Retro Jams was a

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

network that played music videos from the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s, with the vast majority of clips used in the

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no Exclusive exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly Waiver, waived, or may be inapplicable. Because no one holds ...

to reduce and avoid performance and rights fees. Established in 2007, it was owned and operated by now-defunct Equity Media Holdings. Retro Jams was formerly carried full-time as a

free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscri ...

TV channel on various Equity-owned terrestrial low-power

television station A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the earth's s ...

s nationwide. Blocks of programming on sister network

Retro Television Network Retro TV (stylized as retrotv), formerly known as Retro Television Network, is an American broadcast television network owned by Get After It Media. The network mainly airs classic television sitcoms and drama series from the 1950s through t ...

also featured ''Retro Jams'', either with videos pre-programmed or requested live by viewers.

History

Retro Jams was established by Equity Media Holdings as a filler format to provide music video programming to a few individual, local Equity-owned stations which lacked a conventional television network affiliation. Programming consisted primarily of music videos from the 1980s and early 1990s. On most of these stations, Equity replaced Retro Jams with the

in mid-2008. As Equity had founded RTN and owned the network until 2008, the "Retro Jams" name continued in use as a programming block name, along with certain hours being by viewer request. While most affected stations simply replaced Retro Jams with Retro TV, a few stations went to other networks. Cash-strapped Equity Media Holdings sold Retro Television Network to Luken Communications in June 2008 and entered federal

chapter 11 Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code ( Title 11 of the United States Code) permits reorganization under the bankruptcy laws of the United States. Such reorganization, known as Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is available to every business, w ...

bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the deb ...

protection in

Little Rock, Arkansas Little Rock is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Arkansas, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arkansas. The city's population was 202,591 as of the 2020 census. The six-county Central Arkan ...

, in December 2008. An option allowing Equity to re-purchase Retro TV from Luken expired unexercised on December 24, 2008. Equity continued to provide

broadcast automation Broadcast automation incorporates the use of broadcast programming technology to automate broadcasting operations. Used either at a broadcast network, radio station or a television station, it can run a facility in the absence of a human oper ...

facilities and operate Retro TV from its

centralcasting facility on behalf of Luken Communications until January 2009, when Equity's failure to pay the studios supplying Retro TV programming caused Luken Communications to move Retro TV to independent facilities. Retro TV was permanently removed from all Equity-owned or operated stations on January 4, 2009.TV Newsday: "Financial Dispute Disrupts RTN Diginet"
1/5/2009 Some Retro TV stations had networks such as

This TV This TV (also known as This TV Network and alternately stylized as thisTV) was an American free-to-air television network owned by Allen Media Broadcast Networks, LLC, part of the Allen Media Group division of Entertainment Studios. Originally ...

or a

schedule compiled by Equity as a replacement, though many had a resurrection of Retro Jams placed on the channel space to provide some form of programming to the remaining Equity-owned stations. This all-music video format continued until Equity's bankruptcy in the middle of 2009, and most of its stations were either sold at auction or closed permanently shortly thereafter.

References

{{American broadcast television Defunct music video networks Defunct television networks in the United States Equity Media Holdings Music video networks in the United States Television channels and stations established in 2007 Television channels and stations disestablished in 2009