Pink Floyd songwriter Roger Waters says MTV and the ‘death of radio’ are making music ‘superficial’

Legendary rock and roll songwriter Roger Waters has claimed both MTV and the ‘death of radio’ are making music a ‘superficial’ experience.

The Pink Floyd bassist believes the state of music has been made much worse by the influence of new forms of media and how audiences experience their favourite songs. Speaking on the death of radio and MTV, the latter of which terminated its cable music coverage at the end of 2025, Waters claimed he had never watched MTV. He had good reason not to, as he explained it was simply too much of a good thing and did nothing to challenge or channel new music.

He said: “I don’t have satellite radio in my car yet – which is stupid and you can get whatever you want and as much of it as you want – but if I’m flipping through channels in the car I’ll stop for old stalwarts like Neil and John, but usually you can be certain that the thing you’ve stopped for is going to finish in three minutes and the thing that comes after it will be unlistenable. So you sort of don’t bother. 

“That’s why I never watched MTV – because of the programming. Nothing ever seemed to go on long enough to be worth watching. And even if that particular video was interesting, you’d get something directly afterwards that inevitably wasn’t.”

Waters went on to suggest that the death of FM radio in the 1960s was a massive loss for new artists, and new listeners. He explained in 2008: “Yeah, and that’s one of the tragedies of the death of FM radio as it was in the late ‘60s. People played whole albums, or Sad-Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands or whatever, and that made it much more interesting. 

“Then the businesses got hold of it and decided they had to respond to the bottom line and the audience figures were the only thing that mattered, and that sort of destroyed it. Which in some ways could be seen as a microcosm of – or at least a warning sign to – society in the United States at the moment. If you make that the only thing that matters, you destroy many potential avenues for society to change.”

Further negativity from the veteran songwriter came as he declared he had simply given up on there being another musical revolution. Waters said: “I do. There’s something about the mathematics of what we call music that affects something in our physiology and creates an emotional response that feels as if it causes a difference in one. I believe everything is connected.

“It’s like a pebble in a pond: the change might be infinitesimal, but it is a change nevertheless and the ripples spread. I’m not expecting any new revolution or for a new Dylan or Lennon to come along, but music changes all our lives every day.”