand barrier. I keep a look out for new music videos from time to time, although I tend not live on YouTube as you might expect. Without MTV at our flat (a wrong, I will indeed right at some point in the future with MTV HD) I tend to watch Viva or 4Music from time to time at the weekend. The odd time they are not showing general programming (which tends to be the weekend mornings). They have both morphed into general youth entertainment channels. How many re-runs of The Fresh Prince can you watch? Another location that will always play music videos is the gym.

At EasyGym we are not blessed with MTV or even the Freeview babies mentioned above, no they can do better than that. Their own dedicated music video channels (there are two, but only one is visible on the TV) the other is accessible via the equipment (bikes, cross trainers etc). When I am on the bike, I tend to watch Sky News to catch up on what is going on around the world. Being a news junkie, this is perhaps the only time apart from weekday mornings and the odd Saturday morning that I am watching a rolling news network. However, I am not completely sad, I keep an eye out on the music videos being played on EasyGym 1 (they also pump out the music of the same song on the internal PA system, although at times this was not always the case). I quickly switch over to Channel 4 on my bike if I see anything I like.

During the Christmas break trips to the gym were always going to take a hit but I did attend on the penultimate day of 2012! It was on this occasion I spotted a fantastic video on Easy Gym 1, however I was on the rowing machine, and so the awkward viewing angle meant I did not catch the artist. To some a problem but I had spotted Timbaland in the video, and so it would be something I would look up later. As usual with the grand plans I make in the gym, I never acted upon this imaginary task on my task list! However I should really explain what drew me to this video in the first place. For context remember I have my own mp3 player playing my gym playlist so cannot hear the actual song. I am going on images alone! The singer, Rosette is shown in her lingerie but her body is blurred out. Now it is quite clear she is not naked so I do wonder why the EasyGym version was censored. Perhaps the management wanted to take into consideration the demographic of the location but still this was rather extreme. How many lingerie billboard posters did you note around the place just before Christmas? Around Reading station, I noted at least 4, around Slough Bath Road, 6 (the majority (if not all!) for H&M!). In any case, I only remembered the song again on Monday (14th) evening as I was in the gym carrying out a quick cardio session. The video is quite tame, if you consider a music video, which nearly knocks former Prime Ministers from the rowing machine. I noted down in my memory banks the artist on this occasion and finally got hold of the song on Tuesday evening. It has been playing practically non-stop on my mp3 player ever since. Unfortunately, due to a clinch in the Rockbox audio scrobbler, it has not picked up my multiple listens of the same song, so you will not find any evidence on my Last.fm (it is on the right menu of my main blog page). I know many people would get bored listening to the same song all day and for hours at a time. However I am unique in this fashion. Back in PBD (pre blogging days) I recall a car journey in my Mum’s Mini Mayfair when I listened to Pure Shores by All Saints on loop, driving my passengers mad! (For the record I have still to see the movie, The Beach).

Off on a little meandering tangent now but it will be worth it, trust me. If you are of a certain age (early thirties) you may recall an extremely popular television show called Sabrina – The Teenage Witch. My sisters and I were big fans and did watch the show up to the last season (when Sabrina went to college and the show pretty much jumped the shark). However, I am refering to one from season one. The episode featured many famous guest stars, including Thomas. F. Wilson (you will be familiar with him as Biff Tannen from the Back To The Future trilogy). However the ladies out there will remember it for the appearance of Beverley Hills 90210 star, Brian Austin Green. He was created using Man Dough and christened with the fantastic name, Chad Corey Dylan. The perfect, “Dream Date”. This week and probably for a few months, I will forever be saying, “Michelle, I really really love this song!”