In 1986, MTV designed a show called 120 Minutes, which was created to play two hours of light-rotation videos each week. MTV hired Dave Kendall to produce the show, and he took the opportunity to introduce a new, upstart series featuring college radio-style, alternative music to MTV's audience.

120 Minutes premiered on Sunday, March 10, 1986, at 1 a.m. on MTV, hosted by J.J. Jackson, the legendary late VJ. This late Sunday night time slot would be its home for the next 17 years.

In the early years of 120 Minutes, MTV tried out a number of hosts, including Alan Hunter, Kevin Seal, and Downtown Julie Brown. The network continued to experiment with the show's format during this time. In 1989, Dave Kendall became the show's first solid host.

After Kendall left 120 Minutes in 1992, he was followed by many other hosts over the next eleven years. Lewis Largent, along with rotating guest hosts, hosted for the rest of the early '90s.

In 1995, Matt Pinfield officially began hosting 120 Minutes. Over the next four years, he became known as a walking music encyclopedia and remembered as the most recognizable host.

MTV2 (known as M2 until 2000), a 24/7 music video channel, debuted on Thursday, August 1, 1996. While 120 Minutes remained on MTV for years after M2's debut, viewers began to notice an increasing amount of mainstream music videos being added to the 120 Minutes playlist in the late '90s.

A number of mainstream rock music videos may have been played on 120 Minutes because it was one of the only official places for any rock acts to appear on MTV at the time.

In the late '90s, MTV had no other show designed to play rock videos, outside of the short-lived Mattrock Daily, before The Return Of The Rock premiered in 1999. Also at this time, M2 was still showing a 24/7 freeform mix of videos.

Nevertheless, some of the videos on 120 Minutes during the late '90s were truly alternative and couldn't be seen elsewhere, continuing to make 120 Minutes essential viewing.

After a few years of being on MTV and M2 a combined total of 10 to 15 hours a day, Matt Pinfield departed from the network. Other guest hosts and VJs, most notably Dave Holmes, picked up hosting duties for the remainder of the '90s.

In 2000, 120 Minutes began getting pre-empted by MTV's Real World, Road Rules, Loveline, Undressed, and other shows. After a few "ghost town" episodes of 120 Minutes during the spring and summer of 2000, the last show on MTV aired.

120 Minutes moved to MTV2 as part of its January 1, 2001 relaunch. MTV2 picked up where MTV left off, returning to its original, groundbreaking style that MTV2 viewers had come to expect.

Hosts of the show on MTV2 included Jancee Dunn, Chris Booker, and finally Jim Shearer, who began hosting in March 2002 and continued as the host until the finale on May 4, 2003.

In its final years on the air, 120 Minutes returned to its roots, featuring weekly guests and videos from underground bands. On a few special occasions, live performances made a long awaited return to the series, such as with Tegan and Sara.

Throughout 2002 and 2003, 120 Minutes was pushed further into the night on MTV2, moving from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m. ET. Rumors of the program's cancellation started in April 2003 on the MTV2.com message board, and they were more-or-less confirmed by host Jim Shearer on the April 27, 2003 show.

This site (then called The unofficial 120 Minutes site) was the only place on the Internet for viewers to learn about its cancellation, as MTV2.com had no up-to-date information on the show.

The 120 Minutes series finale aired the night of Sunday, May 4th, 2003, at 1 a.m., hosted by Jim Shearer. He was joined by former hosts Dave Kendall and Matt Pinfield to send off the show. If you missed it, you can watch the complete Series Finale video here at The 120 Minutes Archive.

An extended version of the "Exit Interview" by Jim Shearer, never seen on TV, was later published exclusively here at The 120 Minutes Archive. Playlists and videos for hundreds of episodes from the history of 120 Minutes can be found exclusively in our Playlists & Videos archive.

Just 5 days after its cancellation, on Friday, May 9th, 2003, the legacy of 120 Minutes continued on with the premiere of the program's modern-day successor, Subterranean on MTV2.

As we knew it, Subterranean was MTV2's official replacement for and modern-day successor to MTV's flagship alternative series, 120 Minutes. It premiered the night of Friday, May 9th, 2003, at midnight, just a few days after the cancellation and series finale of 120 Minutes on MTV2.

When Subterranean started in 2003, it was billed as the next generation of 120 Minutes. The idea was to take that classic MTV format and apply it to the next generation of alternative music. The series was hosted by Jim Shearer and featured interviews with alternative artists and bands every week until 2007, in the same kind of weekend late-night time slot as 120 Minutes.

Therefore, we like to think of Subterranean as the last stand of the alternative music show in the classic MTV format — the VJ, the interviews with bands and artists, the live performances, and the like, in between music videos. For almost 4 years, Subterranean stayed true to that format. It was something worth watching. It had personality and a purpose. Well, at least we thought so.

In February 2007, MTV2 fired its entire production staff and converted all of its remaining music shows into pure video blocks. No hosts; no band interviews; just videos and commercials.

As a result, we believe it's no longer worth it to watch Subterranean on TV and write down the playlist. In today's era of the Internet, sitting through 20 minutes of late night commercials only for some videos doesn't make sense. It's unfortunate that Subterranean isn't a "show" anymore.

You can still watch the video block on MTV2 every Thursday night at about 1 a.m. eastern time. However, we suggest heading over to MTV.com at your convenience. The videos are still posted there, and you can watch them at any time without sitting through nearly as many ads.

Jim Shearer himself stopped by this very web site to answer all kinds of questions back in 2007, while MTV2 was undergoing the change. The compilation of the Jim Shearer Q&A is here.

Ever since Subterranean ceased production, our site has been in archive mode, but that's OK, as we have more than enough nostalgia to go around. Visit our Playlists & Videos archive for the entire playlist history of Subterranean, as well as hundreds of classic episodes of 120 Minutes.