Interview: Chuck Statler

MTV viewers may suspect that music videos predated the channel, though probably have difficulty naming a director from that era. Chuck Statler, “the godfather of the music video,” is one of them. After collaborating with Devo while at Kent State University, Statler went on to hone his penchant for unusual clips—“Love Stinks” by The J. Geils Band has trumpet players on pogo sticks and vocals delivered from a dentist’s chair—with artists like Elvis Costello and Tiny Tim. A retrospective of his work will be played Thursday at the Music Box Theatre as part of the Movieside Film Festival. Before Statler came to Chicago, The A.V. Club talked to him about why he’s not really the “godfather,” how he probably kept Devo from breaking up, and elevator music.

A.V Club: People regularly credit you as the creator of music videos in North America, but you usually downplay that title.
Chuck Statler: There were many directors and many production companies involved in doing pop clips, “music videos,” long before I engaged in it. I guess that’s in part why it’s gained that reputation, because it’s so closely associated time-wise to MTV that it looks like it really is the precursor to MTV. And I’m not talking about mine specifically, just anybody that was active in doing clips at that point. In great part, because I was fortunate enough to work with Devo and Elvis Costello, who’s had marquee value, that’s put me somewhere on the map.
AVC: There are conflicting accounts on how you got involved with Devo. Were they on the verge of breaking up when you starting working with them?
CS: That’s my understanding as an eyewitness. I can tell you from my own experience and recollection that it certainly appeared that they had run their course. I can distinctly remember the conversation and evening when I sat in an all-night diner with Jerry Casale about 3 in the morning, and he was lamenting the fact that they had expired all their possibilities, at least the potential for ones they would be interested in. And that’s when I said, “Gee, before anything happens, before the demise of Devo, I want to document it.” I know it’s a little more awkward for Jerry to talk about this or admit this, but I know that Mark [Mothersbaugh] has no hesitation to talk about the effect of the video and what it meant to the band in terms of actually getting them the exposure that they needed to then start this bidding war in launching their career. Not that there wasn’t some interest in the band before that, but that’s really the spark that ignited the whole Devo campaign.
AVC: What made you want to document Devo?
CS: I knew both Jerry and Mark, so knowing that I appreciated what they were doing musically; but they both had quite a strong suit visually and it was just kind of a shared aesthetic. We had grown up together those years and had a mutual appreciation for everything from John Waters and Russ Meyer to Luis Buñuel. There was little question that it would be this visual presentation; in fact that’s what we set about to do. Obviously, we hit the mark at some point there.
AVC: You’re working on a documentary about elevator music called The Music From The Ceiling. How did you get interested in something people generally avoid?
CS: Oh yeah, and that was by design. It was really accompaniment to whatever the activity was, to either try to move you quicker through a situation or slow you down with the tempo and the pace of the music. But beyond that, then, of course there was all the negative backlash. How I got interested is back when I went to Kent State, I got this album at a flea market. There was a muzak album—muzak as a record album, an LP! Right here between Hendrix and The Doors, there’s a muzak album. It was something I always found curious. I paid a lot of attention to it, and I knew lots of other people kind of ignored it. But then in the late ’90s I came across Joseph Lanza’s book [Elevator Music: A Surreal History Of Muzak, Easy-Listening, And Other Moodsong]. When I read the book, I started to envision a documentary about it. I didn’t know how difficult that would be.
AVC: How difficult was it?
CS: These were faceless artists. When you go to do a music doc, and you can’t put a face to the music, it becomes a little difficult. But I found a way to deal with that. I collected over a hundred of what I define as “elevator music” albums over the last three or four years doing this research. A lot of them are really dreadful, but I did cull from that a good two to three dozen that I think are really interesting, because of the fact there are these strains of this ethereal trip-hop kind of music. It is an otherworldly kind of music, and a genre unto itself. Anyway, I know there’s enough material to sustain it at least for an hour. I’ve collected enough. I still think it’s interesting. I think it’s time for some re-evaluation, because now there’s enough critical distance, because all that has kind of passed. In fact, when I even talk to younger people—I’m talking in general about people who are in their 20s—a lot of them don’t even know what elevator music is. They’ve heard the term, but really don’t know what it means, and they certainly don’t know what muzak is. I’m in a Gap store in a mall, and ask the young woman who’s a clerk there, and I heard what was on the overhead speaker, and asked her, “Is that muzak?” And she said, “What’s muzak?”
AVC: Is muzak interesting enough to sustain a music video?
CS: [Laughs.] I don’t know how you’d do a music video, but I think you could. If you were doing a music video for an instrumental artist, because of the fact that it is background, you could probably do anything with it.