If there's one useful contribution the Millennial Generation can make to modern culture, it's relaying firsthand accounts of what life was like before The Internet. But not just "life" in a generalized way, but "growing up" - their youth was the last youth spent inside the bubble of the world immediately around them, and "word of mouth" meant literally that. The other thing about Millennials is that they won't ever shut up about this stuff, about "how it was", and I certainly don't wanna perpetuate that stereotype but I gotta give you some history for contextual reasons, so bear with me -- you definitely need to know about this.
Beginning in 1981 (alongside MTV) and lasting throughout the decade, the USA Network would turn into Night Flight at 11pm on Friday and Saturday nights; it wasn't exactly a 'show' but more in the way Nickelodeon turns into Nick at Nite. It was a four hour block of programming that consisted mostly of music videos - initially leaning mostly into Punk and Hardcore but eventually panning out into mainstream stuff. Additionally they would air documentaries, public domain movies, Science Fiction serials, and experimental short films. If MTV was a glossy coffee table book, Night Flight was a stapled-together fanzine; when the coolest stuff wasn't cool enough for you, they had the other thing. I'm sure you get the idea; there are a million documentaries detailing the same kinda record stores and movie theaters and pirate radio stations that were all someone's "key to discovering themselves" or whatever. The point is, I don't have to overexplain this because you're already aware of it or you've seen the ads or maybe you're already balls deep into it, but Night Flight is back, in streaming form - and guys, I'm here to tell you, this is the one.
I became a subscriber during the Fall of 2024 after probably years of seeing ads for it on social media - ads that I would eventually begin to seek out when they didn't pop up on their own because they were that good. And then they dropped some sale that made it like $30 and change to get the channel for a year - which is typically the kinda stuff I don't gamble on but based on what I'd seen so far I figured I could get some use out of it. But alas, it was no fluke - I'm almost happy I didn't learn too much about it before I pulled the trigger because the surprise packed that much of a punch. But I intend to ruin the surprise a bit for you because I've sat on this grenade long enough and I can no longer in good conscience keep it to myself.
First of all, their entire library of what they aired in the 80s is viewable on demand - and I mean the entire program blocks, complete with 1980s commercials. (Reread it to believe it.) So, you could watch an hour-long special on The Thompson Twins broken up by ads for Ghostbusters and Juicy Fruit, followed by a stretch of all the "latest" Heavy Metal videos with 1-900 phone sex commercials in between, and then an uninterrupted experimental short that you've never heard of but now your mind is blown and you're filled with inspiration but now we've moved onto creepy cartoons from the 1930s followed by a Talking Heads marathon.
Their backlog isn't infinite but at a glance it can appear that way, and setting yourself up on a diet of these old programs really allows you to immerse yourself in that era in a way that's comparable to time travel. For me, that's more than worth the price of admission, but that's not even the half of it because this isn't actually the 1980s, it's the Goddamn 21st Century and this isn't cable, it's streaming, and this isn't just Night Flight, it's Night Flight Plus. And what all of that means is that they have a vast library of "content" like any modern day streaming service, except that this content was made for you and me.
There's an innumerable amount of music docs from every period and every genre, and you can sorta tell that's their bread & butter. But their other big push is "Cult and Horror" and for most other streamers that typically means Beetlejuice and The Conjuring Universe. But this, please, cannot be that. This is the real deal Holyfield, pulling from the libraries of Blue Underground, Arrow, Vinegar Syndrome, Severin, Grindhouse Releasing, Something Weird, Criterion, Synapse, and Scream Factory - enough that each of these boutique labels has their own playlist. And those are just the name brands; there's even weirder stuff from god-knows-where doing god-knows-what but given the quality of the company they keep you really can't go wrong. Or maybe you can! That's largely the point of this channel (for me at least): every streaming service allows room for discovery, but so rarely am I in the mood to commit to some Limited Series Event that's been trending for a whole 72 hours. I'm usually pretty up to speed with physical media and Night Flight is on that exact same wavelength, and so they continually make it possible for me to see things without having to dedicate my dwindling shelf space to a buncha 'blind buys' at $49 a pop.
But in the age of doom scrolling it's still that much harder to discover. They've got that covered too: Night Flight has three 'live streams' going 24/7 - one for all their old music video stuff, another (predictably) for Cult & Horror Movies, and as of February 2025 a new third channel dedicated to "Independent & Art House". And it has been largely through this method that I have, in fact, discovered stuff that was new to me -- particularly on the music side: stuff I'd forgotten about along with stuff I've never heard of before. In either case it's been a long time since my old ass has gotten excited about a song, let alone a new (as is old) band.
You'd think they were an official sponsor of Bennett Media the way I'm hawking it, but really I just wanted to express my excitement over the idea of "streaming apps" actually pulling their weight for once - though really it's just the fact that I found one that wasn't so damn boring, and I figured you'd wanna be a part of it. I mean don't take my word for it, you make your own choices, but while you hesitate you're missing the last 45 minutes of Supervixens, but if you hurry you can be here for the start of the Rifftrax version of Birdemic: Shock and Terror!
- Paul
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