Under Moses Znaimer and CHUM (1984–2006) MuchMusic was licensed on April 2, 1984, by the
Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to
CHUM Limited. It had faced competition from two other proposed services. One of them,
CMTV Canadian Music Television, was deemed not to have sufficient financial resources. The third applicant was Rogers Radio Broadcasting. The CRTC believed that the Canadian market could only support one music video service and CHUM's proposal was chosen because of various commitments it had made and the company's expertise in music programming. The station was initially patterned on
City Limits, an overnight weekend rock music show which had aired on sister station
CITY-TV since 1983. in
Downtown Toronto, as seen in April 2005. The channel has been based there since 1987.|left Shortly thereafter, MuchMusic was launched on August 31, 1984, as one of the first Canadian cable specialty channels. It was headed by the channel's founders
John Martin and
Moses Znaimer. The first video played on MuchMusic was "an early music-to-film synchronization short from the 1920s which featured
Eubie Blake performing Snappy Songs." The first video made specifically for television air play was
Rush's "
The Enemy Within". MuchMusic's slogan, and on-air advertising, was "The Nation's Music Station". The station was originally located at
CITY-TV's 99 Queen Street East studios, but by May 1987, Much, along with CITY, moved to the renovated
299 Queen Street West. Making use of CHUM's facilities and production teams, the channel produced many specialty musical and variety shows, including the long-running dance show
Electric Circus and the late 1980s game show
Test Pattern, and Citytv shows such as
City Limits,
The Power Hour,
The MuchMusic Spotlight and
The New Music also became integral parts of the MuchMusic schedule. The channel's format consisted primarily of an eight-hour daily block which mixed scheduled shows with VJ-hosted general "videoflow", which would then be repeated two more times to fill the 24-hour schedule (originally a six-hour block repeated three times). Some variance from this model was seen with the late-night shows
City Limits and
Too Much 4 Much (a show that featured panel discussions surrounding controversial music videos that the channel had refused to air in regular rotation), and live specials such as
Intimate and Interactive. For the first few years of the channel, it was classified as a
pay television service and was therefore offered largely in bundles along with other pay-stations such as
First Choice and
TSN, and would occasionally offer free preview weekends for non-subscribers. The subscriber count was at 500,000 customers by December 1984. In December 1987, MuchMusic received permission from the CRTC to move to basic cable lineups beginning on September 1, 1988; in the interim cable operators could offer the channel as a
negative-option expanded basic channel. In the 1990s and 2000s, the channel ran an annual "MuchTemp" contest, whose winner would get a two-month summer paid
internship at the station to learn about the television business. The most noted winner of the contest,
Rick Campanelli (1994), stayed on with MuchMusic in other roles after the end of his internship, and became a full VJ in 1996; one of the longest-serving VJs in the station's history, he remained with the station until leaving in 2005 to become one of the hosts of
Entertainment Tonight Canada. A US version of MuchMusic, originally known as "MuchMusic USA", was launched in the U.S. on July 1, 1994, through a partnership with
Rainbow Media. The network was largely a simulcast of the Canadian version with U.S. advertising and acquired programs. The network would go into its own direction over time, eventually rebranding as
Fuse in 2003. In 1995, the annual Canadian Music Video Awards were renamed to the "
MuchMusic Video Awards" (presently known as the "
iHeartRadio MMVAs" as of 2018). Since 1996, the ceremonies have been held outside the formerly named "MuchMusic Headquarters" on
299 Queen Street West, the present-day main offices for
Bell Media's speciality channels. In 2002, MuchMusic introduced promos that consisted of one of twelve images of a VJ posing in front of the network's logo, lasting for only 1/60th of a second each. The "quickies" were recognized with a
Guinness World Record for the world's shortest television commercial. Znaimer stepped down from the CHUM board in 2003, although he continued to produce some of Much's programming until the formation of
MZ Media in 2007.
Under Bell (2006–present) In July 2006, Bell Globemedia (later called CTVglobemedia) announced that it would purchase CHUM for an estimated , including MuchMusic. The sale was subject to CRTC approval and was approved in June 2007, with the transaction completed on June 22, 2007, while the
Citytv stations were sold to
Rogers Media in the same year. Since then, MuchMusic has aired a vast number of non-music related shows, mainly
teen dramas and
reality shows. In 2010, the CRTC rejected a request by CTVglobemedia to reduce the percentage of music video programming that the channel shows from 50 to 25 percent. CTV's second request to the CRTC to reduce and reposition its Canadian programming was also denied. For the reasoning behind these requests, CTV explained that "music videos no longer distinguish the service as they are readily available through other sources." This was met with mixed reaction by music fans and drew the ire of notable artists. On June 1, 2011, MuchMusic launched its
high definition simulcast feed. Beginning in September 2013, the channel would air more
comedy programming targeting young adult men during the late afternoon and primetime hours, much of it moved from
The Comedy Network. Such shows included
Comedy Central series (such as
South Park,
Tosh.0 and
The Jeselnik Offensive), reruns of
The Simpsons and
The Cleveland Show, as well as
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and
Conan. These changes came when Comedy's request for licence amendments to reduce requirements for Canadian content and increase the amount of animated programming it could air was denied. Around the same time, the channel officially shortened its name to "Much"; while the "Much" shorthand had historically been used as part of its branding, the channel had still used "MuchMusic" as its main branding. Most of the channel's previous non-music programming, such as
Pretty Little Liars and
Degrassi, moved to sister channels
M3 (formerly MuchMoreMusic and MuchMore) and
MTV respectively. At the same time the channel cut back further on original music-related programming apart from
Video on Trial,
The Wedge, countdowns, and other non-hosted blocks of music videos, with
New.Music.Live. confirmed to have been cancelled and the likes of
RapCity no longer appearing on Much's schedule. By the summer of 2014, amidst production and staffing cutbacks, the
Countdown went on hiatus and Much's remaining original shows, including a revamped
Video on Trial, were cancelled. Meanwhile, in August, Much celebrated its 30th anniversary. A half-hour anniversary special,
30 Years of Much, aired on August 30, 2014, and was preceded by a full-day countdown of
The 100 Greatest Videos Ever. Repeats of both the special and the countdown aired throughout the Labour Day weekend. On September 27, 2014, the
Countdown returned with a revamped format. On April 1, 2015, Much announced the launch of Much Digital Studios (later renamed Much Studios), a production unit and
YouTube multi-channel network. The network features content catered towards Much's demographic of 12-34s, and would also be integrated into their on-air programming. Such content includes the
Mike On Much podcast, hosted by Mike Veerman, co-produced by
Arkells lead singer
Max Kerman, and featuring segments led by Shane Cunningham. The podcast eventually spawned the spin-off series
Much Studios presents "Mike on Much in Conversation With...", which premiered in 2018 on sibling service
Crave. On August 12, 2016, Bell Media sold
MuchLoud,
MuchRetro,
MuchVibe and
Juicebox to
Stingray Digital. On September 1, 2016, M3 was shut down and replaced by
Gusto, which later became CTV Life Channel in 2019, a cooking and lifestyle-oriented TV network that Bell Media acquired, after the original Gusto TV closed in March 2016. In late 2017, Much further cut back on music programming, reducing its music blocks to the morning hours and removing the
Much Countdown from its schedule.
MuchFACT was also discontinued, as a result of the CRTC having dropped the requirement for Much to fund it. On October 11, 2017, Much premiered
Sides*, a new talk show which discusses youth issues; it was streamed live on
Twitter on weekdays, and a weekly highlight show aired on the Much channel. In November 2017, Much began to air a Friday-night block known as
Icons, which featured airings of music documentaries. In 2019, the daytime
Playlist block of music videos was discontinued and replaced with library programming, citing decreased interest and viewership. In addition, that year's
MMVAs, which were moved to August the previous year, were delayed due to scheduling conflicts with the
2019 MTV Video Music Awards. The
Much Retro Lunch block remained the only regularly scheduled music video programming on the channel, with the network citing its popularity among youth as a factor. The channel's early history was chronicled in a 2023 documentary film by Sean Menard, titled
299 Queen Street West. The film premiered at
SXSW 2023, and was soon after acquired by Bell Media. The film was scheduled to premiere on January 26, 2024 on
Crave, but was indefinitely pulled due to copyright issues involving the music video clips seen in the film. In October 2024,
Canada Post announced commemorative postage stamps honouring MuchMusic and MusiquePlus; the stamps feature a stylized rendition of crowds outside of the networks' headquarters. ==Programming==