Don Henley was the night's biggest winner, taking home four Moonmen, including Video of the Year. In fact, his video for "The Boys of Summer" was also the year's most nominated video, receiving seven nominations in total. Meanwhile, David Lee Roth turned out to be the most nominated artist that night, receiving eight nominations for two of his videos: five for "Just a Gigolo/I Ain't Got Nobody" and three for "California Girls." Nevertheless, Roth came out of the ceremony empty-handed that night.
In June 1985, MTV announced that the 1985 Video Music Awards would be held on September 13 at Radio City Music Hall.[1] Preliminary nominees with 10 videos per category were announced in mid-July before the final set of nominees were announced at a press conference at New York's Hard Rock Cafe on August 13.[2][3] Eddie Murphy was announced as the ceremony's host in mid-July.[4]