Channel V

CONFIRMED: Legendary Music Station Channel V To Close After 20 Years

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Foxtel has confirmed the closure of legendary music platform Channel V with an email to staff overnight.  As of Friday this week – yes this bloody week – the station will cease to exist in its current form.

According to Music Feeds, it’s understood that the popular tv channel will merge with other Foxtel music channel [V] Hits, and will operate as a music video based channel with no “long form” content. There will also be a V Hits +2 channel.

In another blow to the Australian music industry, this probably means less mainstream media coverage of up-and-coming artists who are promoted on such Channel V segments as the ‘Ripe Clip of the Week’ and ‘The Riff.’ The station boasted awesome original long-form music content alongside youth lifestyle series and along with ABC’s Rage, constantly lead the way for original music programming.

The channel has also been a platform to launch the careers of media personalities including Osher Günsber, Danny Clayton and Jane Gazzo. The gang have been taking to Twitter to express just how much the channel has meant to them:

Foxtel is also scrapping the long form content from their other music channels including Max, Country Music Channel and Smooth.

An email obtained by P.TV written from BSD’s Brian Walsh, Executive Director of Television and Stephen Baldwin, Head of Channels & Operations for the Foxtel Networks confirms the tough decision.
The email reads:

Dear Colleagues,

As foreshadowed in my presentation yesterday, we are making changes across our organisation in order to be match fit in an increasingly competitive landscape. One area I discussed with you was channel rationalisation.

Over the past several years music clips have become ubiquitous with availability on services like YouTube, whilst linear broadcast audiences for music channels have been in steady decline. In order to run the Foxtel music services more efficiently we have decided to merge Channel [V] and [V] Hits.

The new service will be called [V] Hits and we will create a +2 of this channel. [V] Hits will continue to be a clip based channel with no long form content.

This change will begin to take place this Saturday, with the channel branding completed by late March.

I would like to thank the music team for their hard work and dedication in making Channel [V] an integral part of the Australian music landscape throughout the years.

I would also like to thank those team members leaving us today. You leave with our best wishes for your onward journey.

Brian Walsh & Stephen Baldwin

The changes will begin this weekend, with a complete re-branding expected.

For anyone lucky enough to have Foxtel growing up, Channel V was a huge source for finding new music, indulging in pop gems and giving you FOMO for some of their awesome parties and backstage antics.  We’ll miss you dudes.