D-TV

Music video block on The Disney Channel

D TV is an old series of music videos created by The Walt Disney Company and produced by Charles Braverman and edited by Ted Herrmann. The series premiered on May 5, 1984, by taking hit songs of the past and putting them together with various footage of vintage Disney animation, created out of the trend of music videos on cable channel MTV, which inspired the name of this series.

Most songs used in the series were contemporary hits (e. g., "Kiss on My List" and "Private Eyes" by Hall & Oates), though older songs like Sheb Wooley's "The Purple People Eater" were also featured. These music videos were shown as filler material on the Disney Channel (as the network didn't air any commercials at this time), as well as being the focus of several television specials. Home video collections were also released on VHS, Beta, CED Videodisc, and Laserdisc formats. After the first run of D TV, in 1989, a second series was produced known as DTV².

The main title music, known as "RPM", was created in 1981 by a recording company called Network Music. When the segments were shown individually on television, the title music used was from "Sunset Boulevard", also by Network Music. In the show's opening, a cheese like Moon zooms out to reveal a black background with blue musical notes. A silhouette of Mickey Mouse's head rises from the Moon, and it exits below the screen. The letter D (in the corporate Disney font) and the letters TV appear and zoom out to attach Mickey Mouse's head. Finally, after a few seconds, Mickey Mouse's head is shown, revealing several vintage Disney cartoon clips.

Many songs listed above were released on VHS, in five separate volumes. The first three volumes, entitled "Pop & Rock", "Rock, Rhythm & Blues", and "Golden Oldies", were released in late 1984, as part of Walt Disney Home Video's "Wrapped and Ready to Give" holiday promotion. In the Summer of 1985, two more volumes, "Love Songs" and "Groovin' For a '60s Afternoon", were released.