Together We Are Top of the Pops

On an evening 35 years ago when the BBC1 line up was:

6.20 Nationwide 6.55 Tomorrow's World 7.10 Top of the Pops 8.00 Morecambe & Wise At BBC 8.30 Butterflies 9 News 9.25 The Good Old Days.............


11-1-79: Presenter: David Jensen

(14) CHAKA KHAN – I’m Every Woman (and charts)
(24) ROCKY SHARPE & THE REPLAYS – Rama Lama Ding Dong
(30) SALLY OLDFIELD – Mirrors
(13) PAUL EVANS – Hello, This Is Joanie (The Telephone Answering Machine Song) (video)
(NEW) BONNIE TYLER – Louisiana Rain
(21) LEO SAYER – Raining In My Heart
(25) MANKIND – Dr. Who
(27) DRIVER 67 – Car 67
(NEW) THE DOLL – Desire Me
(16) HOT CHOCOLATE – I’ll Put You Together Again (video)
(35) THE SHADOWS – Don’t Cry For Me Argentina
(18) FUNKADELIC – One Nation Under A Groove (danced to by Legs & Co)
(NEW) STEVE ALLAN – Together We Are Beautiful
(1) VILLAGE PEOPLE – Y.M.C.A. (video)
(29) BILLY JOEL – My Life (and credits)




Chaka Khan ~ plays over the opening titles, on the day when the newspaper headlines in the UK were
famously 'Crisis? what Crisis?'

Rocky Sharpe and the Replays ~ if they remind you a wee bit of Darts, that's maybe because both Den Hegarty and Rita Ray were both original members before they left to form.......... Darts.

Sally Oldfield ~ singing this irresistibly pretty song is the older sister of Mike Oldfield ~ and she also sang backing vocals on her brother's legendary Tubular Bells album.

Paul Evans ~ another irresistibly pretty song, if you regard ringing your girlfriend's answering machine to listen to her dead voice as pretty, Paul also wrote 'When' which got to number 1 in 1958 for the Kalin Twins and number 3 in 1977 for Showaddywaddy.

Bonnie Tyler ~ This Tom Petty cover failed to chart for Bonnie. Not too surprising, it's not a patch on It's a Heartache or Lost in France.

Leo Sayer ~ was edited out of the 7.30 BBC4 showing ~ catch his Buddy Holly cover on the second showing at midnight.

Mankind ~ ditto for the Dr Who theme tune cover.

Driver 67 ~ what a fabulous novelty record this was from Paul Phillips and Pete Zom, which is trending now 35 years later on Twitter apparently :-)

The Doll ~ are also not coming out to play until the midnight repeat showing.

Hot Chocolate ~ ditto HC, with the third irresistibly pretty song of tonight's show.

The Shadows ~ This fine instrumental Lloyd Webber cover peaked at number 5. Shadows drummer, Brian Bennett, also has a successful career composing tv theme tunes, including New Tricks and the Sweeney.

Funkadelic ~ This scantily khaki clad Legs and Co routine helped One Nation Under a Groove get to number 9 in the charts.

Steve Allan ~ Steve's real name is Alan Carvel and he had first appeared on the show back in 1977 with his band The Carvells, performing The LA Run. His version of Together We Are Beautiful failed to make the top 40, but a year later a much more emotive vocal from Fern Kinney took it to number one.

Village People ~ YMCA is the UK's 32nd best selling single, with sales of 1.47 million. Village People lead singer Victor Willis was married to Phylicia Ayers-Allen, who played Bill Cosby’s wife in The Cosby Show.

Billy Joel ~ from his album 52nd Street, this song peaked at number 12 in the UK.

Next week's show, from 18th January 1979, is presented by Peter Powell with performances by Frankie Miller, Ian Dury and Chic, amongst others.