What's another year?
30-10-80: Presenters: Peter Powell & Colin Berry
(13) ADAM & THE ANTS – Dog Eat Dog
Barking its way to number 4 in the charts.
(6) ODYSSEY – If You’re Looking For A Way Out (video)
Now at its peak.
(5) BAD MANNERS – Special Brew ®
About to go two place higher and become their joint biggest hit.
(20) DAVID BOWIE – Fashion (danced to by Legs & Co)
The follow-up to Ashes to Ashes, from his Scary Monsters album.
(17) SHEENA EASTON – One Man Woman (video)
Her third single already, peaking at number 14.
(25) OLIVIA NEWTON-JOHN & CLIFF RICHARD – Suddenly (video)
The fifth single from Xanadu, this one peaking at 15. Although the movie flopped, a stage version become a surprise hit on Broadway in 2007, and the show has recently opened in London at the Southwark Playhouse Theatre.
(22) SHOWADDYWADDY – Why Do Lovers Break Each Other’s Hearts ®
This was now the peak position for their final top 30 hit.
The Top Ten Rundown:
(10) THE POLICE – Don’t Stand So Close To Me (video)
(9) THE NOLANS – Gotta Pull Myself Together (video)
(8) ORCHESTRAL MANOEUVRES IN THE DARK – Enola Gay (still picture)
(7) MADNESS – Baggy Trousers (video)
(6) ODYSSEY – If You’re Looking For A Way Out (video)
(5) BAD MANNERS – Special Brew (still picture)
(4) MATCHBOX – When You Ask About Love (still picture)
(3) OTTAWAN – D.I.S.C.O. (video)
(2) STATUS QUO – What You’re Proposing (clip of TOTP 23-10-80)
(1) BARBRA STREISAND – Woman In Love (video)
The second of three weeks for Barbra's only number one.
(26) STEPHANIE MILLS – Never Knew Love Like This Before (crowd dancing) (and credits)
This one reached number 4 to become Stephanie's only top ten hit.
The next show should be the 6th November, but it was hosted by Jimmy Savile and so won't be shown, so instead BBC4 will move on to November 13th 1980.
Wow, to have Odyssey, Barbra Streisand and Olivia/Cliff combo on the same show, we were now entering a new elevated level in the history of the British charts, which was to be continue for another few years till the mid-80s before peaking out, in my opinion. Certainly this week’s show with these above-stated performers, meant we were very spoiled to have all this class on the show.
ReplyDeleteOdyssey – after presumable peaking at No.7 and getting stuck there for three weeks, it somehow leapt to No.6 this week, but crucially it meant a second showing of the video on TOTP since the first appearance 4 weeks earlier, and this time in full!
David Bowie – to see Legs & Co this enthusiastic and this happy, was certainly a sign of where the show had now reached in our lives. Sue as usual taking central position on the stage, as the longest standing member and oldest of the girls, showing she’s firmly in charge here.
Sheena Easton- I enjoyed this more than her first two releases, 9 to 5, and Modern Girl. Certainly the video was really good, and Sheena was now taking on a more confident sexy look, as her confidence increased, having charted Top Ten in her previous two hits in the summer.
Olivia Newton John & Cliff Richard – how these two never got married, I really do not know, because judging by this video from Olivia’s Hollywood Nights TV Special recorded six months earlier in April 1980, and before the worldwide release of this song from the Xanadu soundtrack, the snog at the end of the video was a moment of pop heaven, especially as TOTP showed the video in full here in October 1980. Cliff somehow remains single to this day and with his 75th birthday just celebrated this month.
Barbra Streisand – great to see the video, not only in full, but also without Legs & Co, so that we could concentrate on the other two lovebirds on the show, ie, Barbra Streisand and Kris Kistofferson. I thought Kris was married to Rita Coolidge since the 70s, so where did Streisand come in?
I think when Cliff revealed a while back he'd been living with his boyfriend for a number of years might explain why he never married a woman. Wasn't he going out with Sue Barker at the time of this episode, anyway?
DeleteThe clips of Barbra Streisand with Kris Kristofferson were taken from the film 'A Star Is Born'. Similarly, the scenes featuring Ryan O'Neal were culled from 'What's Up Doc?'
DeleteTHX, I don't agree regarding Cliff's orientation. It must have been his hectic work lifestyle and the prospect of a long-distance relationship that got in the way of a steady relationship with Olivia.
DeleteThe body language on this video suggests Olivia was very attracted to him, certainly by the kiss at the end, which was no peck on the cheek by any means, and they certainly would have been pop's perfect couple if there was no long distance relationship between the UK & Australia, and this is perhaps why he may have turned down Olivia in favour of Sue Barker, if in fact Barker was in his life at this point.
about 10 years earlier i think olivia had been one of cliff's "beards"
DeleteDory - ONJ was living in the States by this time, but that would still have been an impediment to a relationship with Cliff, on the doubtful assumption that there was one.
DeleteWell, I'm not here to shatter any illusions Dory, but maybe take a look at a little film called Pillow Talk next time it's on TV (!).
Delete20-odd years ago i worked with a woman who had previously worked at the beeb in the 60's/70's. she told me with utter conviction that when she attended beeb parties she would see cliff hanging out with his gay male friends, with not the slightest bit of interest in the ladies. you may call that idle tittle-tattle and gossip, but i also once heard from another ex-beeb employee that he caught rolf harris in his dressing room with a young boy admiring his "didgeridoo". i was somewhat sceptical of that story when i heard it at the time, but look how that turned out...!
DeleteThe dull roar of the audience is a misstep, and Adam and the Ants were barely audible over it. Having a bit of trouble with his seagull feather, there.
ReplyDeleteOdyssey, they look so sad in this video, in spite of their Earth Wind and Fire-style clobber.
Bad Manners, just noticed the harmonica player spends the whole performance in a huge cooking pot. Could they not get a dinner jacket to fit Buster? His sweatshirt is a bit sartorially disappointing.
Not much point in the Legs & Co routine this week seeing as how we could hardly make them out from that distance and through those special effects, and Dame Dave was drowned out by the audience. Bit of a shambles, but at least they acted out the turning to the left and right through the medium of dance, as is only correct.
Sheena Easton, how's he supposed to take your picture if you keep moving about? Always thought ending the chorus not with lyrics but with an "ooh ooh ooh" was pretty weak, but it's OK as disposable pop.
Olivia and Cliff, not one of the highlights from Xanadu, a bland ballad and the video could have done with Buster's rocking chair for them to sit on in time with the music. Nice to see the audience slow dancing (did the studio turn the lights on at the end?), because it meant they shut up for a while.
A new variation of clips for Babs, with some odd candid shots of her and Baz mixed with bits of A Star is Born, presumably because with that beard and barnet Kris Kristofferson looks a lot like him. Song's classy enough, but made no impression on me at the time, definitely one for the mums.
Next week should by all rights be introduced by Griff Rhys Jones in his "Hey Wow" mode, he'd keep the crowd in check. Colin Berry must have been wondering why he showed up, I kept expecting him to read out the votes from the British Jury.
Olivia and Sir Cliff certainly seemed to have been made for each other. Had they married, maybe he would have become a bigger star in the US - who knows?
ReplyDeleteLegs delivered a sterling performance to one of Bowie's all-time classic hits. The models' outfits in the superimposed film were not unlike those that they would sport in their interpretation of Lennon's 'Starting Over' a few weeks later. However, their routine to Bowie's smaller hit 'Up The Hill Backwards' - which we may well see on BBC4 in 6 months' time - was somewhat puzzling; were they meant to be Native Americans, or Middle Eastern belly dancers, or Spanish flamenco dancers at rehearsal? It's currently available on YT, so I'll leave you to decide.
Stephanie Mills - once married to Shalamar's body-popping pioneer Jeffrey Daniel - deserved to be more successful than she was in the pop field, though she continues to work steadily as a musical theatre actress and inspirational singer.
'Woman In Love' was the legendary Barbra Streisand's only British No.1 single, but the 5th for the brothers Gibb as songwriters. Their 6th would come in '86 with Diana Ross's 'Chain Reaction', but they would not hit the top again as performers until '87 with 'You Win Again' - in which they appropriated the thumping bass drum pattern from Lindisfarne's 'Meet Me On The Corner'. The Gibbs weren't the only megastars to borrow this idea from the Geordies, though - remember Queen's '39'?
Stephanie Mills is regarded as a one hit artist, but she did actually manage three consecutive mugshots at number 29 with "The Medicine Song" in 1984, the promo video for which shows her doing some very light Danielsesque moonwalking at the 1:40 mark.
DeleteThe video of Olivia & Cliff for this classic duet was lifted from Olivia's TV Special recorded a few months earlier in Hollywood. It also features a duet with Sir Elton John, doing Candle In the Wind with Olivia, which was never shown on British TV, considering Sir Elton is British.
ReplyDeleteThe full show is on this link:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x10kqm9_hollywood-nights-olivia-newton-john-elton-john-andy-gibb-gene-kelly-cliff-richard-tina-turner_music
this was a real non-show this week, and certainly one of the worst i can remember seeing. rather alarmingly i have several instances of non-recollection here: i have no idea who colin berry is/was (with his receding hairline allied to 5-years-out-of-date over-the-ears look he looks like a presenter from "playaway" or something), nor do i remember a couple of songs on the show. there was an amusing link where peter powell is surrounded by the audience, but one of them is far further in front of him than the rest, and spends the duration looking around in an obvious state of distress. pp's hand also encircles the waist of that glamourous-if-skinny model with the totp t-shirt at one point (thus no doubt prompting a frenzy of activity by the yewtree squad goons). other than that, not much else to comment on what with everything being repeats, bands who've been on before and videos...
ReplyDeletebowie/legs: perhaps the dame's greatest-ever effort, this was ruined by all the whooping and other noises going on. and when legs are superimposed they are wearing different costumes for no apparent reason
sheena: one i can't remember at all. sheena was looking good (in her glam/new romantic-style make-up and tight shiny pants) if not sounding good (with her usual shrillness and instantly-forgettable lightweight pop tune). it would have been brilliant had she mimed to "fashion" instead. was this actually a hit? i thought she followed up her first two singles with the "bond" theme that broke her big stateside and allowed her to escape what would almost certainly have been a famous-for-15-minutes career here ...?
'One Man Woman' was a hit, reaching No.14 in the UK and No.5 in Eire - though it rarely gets airplay these days. Sheena would reach her full potential circa '85, after splitting from her second husband Rob Light, relocating to Minneapolis and joining the Little Purple One's clique.
DeleteWilberforce - it was 9 to 5 that broke Sheena E in the States, where it somehow managed to get to number 1 (retitled Morning Train to avoid confusion with the contemporaneous Dolly Parton hit).
DeleteIf you don't know who Colin Berry is, you obviously had no trouble sleeping in the 80s.
Deleteif mr berry was a radio 2 DJ, then that explains my ignorance of him - having been subjected to the dreadful likes of terry wogan on that in the 70's when i was a teenager at home, there was no way i was going to listen to it through choice once i moved out!
DeleteThe odd thing about Colin Berry is that he was younger that a lot of the Radio 1 deejays but spent most of his time on Radio 2. Although he did read the news on Radio 1 for a while.
DeleteSheena's 'For your Eyes only' (for which she appeared in the opening credits uniquely) was her 6th hit in June 1981. We've still got the flop 'Take my time' and the ballad 'When he shines' to come.
Deletethanks sct - i don't remember those either, but somehow i don't think i'll be any the worse off for it...
DeleteHas anyone got the 6 November 1980 edition
ReplyDeleteHopefully Neil B will have it, though it often takes a couple of days for videos of Yewtreed shows to appear on his 4Shared site.
DeleteAnyone worked out how to download and save from Vimeo yet?
DeleteCan anyone help?
DeleteBama, you don't need to download from Vimeo. The show is on Neil B's 4Shared page, and you only need to make sure you have Adobe Flash Player installed on your computer, and then it will play automatically from this link:
Deletehttp://www.4shared.com/video/XKqERb_cba/TOTP_061180.html
Yes I've done that thanks. But I was actually referring to the other Yewtreed shows that are on Vimeo. It would be nice to download and keep those for future viewing. But when I do that they won't play in the Flash player.
DeleteKool and the gang debuts on it
ReplyDeleteWhat idiot thought it was a good idea to have ambient audience chatter drowning out the songs during the studio performances? It badly spoiled this show, and was particularly glaring during the Fashion routine, where I could barely hear the song above the hubbub (not that I like it very much, I must confess). Hopefully this gimmick was swiftly discontinued...
ReplyDeleteI'm not familiar with this Sheen Easton offering, but it was decent enough and well produced, though not in the same class as Modern Girl. The Cliff/ONJ duet is OK, but I found the video sickly sweet in the extreme, and it feels very odd to see Cliff indulging in romantic canoodling. The audience's attempts to dance to it were laughable, and some of them looked bored out of their skulls, doubtless incurring the wrath of Mr Hurll in the process. Still, at least there were no shamrock t-shirts present this week...
PP did a good job overall, though this endless plugging of the t-shirts is getting a bit tiresome. However, why on earth was Colin Berry there? Did Hurll have a masterplan to bring Radio 2 presenters on to TOTP? If so I can see why he swiftly abandoned the idea, as poor old Colin looked extremely nervous throughout and seemed to be perpetually jigging around, doubtless desperate to get back to the sanctuary of the Radio 2 studio...
Very odd? I think many men would like to be kissing Olivia around that log fire instead of Cliff. As if that wasn't enough, we then got to see Barbra Streisand kissing Ryan O'Neal and Kris Kristofferson in the same video at No.1 for the second week running.
DeleteOh the good times were now here in 1980, in a very romantic TOTP this week, if you also include Odyssey in the mix. Now where is that aftershave?
Given Cliff's normally chaste image, it did seem odd to me to see him lock lips with Olivia, but I guess it was all innocent enough!
DeleteWith Matchbox now at peak position this week at No.4, and clearly influenced by the Fonz of Happy Days, with the doting chick on stage, it is with great sadness to hear today of the death of Big Al (Al Molinaro) of Happy Days, aged 96.
ReplyDeleteAl was the kingpin of the show, as the gentle bar/cafe owner and cushion of all the antics of the Fonz and his followers at the famous Happy Days show, that was going regularly beside these TOTP shows in 1980, and up to 1984 when it finally ended.
"Goodbye grey skies, hello Blue, there's nothing can hold me when I hold you, things go right, they can't be wrong, rockin' and rolling all night long........"
061180 has turned up on 4shared
ReplyDeletehttp://www.4shared.com/file/LFPUMqMXce/TOTP__061180.html?
Thanks for flagging this up Steve. Unfortunately, it doesn't look as if you can watch this one without downloading it, and that is putting my anti-virus software on alert! If anyone can post this in a more accessible way, where you don't have to download, I would be very grateful!
DeleteGreat stuff Steve H. Who's Robert T.?
DeleteI also can't seem to download it without going through and installer programme which i don't know whether to trust or not.
DeleteThe safest way to upload is on WeTransfer, so if Robert T. is reading this, then please use We Transfer, or Vimeo, or Dropbox, so that we don't need to use 4shared!
Anyway, I found the first two minutes of the show on tube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2hThuwu2DA
I wouldn't download it from there as it ends in .exe which is always a bad sign as it could be a bit dodgy and may load and unwanted programme on your computer.
DeleteIt's easy to download from 4shared.Click on the download button left of the share button. Then click free download, wait 20 secs and it should auto download. You just have to ignore all the ads and other buttons
ReplyDeleteIt won't let me do it could it be put up on this page
ReplyDeleteThe trick with 4Shared.com is to create an account with them. It doesn't cost anything..you just need an email and set up a password.Once done you should have no problem downloading the shared files.Hope this helps everyone having difficulties with the site :)
ReplyDeleteFor those of you wishing to see the full intro of the Cliff/Olivia video missed off by TOTP (even in 1980), here's a clean copy which includes Olivia narrating in the start of the video by personally inviting Cliff to Hollywood for her TV Special.
ReplyDeleteWorth keeping this in your favourites folder:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npuQ_PSgilo
Firstly a word about those bloody tee shirts, they've been going on about them for three weeks now (four in un-Yewtreed time) but they're still not available until two weeks later. The BBC really were hopeless in those days with sell-through products. Even by 1985, I remember buying my mum an EastEnders calender from The Radio Times and it took about 4 weeks to arrive.
ReplyDeleteSecondly what a pitifully thin show this was. The audience turned up to see precisely one act in the studio - Adam and The ants - plus good old Legs dancing to Bowie. There wasn't even the unwelcome distraction of the Irish Nazis in their shamrock tee shirts. If I had been there I would have asked for my money back.
Interesting to see Radio 2 DJ Colin Berry co-presenting the show. He was also what they used to call a BBC staff announcer and could be heard reading the news on Radio 1 and 2 and doing voice overs on all manner of TV shows including The Generation Game and of course Eurovision. He frankly looks a bit uncomfortable in front of a cameras but gets a bit better as the show progresses.
A new performance by Stuart Goddard and co and it's the highlight of the show.I like guitarist Marco's faux Townsend windmill playing action
The video of Odyssey again. The lead singer has a few stray loose ends on her top which need snipping off.
A repeat of Special Brew. I liked Bad Manners at the time and bought a lot of their singles and their second album (which came with a free Buster ear stud!) and I even saw them live. But it struck me even at the time that unlike other ska bands, while they were fronted by a skinhead the rest of the band weren't really interested in the skinhead/two tone thing and were just having a bit of fun. The bassist Dave Farren looks a bit like a young Serge Gasinsbourg.
Colin Berry gives us some music news and then the charts followed by Legs dancing to Fashion (or "dancing it" as Colin says). A strange performance, all the close ups are done in stop frame slow motion overlaid on the static long shot and, as others have pointed out, the ambient crowd noises are so loud you can't hear the song.
The next section of the charts complete with back-to-front D for Adam and the Ants. I like the tall bloke in the leather jacket gently taking the piss out of Colin with his mad starey eyes routine when Colin introduces Sheena Easton. Colin is of course sublimely oblivious.
Something new at last - Sheena Easton - but it's on video. Not a bad video but I don't recall this song at all.
Then Cliff and ONJ also on video (of sorts). Another song I have no recollection of but it's quite good and I like this type of performnace which the American TV shows do so well. It is cheesy but it's classy.
A repeat of Showaddywaddy and then the Top Ten. It's weird that they are still using still pics when they have footage of the acts. So this week we see a clip of the Matchbox video but we get a still pic of OMD when they were on the show last week. Why not have all moving images? Who decides these things?
We're back to Diana Ross territory with a rotten scrapbook video for BarBra Streisend made up of clips of old movies and panned still pictures. But it goes to show that in those days it didn't seem to matter - you could get to Number One purely on the strength of a good song.
And play out as we came in with Stephanie Mills sans Shamrock Nazis. This proves that the first shot of the show is actually taken from the end to allude to a continuous so-called 'party atmosphere'. If this was the BBC's idea of a party no wonder Jona Lewie spent all his time in the kitchen.
And finally what that horrible bit of business Peter Powell did with the pretend tossing of the coin deciding who gets which TOTP Tee Shirt Girl??!! And just when I was starting to like him.
Aaaaargh! Don't mention Jona Lewie!!! He'll be back in a few weeks time with a song which would be good to hear again if we hadn't heard it for 35 years but we HAVE heard it since then. Quite a few times.
DeleteMe, I'm looking forward to 1981 (if the BBC is willing) when the music starts to pick up again. Not that there's anything wrong with the music we're hearing now, it's just that nothing really clicked with me back in the day.
Enjoyed this show too and surprised myself a little also…
ReplyDeleteAdam and the Ants – I first saw two drummers featured in Genesis live performances, however Phil and Chester these two guys ain’t! Check out the album ‘Seconds Out’ for the brilliant live two drummers solo between ‘Dance on a Volcano’ and ‘Los Endos’ before they got carried away in later years and made ‘em too long. Anyway, Stuart and the insects never did it for me and still don’t.
Odyssey – Hey I’ve been rather dismissive of this group in previous posts due to the awful ‘Use it up and wear it out’ (which I still think is awful). However, I decided to hold off the FF button on this occasion and listen to ‘If you’re looking for a way out’ in full, and I have to admit it’s rather good. Dory and Co. you were right!!
Bad Manners – Speaking of FF…
David Bowie – Nothing special really. Dance routine not too bad and matched the song theme but I just don’t think it’s a great song.
Sheena Easton – I’d really forgotten this song. Now I know why.
ONJ & Cliff – I love the Xanadu soundtrack. I haven’t seen this video since 1980 and boy the chemistry between ONJ and Cliff is just amazing. It’s so romantic. Really looks like two people deeply in love. I don’t know whether this was down to a good producer or just that they were naturally close and comfortable making this film.
Showaddywaddy – At their peak, the boys released an awful single called ‘Trocadero’. I reckon if they have released this song at that time it would have gone top 10. By 1980 they were somewhat old hat, but seem to be having a good time nevertheless.
Barbra Streisand – Still sounds wonderful and here is the official video sans Legs & Co. Given what happened with M*A*S*H and Bright Eyes I am very surprised that this repeat showing hadn’t been tinkered with to remove the film clips. As with ONJ and Cliff, some very romantic moments on show.
err... i think the first act on totp featuring two drummers was one g*ry gl*tter...
Deletei never got to mention odyssey in my review: "if you're looking for a way out" is an okay ballad with a strong lead vocal, but after the horror of "use it up and wear it out" anything that followed had to better. apparently both sisters are no longer with us now but the band carries on fronted by one of their daughters. which seems a but weird to me. talking of 70's soul acts staffed by ringers, when i visited my hometown on the south coast recently you couldn't move for posters announcing that the stylistics were doing a local gig. they were pictures of four of them, one looking a lot older than the rest and presumably the only one from their 70's heyday. maybe he was the benched one in their first appearance when they started showing these old totps? but whoever he was he certainly wasn't russell thompkins jr. who to be frank was both the voice and the face of the stylistics with the rest utterly anonymous and interchangeable, so it all seems a bit of a con to me. but i don't suppose most punters who went to that gig would have known or cared!
Deletei remember going on school trips to london in the 70's and there was an arcade/mall in the west end called "the trocadero" - was the showaddywaddy song inspired by that, or vice versa? probably the former given that the single of that name barely scraped the top 30, thus causing the band to abandon their own material in favour of 1950's cover versions instead (which extended their chart career by several years)
DeleteI was at the Southend Cliffs Pavilion last night for a Steve Hackett show and there were plenty of flyers around advertising a 'Stylistics' gig in the future...
DeleteAbsolutely right Wilberforce, that bit where Russell Thompkins Jnr (b1951) comes in on 'You make me feel brand new' is just timeless. I don't think he features in the current line up sadly.
"Trocadero" made number 32 and was the middle of three 'Waddy composed singles which either just missed the mugshots or, in the case of "Take Me In Your Arms", stiffed completely, at which point their record company told them to release covers or lose their contract, at which point they hit paydirt with "Under The Moon Of Love" which, ironically, had already been recorded by Mud but not released as a single. How things could have ended up differently.
DeleteBurundi Stephenson Black - the act Adam and The Ants nicked their drum sound from - were surely the first act to feature two drummers in 1971. Actually there were 25 of them.
DeleteBig thanks to Neil B, who has made the 6 November show available so that you can watch it without downloading:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.4shared.com/video/XKqERb_cba/TOTP_061180.html
I should have added that the number 1 and end credits are missing, but the rest of the show is intact.
DeleteI managed to watch it on Neil B's site, by installing Adobe Flash Player latest version.
DeleteHas anyone got a clean copy including the No.1 and the end credits?
While we're thankful to Neil B. for his uploads of the Yewtreed shows, his copies tend to be without the No.1s, as has happened a few times before.
Camt find it could u display it on here
ReplyDeleteActually I found it and watching it
ReplyDeleteI managed to watch it 2 dory
ReplyDeleteGood evening, Top Of The Pops! Can we have your votes, please? And while we’re at it, could you turn that bloody ambient audience row off? I’d like to hear the music.
ReplyDeleteI thought Colin “punk rundown style” Berry bore a resemblance to Rory from Animal Kwackers. No doubt after his performance, Michael Hurll thought of a 50’s R&B legend – chuck Berry!
Performance of the night by Adam and the Ants. Not much competition, though, as previously pointed out. Why go to the bother of booking just one studio act and the Leggers? Couldn’t Michael hurl get Matchbox out of their trailer as a standby?
That Clare was definitely modelling an adult TOTP T-shirt. Didn’t she look fed up before Pete’s link to Odyssey, or was she trying to pout in a Goth manner? Talking of Odyssey, this sublime hit was once covered in pub singer mode by Nottingham group noir Tindersticks.
Of the chartbound hits mentioned by Rory…er, Colin, Geraldine Hunt’s disco smash peaked at 44 (it was the debut release on the Champagne label, marketed by DJM, so surprising it made the chart at all, really), Hazel O’Connor stalled at 41 and Liquid Gold made number 32. Colin was more on target with Kool and the gang before playing the safe card and naming some obvious future hits.
Shame we couldn’t hear the great guitar work on “Fashion” as mentioned by Pete due to the studio row. Shame we could hear all of Sheena’s deadly dull effort due to it being on video. Talking of videos, can you imagine the carnage Dollar would make of that Cliff and ONJ tune? And why were those idiots sitting in front of the screen in the studio and blocking some of the projection? Bring back the Popatron, or whatever one of our mates christened it a couple of years back.
So, Pete, Showaddywaddy are always making hits? This was the last week we saw them on TOTP with a single in the top 30. Their next four ‘hits’, in similar fashion (beep beep) to this single’s predecessor, all stalled between 31 and 39.
Finally, another dog (eat dog)’s dinner of a top ten countdown. Still no names or numbers, but a headache inducing graphic for some, not all, of the top ten.
arthur thanks for mentioning geraldine hunt - i'd never heard of her before but as a result have found a few decent disco efforts on youtube by both her and her son freddie james. also as a result of looking her up in the lower reaches of the charts for this week i came across a couple of interesting failures: an early single by the teardrop explodes called "when i dream", plus "the sit song" by the barron knights - a paean to famous-at-the-time dog trainer barbara woodhouse!
DeleteArthur you had me in a fit of giggles. I had never seen Animal Kwackers but I checked them out on You Tube and Colin Berry does look like Rory the lion. Both are a bit toothy and have the combination of being creepy and slightly scary at the same time.
Delete'Toppotron' (TM) was the big screen, Arthur. It was me that named it!
DeleteI forgot to mention, interesting to see two of the acts who suffered strike-hit number ones on this show, introduced by the same presenter who mentioned their chart toppers retroactively on the first show after the strike. All we needed was Don McLean for a reunion full house, but he never made the mugshots after "Crying" and I don't think he was on TOTP ever again.
ReplyDeleteI also forgot to mention, Colin referred to Liquid Gold as Adrian Baker's band. Adrian wasn't in the band on stage, but he wrote the songs and did the production work. Adrian had two hits in 1981 with Beach Boys tribute singles released under the alias of Gidea Park (near Barking, probably where he's from) and he was famously drafted into The Beach Boys after they were impressed by his efforts.
ReplyDeleteOh dear. Oh dear oh dear oh dear. I am usually a glass-half-full kinda guy - always trying to find something to like about people or things or places. Or 35 year old TV shows. Today though, I'm struggling. I mean there are plenty of negatives I could mention.............
ReplyDeletePresenters. Peter Powell - how do I loathe you? Let me count the ways. No charisma, no musical knowledge, no musical taste, no stage presence, no front-of-camera persona, terrible taste in clothes ( leather kecks hoisted over the navel) that horrible smile-in-the-voice way of talking, the fake laughing, the fake sincerity, the appalling links, the fake toss-the-coin bit to decide which one of the two lovelies had the (mis)fortune to cop for him.
Colin Berry. Don't think I have ever heard of him and on this showing its not hard to see why. A face for radio indeed.
Guest Interlopers. Just the one this week so I suppose that counts as a positive. However it was some sort of model from the front of Radio Times in a cross-media advertising blitz for the ToTP T shirt. 'Out in a few weeks'.
The music. Only two decent tunes this week - Adam & The Ants and Dame David Bowie both of whom were subject to the crowd noises mentioned several times above.
The audience - fifty percent bored rigid, fifty percent 'look at me I'm on telly' morons.
The scores -Powell cops for a 2 as does the show. An absolute nadir - the likes of which we ,surely, wont have to experience again.
I'm not a robot.
Shaky, I think your favourite presenters 'with charisma and musical knowledge' would have been be Richard Skinner and Paul Gambaccini.
DeleteCertainly Skinner did get his way onto presenting next week's show with Saville, but I don't recall Gambaccini ever getting to present TOTP, as for me he is best musical brain of all time, apart from Julie Joanne Bevan on this blog of course.
Paul Gambaccini did present at least one show which was the superb Christmas 1981 extravaganza - at least he co-hosted it with ALL the other Radio 1 deejays. Sadly we won't get to see it because it features DLT and JS but it's on YouTube.
DeleteAccording to the bespoke Popscene website, Paul Gambaccini was a TOTP presenter or co-presenter five times between December 1981 and December 1989.
DeleteDespite his inexplicable love of LiverpoolFC, John Peel would get my vote of fave presenter - especially when coupled with Kid Jensen. Gambo and Skinner were also good hosts, as were Messrs Mayo, Goodier and Read.
Deleteah, saint peelie! am i alone in an emperor's-new-clothes manner thinking the guy was a charlatan and a fraud who shamelessly leapt aboard any musical bandwagon going (late-60's psych & prog, late-70's punk, late-80's dance music - none of which had anything on common with each other) just to be seen as cool by the kidz? and don't forget the contrived cod-scouse accent, when in reality the guy was somewhat of a toff!
DeleteAs the late, great John Walters said, Peel was such a fixture of the British (and world) music scene for so long because he had "young ears", meaning he had the right state of mind to be open to new forms of music, unlike the rest of us whose musical taste stops developing about the age of 18. I listened to him for years, and he didn't always like the new stuff, he didn't "get" Britpop at all, for example, aside from Pulp who he had been championing for years. His influence is huge.
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