If you were to guess the most played song on MTV, depending on your age, you might end up with more of a question: “they still play songs on MTV?” In point of fact, it’s been decades since the M in MTV could really be said to stand for “music,” but in a recent Rolling Stone piece Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo, as well as various TV and film scores over the years, revealed that his most lucrative song holds just that distinction — but it’s because it’s used as the theme song for MTV’s inescapable Rob Dyrdek’s sleeper hit “Ridiculousness.”
The song is “Uncontrollable Urge,” and though its original chart success as a single was limited, it found a new life as the theme to “Ridiculousness” and its seemingly limitless reruns on the channel. According to Mothersbaugh, it earns him some $1 million per year in royalties, the bulk of which comes from its use on the show (to put it in perspective, the song has only generated about $150,000 for Mothersbaugh in streaming royalties since the genesis of the platform).
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Mothersbaugh’s wife and manager, Anita Greenspan, sees the situation as something of a full-circle moment for Devo and MTV:
“In the beginning of MTV you saw a lot of Devo because they were early to make videos, but MTV started questioning the videos Devo were making. [The videos] were subversive, they didn’t like them and wouldn’t play them anymore…Now ‘Uncontrollable Urge’ is easily the most-played song on MTV, so [Devo] wins.'”
In addition to his work with Devo, Mothersbaugh is also a prolific composer for TV and film, having composed scores for everything from “Thor: Ragnarok” and “The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou” to the unforgettable theme song to the Nickelodeon animated series “Rugrats.” But according to Mothersbaugh himself, it’s now an obscure DEVO single that has generated the most income for him over the years.