Martin Kahan, a prolific music video director, has died at age 74. He passed away this past Sunday (July 18th) in Lakewood, New Jersey, following a battle with cancer.
Kahan directed numerous videos for hard rock acts in the 1980s. If you watched MTV during that era, you surely caught Kahan’s work.
Some of his best known clips include KISS sans-makeup (“Lick It Up”, “All Hell’s Breakin Loose”), Mötley Crüe (“Too Young to Fall in Love”), Scorpions (“I’m Leaving You”), and Bon Jovi (“In and Out of Love,” “She Don’t Know Me”). Videos for Ian Hunter (the VMA-nomiated “All of the Good Ones Are Taken”), Loverboy (“Queen of the Broken Hearts”), and Michael Bolton (“Fool’s Game”) also garnered rotation on MTV.
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Kahan got a break early in his career when he shot three videos for progressive rock legends RUSH (“Tom Sawyer,” “Freewill,” and “Limelight”). Accompanying three of the band’s most famous songs, the clips document the band in its prime and are beloved among fans.
Kahan didn’t stick exclusively to hard rock. In the 1990s, Kahan returned with a slew of country videos that were just as popular — the immersive river party video for Alan Jackson’s “Chattahoochee” becoming one of his most widely seen clips. Kahan stuck with Nashville after that, with Kenny Chesney’s “I Lost It” in August 2000 being his final directorial credit.
Watch some of Martin Kahan’s music videos below.
