POP MUSIC : You’ll Get Your MTV : It’s time once again for the cable network’s video awards, where the action lies not in who wins but in the did-I-really-see-<i> that</i> ? live performances

If there were any truth in advertising, they’d call it “The MTV Superstar Concert Cameo Splash-o-Rama and Post-Show Industry Blowout of the Year.”

But for now, the celebrated show’s name remains “The MTV Video Music Awards,” with the giving of statuettes the ostensible purpose behind the annual event. Nonetheless, probably not a soul will be tuning in the telecast (which airs live on MTV from UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion at 6 p.m. Wednesday) in breathless anticipation of which video vixens’ visages will win and which headbangers will go home empty-handed.

Even the celebrity nominees themselves no doubt feel very little is at stake, other than half a minute of potential free promotional time for that next album if awarded the chance to stumble to the podium.

The real winners are the performers who make a splash with their one-song appearances. Just as you can’t remember who has won a single MTV Video Music Award before now, you probably can’t forget Madonna’s Victorian-dress, privates-grabbing “Vogue” a couple of years back, or Prince’s made-ya-look, butt-baring “So Fine” outfit for the ridiculously orgiastic “Gett Off” last fall. Not to mention Pee-wee Herman, who made headlines worldwide just by virtue of showing up for a few seconds.

(There are big losers in this game too: Think of the hoopla over Paula Abdul’s less-than-figure-flattering bodysuit in her big production number of ‘91, and how we have its attendant publicity to thank for her subsequent crash diet and teensy new torso.)

This year, on the live performance front, the potential nominees for Biggest Buzz include performers Nirvana, Bobby Brown, Guns N’ Roses, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and (by satellite) U2, among many others.

Meanwhile, though, what of the awards themselves? Should MTV just dispense with all of them in a pre-telecast ceremony, as the Grammys do with their less telegenic categories, and devote the entire show to high-concept hit readings and hot-actor walk-ons? Is there even an art form worth celebrating here, ostensibly or otherwise?

Actually, yes--barely.

More than a decade after MTV’s inception, there are a handful of filmmaking formulas that most music videos typically fall into, and only a scant few each year capitalize on the mixed-media form’s full visceral potential. The Video Music Award nominee lists are filled, almost by necessity, with a fair amount of flotsam and jetsam as well as honorable work.

Yet it’s worth having this avenue to reward ambition in a medium geared toward little more than instant teen gratification and salesmanship. And there is a degree of integrity in the nominee lists--picked by industry professionals--that suggests that it’s not necessarily just the artist popularity contest you might assume.

Look at who’s missing, for example: Michael Jackson’s mega-publicized “Black or White” is up for just one award, best special effects, and his “In the Closet” is likewise nominated only once, for best cinematography, while “Remember the Time” was shut out entirely. Hammer’s sole nomination is for best video from a film.

Conversely, it’s a good sign that the video clip that many regard as the most interesting of the year--the far from widely seen “Right Now,” for a Van Halen song--is the most nominated, in six categories. (Though the Red Hot Chili Peppers have more nominations as a group, in eight categories, they are split between two different videos.)

So as the talent-heavy ceremony approaches--while En Vogue is busy deciding which size-too-small dresses to squeeze into, Bono goes shopping for Ray Bans, the Cure visits the styling salon, Kurt Cobain is pondering which guitar to smash and host Dana Carvey is wondering which monologue insults would be prudent--let’s ourselves consider the merits of the least celebrated aspect of the show--the appointed honorees, deserving or no:

Video of the Year. Of the four nominees in this top category, the least explicable is Def Leppard’s “Let’s Get Rocked,” an OK video for a noxious single that mixed flashy band footage with creepy computer animation of a suburban metal kid from hell, the lunkhead combo virtually guaranteed to turn off anyone over the age (or IQ) of 17. Nix .

Far better was the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Under the Bridge,” which managed to complement the tune’s restlessly furtive, lonely-in-L.A. feel, even as it featured the studly band members in all their bare-chested glory. The lack of a single compelling image that sticks out in the memory, though, marks it as the sort of mood piece unlikely to inspire top honors.

That leaves it to Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and Van Halen’s “Right Now” to duke it out as contenders. Whoever comes out on top, Sammy Hagar or Kurt Cobain, it can only mean one thing--a good video and a bad hair day.

“Right Now” proved to be a wholly uncharacteristic clip for Van Halen, matching the not-so-artsy group’s likable pop anthem with a witty succession of written messages both political and philosophical, all of which deigned to presume what’s going on in the world and in our heads “right now.” Under first-time director Mark Fenske, the non-sequitur sloganeering was an inspired and accomplished idea, and easily one of the year’s most entertaining videos--one that found even Van Halen detractors tuning in for repeat viewings. And when else do you find MTV videos that require actual literacy ?

But if your video ideal is a marriage of form and function, you’d probably vote for a clip that definitively bespeaks the artist it represents--in which case you’d have to cast your ballot for “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” the clip that some think made Nirvana. The video’s underworld Hades High pep rally--where the cheerleaders all have anarchy symbols on their leotards and where nothing in particular seems to be being rooted for, except maybe a climactic riot--perfectly exemplified the utter cynicism of the song itself, an anti-anthem for a generation that lost its idealism before it ever had any.

Best Male Video. In an example of the trickle-down effect in action, Weird Al Yankovic’s “Smells Like Nirvana” gets a nod for its parody of its namesake, complete with art direction and central casting from some of the same people who worked on the Nirvana video. Funny and, of course, forgettable.

Tom Petty’s “Into the Great Wide Open” attempted to satirize rock ‘n’ roll in a more earnest way, with a high-concept clip portraying the rise and fall of a rocker played by Johnny Depp, also featuring Faye Dunaway as Depp’s swept-aside manager. But the treatment was hackneyed and the message--stardom is fleeting--unbearably obvious.

John Mellencamp’s “Get a Leg Up” is notable only for supposedly having introduced the singer to the model seen ogling him during his performance, who is now his wife. If this were “Studs,” he’d be a sure winner.

Eric Clapton’s “Tears in Heaven” was the biggest hit of any of the songs here, and that and Clapton’s resurgent appeal peg it as a front-runner, though it’s a characteristically subdued performance.

The best work here is Bruce Springsteen’s “Human Touch,” the visual for which astutely builds from a low-key nighttime train ride home alone to a passionate clinch at the climax. Unfortunately, Springsteen--whose lone nomination this is--seems to be on the “out” list right now, so don’t be surprised if E.C. gets his MTV trophy.

Best Female Video. Though they’re not bad, you can quickly cross off Madonna’s “Holiday,” a serviceable concert rendition of one of her lesser dance hits (culled from the “Truth or Dare” film), as well as Vanessa Williams’ “Save the Best for Last,” which had the R&B; singer crooning her big ballad on a big screen in front of a full studio orchestra.

But it’s a strong tossup of a contest between the remaining two, each of which is a virtual study of its singer’s face, with mesmerizing results that ultimately point back toward the power of the music therein.

Annie Lennox’s “Why” is strikingly deconstructionist, commencing with the singer bored, bitter, without makeup and not bothering to lip-sync. As she proceeds to glamorize herself on camera and begins to strike artificial model poses, the anger is no less inherent.

Tori Amos’ “Silent All These Years” is also stark in its own way, using a variety of special visual treatments to highlight the newcomer’s striking visage, ending with a sustained, static close-up that’s gutsy in its sheer length. A win for either diva would represent an honest-to-gosh feminist triumph.

Best Group Video. The transformation of Dublin’s finest from earnest lads to suspiciously self-mocking superstars continued with U2’s “Even Better Than the Real Thing,” which repeated many of the motifs of the “Zoo TV” tour, right down to the international channel-changing.

Unfortunately, though most fans’ memories don’t stretch that far back, the Tubes beat U2 to this level of media satire by almost two decades. The method used to film most of the Bono footage was unique--placing the camera on a see-through sphere that revolves around the singer--though the effect is ultimately like chasing a hamster in one of those transparent pet balls around the room, close up.

Nowadays Bono’s just too sexy and, by golly, so is En Vogue’s “My Lovin’ (You’re Never Gonna Get It),” lovingly photographed struttin’ easily summed up thus: a striptease without the strip. That leaves Van Halen’s “Right Now” and the Chili Peppers’ “Under the Bridge,” with the former clip easily the more deserving piece of filmmaking but the latter a likely winner just for the funksters’ continuing swell of popularity.

Best New Artist in a Video. Let’s hear it for a four-way tie; if only the Grammys could ever put together a new-artist competition this credible. Cracker’s “Teen Angst (What the World Needs Now)” and Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” both represent great rock non-anthems, though the Cracker clip, with the band literally out standing in its field, isn’t much.

If it’s not surliness but earnestness you seek in your freshmen, the two other nominees both have it in subtly moving spades: Tori Amos’ “Silent All These Years” is also a contender here, a ballad of empowerment with equal dollops of the feminist and feminine, pretty and harsh all at once. And Arrested Development’s crossover hit “Tennessee” could find the electoral votes needed for a surprise win here. It’s the most unusual kind of rap, a true, subdued spiritual , with arresting black-and-white imagery of the rural South that conjures up the community of the future, the poverty of the present and the harassment of the past.