Tonight's show is barking mad!
9-9-82: Presenter: Peter Powell
(29) EVELYN KING – Love Come Down
A bubbly start to the show from the champagne queen with what became her only top ten hit peaking at number 7.
(4) DIRE STRAITS – Private Investigations (video)
This first single, taken from their huge number one album Love Over Gold, peaked at number 2.
(40) WONDER DOG – Ruff Mix
Zoo become pampered pooches but Wonder Dog's chart walkies ended at number 31.
(44) NATASHA – The Boom Boom Room
The follow up to Iko Iko but it went no higher than number 44. But edited out of tonight's 7.30 showing.
The edited out JK bit:
(US CHART) MELISSA MANCHESTER – You Should Hear How She Talks About You (video)
(US CHART) JOHN MELLENCAMP – Jack And Diane (video)
(US CHART) CHICAGO – Hard To Say I’m Sorry (video)
(50) GILLAN – Living For The City
This Stevie Wonder cover was Gillan's final hit and number 50 was its peak.
(17) SHALAMAR – There It Is
A second Zoo routine tonight to help Shalamar to their third top ten hit of 1982, reaching number 5.
(19) DAVID CHRISTIE – Saddle Up ®
His only hit, peaking at number 9.
(11) SHAKIN’ STEVENS – Give Me Your Heart Tonight ®
Now at its chart peak.
(1) SURVIVOR – Eye Of The Tiger (video)
Second of four weeks at number one.
(5) ROCKER’S REVENGE – Walking On Sunshine (crowd dancing) (and credits)
This Eddy Grant cover went up one more place.
September 16th 1982 is on next.
An edition decidedly lacking in lustre, and even the normally ebullient PP seems more subdued than usual, though that's not necessarily a bad thing. He hesitates a couple of times, and messes up his intro to the Zoo routine, but overall this is one of his better hosting jobs.
ReplyDeleteDid Evelyn King get her "Champagne" moniker because she had a bubbly personality? She looks a bit lonely on that stage, but this is a very professional performance of a decent pop-dance number - she also sounds a bit like Michael Jackson's female doppelganger in places. Private Investigations is one of Dire Straits' finest moments, and easily the best track on this show, so why does it get cut off before it reaches the best bit? The video is suitably moody, if a little cheap-looking.
To add insult to injury, Knopfler and co are curtailed to make way for a very ruff piece of music indeed. I seem to be making a habit of hearing these sorts of records lately, as I had the misfortune to catch a Ray Stevens-orchestrated version of In the Mood the other day that was performed by chickens! In any case, the most notable thing about this barking mad performance (sorry, I can't stop punning today) is that Simon Cowell is apparently in the Wonder Dog costume, thus showing his embrace of the lowest common denominator began very early! Natasha then turns up looking like she has come straight from the nearest red light district. I hate to admit it, but this is actually quite a catchy little record - I assume a "boom boom room" is something a bit saucy?
We haven't seen Gillan for a while, but unfortunately here they are with a deeply ill-advised cover of one of Stevie's very best. They somehow manage to strip all the power and distinctiveness out of the song, and turn it into a totally generic hard rock track; thankfully, they would split up by the end of 1982. The plodding nature of the show then continues with a rather forgettable Shalamar effort, which isn't a patch on their previous two singles. Sadly Jeffrey is not around this time to dance, so we have to make do with Wesley and Julie from Zoo, who certainly don't disgrace themselves, and wisely avoid trying to moonwalk!
After that it's repeats all the way to the end, when Wesley and Julie are joined by some uncredited Zoo members for another crack at Walking on Sunshine. Incidentally, DLT has not been completely erased from history by BBC4 after all, as you could see him lurking right at the back during the repeated David Christie performance...
Evelyn was called Champagne because it was her favourite drink. True story. Peter Top Deck Powell should have really told us that.
DeleteThanks THX - I guessed it would be a fairly prosaic explanation!
DeleteI'd imagine PP's favourite tipple was Sunny Delight, all those e numbers would explain his usual exuberance.
DeleteAccording to an interview I read with her circa 1977 when she had her first hit with Shame, Evelyn King got her nickname because she had a habit of blowing saliva bubbles as a teenager. She was given the nickname by a couple she used to babysit for.
DeleteNo wonder she revised that story!
DeleteDavid Christie I thought looked too much like the lead singer of Level 42, but does not mime anywhere near as good as Level 42.
Deleteer dory i pointed out the mark king resemblance the last time mr christie was on the show...
DeleteThis will be a very short edition for me to watch. Probably only two songs I’ll bother watching completely, five where I’ll dip in and watch as much as I can stomach, and three repeat FF’s near the end.
ReplyDeleteThat Ray Stevens chicken effort actuallymade number 31 over here, and it was released in the US under the pseudonym Henhouse Five Plus Too.
A boom boom room is slang for a prostitute’s, erm, office.
Thanks for the info Arthur - it doubtless helps to explain Natasha's choice of attire...
DeleteGillan's HM treatment of Stevie's 'Living For The City' works quite well. His songs, like those of The Beatles and the brothers Gibb, are evergreens that can be imaginatively adapted without sounding absurd. I remember Blue Mink lending 'You Are The Sunshine Of My Life' a reggae flavour on a few TV variety shows in the 70s.
ReplyDeleteAs John points out above, Wonder Dog (described as "UK, canine vocal group" in The Guinness Book of British Hit Singles) is an early example of Simon Cowell's preference for commercialism over artistic quality. Forward to '86, and his Fanfare label would release Sinitta's 'So Macho', with its irritating overuse of orchestral hits.
Moving swiftly on, post-disco was as strong as ever with Evelyn King, Shalamar and Jacques Pepino aka David Christie all taking the chart and the clubs by storm. At long last, one of Eddy Grant's overlooked early solo classics became a smash in the hands of Arthur Baker's studio aggregation, Rocker's Revenge. Let's hope Raw Silk's appearance with 'Do It To The Music' will not be Yewtreed.
Spoiler alert - Julie, you're in luck regarding Raw Silk.
DeleteThanks, Arthur. I've just discovered that Wonder Dog was a GERMAN project promoted in this country by Simon Cowell, who issued 'Ruff Mix' on his own Flip label.
DeleteI suspect Simon Bowel had his mind set on a portion of those Tweets millions.
DeleteP.S. Have you noticed that 'Walking On Sunshine' uses only two chords, namely A-flat major and A-flat minor? It reminds me somewhat of The Temptations' 'Papa Was A Rolling Stone', which uses only one chord: B-flat minor. It is a testament to the musical geniuses of both the Whitfield/Strong team and Eddy Grant that both songs have become all-time classics of R&B.
Deleteyou could say that disco/funk/dance stuff is much more about the groove than the tune, so using just one chord isn't that remarkable in that field in my opinion. i do remember that nilsson (harry that is - not dennis!) wrote and recorded a couple of songs with no chord changes (deliberately i think). one was a US hit called "coconut" but i can't remember what the other one was called
DeleteDid anyone else see the repeat of That's So 1982 on C5 last weekend. It gave a real flavour of the year - lots of great news clips and music, it reminded me of the 1980s BBC show The rock 'n' Roll Years. It made a good companion for this run of TOTPs.
ReplyDeleteI forgot to ask - having looked at that studio checklist, does anyone know who Pinki was and what their audience warm-up routine consisted of?
ReplyDeleteSeemingly Pinki was one of the black male Zoo dancers, eg he played one of the wedding guests when Godley and Creme did Wedding Bells. He has been credited in the end credits a few times
DeleteNot sure what the warm up consisted of but I expect he led the crowd to get dancing ahead of the start of the show.
Thanks, Bama. I was really hoping he'd do a stand-up comic routine, like they used to give the captive audience prior to recording comedies and game shows!
DeleteA mixed bag, as they say. Evelyn King stays off the champagne for her classy bit of pop soul, a bit "dancing around the handbags" but nicely performed and well done for not falling off those precipitous heels.
ReplyDeleteAll the way through this Dire Straits video I was thinking, they're going to cut off before the instrumental break that everyone bought it for, aren't they? True to form, those bass notes start and the clip ends! Anyway, video's a bit naff and underfunded, but it's an atmospheric tune even if Mark's vocals are too low in the mix.
Something else that's dire, Simon Cowell attempting to get his reign of terror underway. It would go down well at a furries convention I suppose, and that's what it resembles, but it's the equivalent of a tatty trinket bought at a fairground.
Natasha's song sounds like its writer had a great line he wanted to use, but couldn't think up anything else to go with it, so just went, what the hell, I'll repeat the cool line over and over and that'll do. Not a hit, you say? Fancy that.
If not for Cowell, Gillan would be the worst thing on this show, a horrendous cover of Stevie Wonder that sounds like a parody. Actually it sounds like one of those contributions to a hard rock covers album not very famous American bands like to do, "A Tribute to U2" or something similar. No one in their right mind would prefer this over the original.
So now we can identify Julie and Wesley out of the Zoo line up, well, it's nice to put names to the faces. A Shalamar hit much in the same vein as Evelyn King, bit o' class to dance to at the local club.
After that, three repeats in a row, which is a bit off in spite of one being the number one, therefore unavoidable. Was it the Guardian Angels who were those New York Subway vigilantes in the 80s? They wore a beret too.
host: pp momentarily forgets one of the band names in his intro, which is not an auspicious start. and he still pronounces depeche mode with an "A" at the end. and every single hit in the chart countdown is delivered in exactly the same way i.e. at (chart no) (song) from (act) with no variation whatsoever which is pretty boring and shows distinct lack of imagination or forethought
ReplyDeleteevelyn king: this has all the acoutrements of the post-disco/80's club sound i.e. drum machine/synth bass/other bright stabbing synth noises, but like her disco effort "shame" (released about 5 years earlier when she was only about 16 to my recollection) it's something i can't like wholeheartedly. and as usual a solo singer on a stage looks a bit rubbish (if you don't have a band, then get some dancers around you to make things a bit more interesting. or even a plantpot or something)
dire straits: by far the best thing they ever did in my book, but it would have been better had it been an instrumental than a backdrop for mr knopfler's film noir-style ramblings. but at least he spared us the "singing" this time!
wonder dog: it's actually not too bad backing-wise, but i have an aversion to dogs barking in any form so it was strictly move-it-on time for me. but just what is the woman in the white furry rubber rings dress-thing supposed to be? if you are into this kind of novelty nonsense then i would personally recommend the singing sheep (the "guinness book of hit singles" categorised that as "computerised sheep noises"!)
natasha: talking of which, it's the return of our favourite mutton-dressed-as-lamb. and she's even more daring than ever in her leather mini skirt that we can almost look right up at the beginning (calm down dory!), but obviously all to no avail given the lack of tune and the musical mishmash of do diddley and adam ant leftovers. at least she had a band on stage with her this time though - take note ms king!
gillan: i thought this rock treatment of a lesser stevie wonder track was actually fairly well done. not that i'd ever want to listen to it again though. sadly ian has obviously been nowhere near a hairdressers since the last time he was on the show
shalamar: slightly more old-school than the evelyn king effort, and nowhere near the class of "a night to remember". and no sign of jeffrey either this time which doesn't help. but did he ever actually sing lead on any of their tracks?
obvoously that depech-A mode rather than depech mode-A!
DeleteI quite liked the Wonderdog track as a welcome novelty record, despite having no recollection of this at the time. The tune itself is very catchy, even without the barking, and as for Julie from Zoo (the Lois Lane for this week's Superman, I mean Wonderdog), the white furry ballet-looking dress was enough to get the lion on that dance floor to fight for this foxy chick a losing battle with Wonderdog, who eventually whisks her away. Woof woof!
DeleteAs far as Natasha goes, I was already having a tasty starter with Julie of Zoo on the Wonderdog track, and then was immediately served up a jaw-dropping main course of Natasha in a daring miniskirt showing her hot body for the TOTP regulars like us. Have no recollection of this track at the time.
DeleteThe show gets off to a great start with Love Come Down. Loved this track at the time. Strange that they decided to put Evelyn King on a stage rather than in the round like they did with Junior. She would have benefited from as few dancers in the background but still a good performance.
ReplyDeleteThe lighting this week is very dark and a lot of what's going on can't be seen properly. The Beeb were clearly trying to save money on electricity that week. The show is also very tightly edited, a lot of the songs ending early.
Can I just say here that I never understood the appeal of Dire Straits. They seemed to command huge respect on what were a handful of very average singles. Private Investigations is a bad ideas made bad being Bob Dylan meets John Williams. It's not very tuneful and is incredibly BORING.
Wonderdog I thankfully had no memory of until recently when I read about the Cowell connection. I certainly don't want to see this again. How Cowell can profess to be an arbiter of musical taste on the strength of this debut is beyond me but seemingly he's proud of it.
I like the way the session musicians in Natasha's band are miming to HER backing vocals. Very odd.
Gillan, not really my sort of thing but I get why some people like it. Interesting choice of song to cover but not a patch on the original.
I have a soft spot forb There it Is because it reminds me of someone I knew at the time who I had taken a long time to find. Sadly it didn't last. Not a bad dance routine but they should have got Jeffrey back to do his stuff.
It's a good job Jacques Pépino didn't opt to call himself John Christie, might not have had the same appeal.
Another repeat with Shaky. I've often wondered what the crowd do when they play a repeat, do they dance or are they standing looking at a screen?
Survivor surviving at the top. The video with the bit of them marching down the street is almost a blueprint for The Verve's Bittersweet Symphony. Maybe they should have bumped into a few passers by
And then a good play out with Rockers Revenge and Zoo inventing the dance offs that became popular in the late 1980s.
John Christie!!! Remember when Noel Edmonds predicted big things for him in 1977 and we never saw or heard him again?
Deletei think bama means the serial killer rather than the obscure 70's pop star...
DeleteThat's the one. There's a drama about him on the BBC next week.
DeleteI nominate 10 Rillington Place as the most oppressively depressing British film ever.
Deletethe guy hid three of his victims in his kitchen! a bit similar to dennis nilsen (who was of course "active" at the time of the original broadcast of these current re-runs) who stored body parts in his fridge. i have to admit that after i moved to north london in the mid-80's, i was once driving in the muswell hill area and felt compelled to take a detour down cranley road in order to go past/look at his flat where he disposed of his victims down the drains...!
DeleteI do question why the Beeb feel the need to retell the Rillington Place story, but I guess the British public's appetite for voyeurism is as strong as it ever was...
DeleteYeah, it's usually ITV who obsess over true crime dramas.
Deleteyes, i remember watching one of those semi-doc/semi drama things on nilsen a while back. i wonder if the americans (who of course have a far higher concentration of serial killers, mass murderers and general wackos than we do) are as much fascinated by such things?
DeleteJudging by the huge popularity of Law and Order, which bases its scripts on real cases, I'd say yes.
DeleteWhat an odd show - some of these repeats look pristine, but this seemed like one of those 'propped open a store cupboard' reels given the poor picture quality (and not just because the lighting was quite low!) plus Peter Powell seemed half-asleep. As for the content....
ReplyDeleteEvelyn King - It's alright I guess. I've never got that excited about this one. But it's miles better than...
Dire Straits - I don't dislike all of this stuff but I'm going to go against the grain on here and say that I find this incredibly boring. Somehow, it's their biggest hit isn't it?
Wonder Dog - Now...weirdly, I remember seeing this at the time so it must have made some impression. There is now way that it's Simon Cowell in the blue head at the beginning doing the dancing though - that just has to be one of Zoo. I do believe that it's him with the full 'superhero' costume at the end though.
Natasha - She still looks ropy, and so is the song unfortunately.
Gillan - And I thought (hoped) they'd gone. Awful.
Shalamar - 'Ferret Ears' as some might have misheard it. Marginally less of a housewife classic than their other big hits I suppose.
Then a couple of repeats of Yewtreed stuff (I do like the Shaky song) and bloody Survivor.
My favourite bit of the entire show was when Peter Powell congratulated David Christie for his excellent English. Which conjured up a lovely image of him turning up sounding like Arthur Bostrom in Allo Allo singing 'Soddle Ip And Ride Your Peony' or something. Honestly Peter, what did you expect?!
It was indeed somewhat surprising Noax that Dire Straits were already at No.4 with a song totally against the grain of the TOTP dance-party atmosphere that we were now getting very accustomed to.
DeleteThe video which in full is just under six minutes in duration, is among my iTunes video collection,
and is a classic, but does come across as very pale when you compare with their other hits. This probably explains why TOTP could only take so much of this as part of the airtime available for the show, with a song this slow.
That's funny, I'm not a big DS fan (though I have heard Brothers in Arms, because it was the 80s), but I really like Private Investigations. It sets a scene very nicely and takes its time in unfolding.
DeleteIt is more for the connoisseur of fine music and album track offerings, but I'm not sure it is for the singles chart, and quite surprised that it made No.2 on the singles chart with such a sound.
Deletetake away the guitar skills of mark knopfler, and all that's left with dire straits is plodding meat & potatoes mainstream rock featuring a guy who can't carry a tune in a bucket! i always think that the bassist is the luckiest man in pop, as he made millions despite being a journeyman at best with his predictable and unimaginative playing...
DeleteNot much time to fire off comments before the next ep - and most of the thoughts I DID have, have been mentioned. But, for what its worth. . . .
ReplyDeleteEvelyn King. Lurve this. A proper 80s dance classic with a very Jam/Lewis sounding backing (years before their time). One of the best show-openers for many a year. Not sure what the phrase 'you make my love come down' actually means though.
Dire Straits. Not a patch on Sultans Of Swing or Romeo & Juliet and - in typical ToTP fashion - the best part of the record is cut off. Also Knopfler's vocals seem to be even lower in the mix than I remember. In the video Knopfler writes left-handed but plays right-handed. Unusual.
Natasha. I'm gonna hold my hand up and admit that I really like this. Yes, its simplistic, both lyrically and musically, but so what?
Gillan. How to describe this. So, you're at your cousin Terry's wedding and your 60 year old Auntie Sheila is handbag-dancing to Dancing Queen, when the DJ does a musical left-turn and throws on 'I Wanna Sex You Up' and instead of siting down Auntie Sheila drags Uncle Tony up and not only sings along but grinds herself up against him while licking her Maybeline-coated lips. That.
A couple of Zooologists do a proper dance to Shalamar, with 'proper' moves and none of that acrobatics that. . . oh. He couldn't resist, could he?
And then a load of repeats as the show runs out of steam.
Scores. Smile-In-His-Voice wasn't at peak irritant levels this week but his chart rundown was abysmally boring and his faux 'serious' expression leading into Dire Straits made me laugh out loud (or lol as I believe the youngsters say). 4
Musically we have high points from Ms King and Natasha and low (very low) points from Gillan and that dog thing - 6
i forgot to mention with the evelyn king track: what about the "doo doo doos" just before the chorus - couldn't whoever responsible be bothered to write any lyrics to fit? or maybe they'd just ran out of ideas. or perhaps they'd just heard "save a prayer" and thought "those doo doo doos sound really good"!
Deleteas i've menntioned in another recent entry, i'm also left-handed. and i also play a guitar in the standard manner, even if perhaps it was because that was the way i learned. but whilst doing so it certainly never occurred to me that there was any problem playing that way, and in fact i later realised that it doesn't make sense for lefties to play them "upside down" as it is the left hand that does most of the work by making the chord shapes! i also use cuttlery in the "conventional" manner (fork in left hand) as that also felt natural to do so. however i have to admit that i find it a bit odd that there are cricketers like stuart broad who bats left-handed and bowls right-handed!
DeleteDavid Gower batted left handed but played golf right handed.
DeleteI'm left handed, but bat right handed in cricket. Well, I stopped playing in my thirties, so I don't really care any more.
Deletei played golf right-handed, but that was only because (unlike a cricket bat) you could only hold it one way, and there were certainly no left-handed clubs around at the time for me to use! but what i did do was instinctively hold the club with my hands the wrong way around, which meant no matter how well i hit the ball, it always had a habit of being hooked to the left (and something that had to be factored into my swing stance accordingly)
DeleteA work colleague of mine is left-handed but plays guitar the 'normal' way round because, like Wilberforce, he learned it that way. I suppose that when you pick up a guitar for the very first time (and not influenced by seeing others play) there's no 'natural' way to hold it.
DeleteUnlike drums. We all know that well worn bit of trivia that there were two left-handed members of the Beatles. Now I can tap out eighths with my dominant (right) hand and hit '2' and '4' with my left but can't do it the other way round, so I think that Ringo is particularly amazing in this respect.
i also taught myself to play drums in the "normal" way (musically i'm a real jack-of-all-trades) for the same reasons i.e. that was the way they were always set up. it came to me quite naturally and easily, so it never even occurred to me swap them all around. does macca (who of course plays guitars and basses in the "cack-handed" style) play drums using the conventional set-up?
Deleteby the way, i didn't know there were two left-handed members of the beatles! as someone else has pointed out, both guitarists in UB40 played "left-handed". but were there any other bands that were notably sinister?
what i also think is a bit odd about lefties playing guitars upside down is that some re-string them so that they are the same order of pitch as a regular guitar, and others just learn to play with the original strings inverse in pitch too!
DeleteIf "Ruff Mix" wasn't quite your thing why not check out this classic instead -
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfsLB9Dnv1A
If "Ruff Mix" didn't quite cut the mustard why not check out this classic instead? -
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfsLB9Dnv1A
i have to admit i found the howling bits on "we can work it out" of some amusement! but what were cats and chickens and things doing there?
Deleteof course the idea of getting animals to "sing" on record was nothing new - it was just much easier to do that with the new fairlight technology than it was before. so you have to admire this pre-computerised effort from the 1950's on a technical level, even if it is utter novelty drivel:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzHQ_2XNsqA
For some truly awful dog barking and howling check out Pink Floyd's 'Seamus' from the 'Meddle' album. 'Shine on you Crazy Diamond' it ain't!
DeleteMy quickest skim-through of a re-run edition yet.
ReplyDeleteWhite handbags alert with a club classic from Evelyn King, who sold 250,000 copies of earlier single “Shame” in the UK despite it reaching no higher than number 39.
Sorry, I can’t stand Dire Straits apart from “Romeo And Juliet” and I can’t stand Mark Knopfler’s voice either. Is this the song where we missed the part where you hear the same bass note ad infinitum for about two minutes?
Cowell’s waste of space for a proper song was complete dog shit.
Talking of which, a ruff mix (see what I did there?) of apparel for Natasha, and the song did nothing for me either.
The most interesting part for me was the section that was cut. Melissa Manchester’s track reached number 5 in the US, but she holds the dubious record of the joint worst chart career in the UK, as she spent a single week at number 75 with “The Music Of Goodbye” in 1986. John Cougar’s US chart topper reached 25 over here and was the only UK hit single for the Riva label not released by Rod Stewart. He released other singles as John Mellencamp and John Cougar Mellencamp and was huge in America, but only made 34, 53 qnd 67 with other tracks over here. Chicgao’s track also made the top Stateside and number 4 over here.
Gillan’s take on Stevie Wonder’s song was a bit too fast and formulaic for my taste, and I didn’t like the way Ian sang “City” in the chorus when the original is “Sitaayyy”. A low range for Ian here, probably as he was about to pack up for a while due to vocal chord problems.
Nice routine by Zoo Lite for a Shalamar song too low in the mix and drowned out by bloody whooping. Talking of which, who were the uncredited dancers for the Rockers Revenge outro dance?
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DeleteJulie from Zoo gets a quick release from the arms of Wonderdog, to dance to Shalamar with Wesley who couldn't resist her charms (can you blame him?). Very nice dancing by this pair, so who needs Shalamar in the studio or even on video when we get this tasty dish served up?
DeleteAs if two appearance by her were not enough, we get a third serving, on the playout with Rocker's Revenge, one of the best dance floor classics of the decade to see us out, and an extra 40 seconds or so of this on the late night showing.
Just had another watch of this Wonderdog clip, and it seems to mirror the Fame video clip, not the one with Irene Cara appearing in it, but the first clip shown on TOTP with scenes from a New York street where someone ruffs up Bruno father, a taxi driver, destroying part of his taxi, and leading to a punch up in the street.
DeleteHere on Wonderdog we see the lion ruffing up Wonderdog, pulling off his glasses, and smashing them on the floor with his feet, before Wonderdog fights back flooring the lion and whisking his adoring Lois Lane off her feet.
Can anyone come to the rescue with the full show with the JK bit? Would be great to see the return of Chicago, absent from the UK chart since the first year of these BBC4 re-runs, i.e., a big No.1 in 1976 with "If You Leave Me Now." As if by answer here in Sep 1982, their long-awaited return on this JK slot was ironically called "Hard To Say I'm Sorry", not to mention the brilliant Jack & Diane by John Cougar Mellencamp.
ReplyDeleteFull version here
Deletehttp://www.4shared.com/video/EGJf0k73ce/Top_of_the_Pops_-_9th_Septembe.html
Nice one Steve H. This loaded within seconds. not bad for 4-shared. A new American history lesson on how America signifies the end of summer. Also, I don't recall Jack & Diane being a hit here in the UK for John Cougar Mellencamp.
DeleteAs for Chicago being No.1 in America with Hard To Say I'm Sorry, I just feel "sorry" (excuse the pun) that this song never made No.1 here, and I rate it above If You Leave Me Now which was their last No.1 and last hit prior to this in the UK in 1976.
A six-year absence for the brilliant Chicago from the British charts, but my what a fantastic single to return with in September 1982 on both sides of the Atlantic. Shame that the video was not ready yet on the JK slot, and like Eye Of The Tiger, we had to make do with scenes from the movie it was taken from. But the video is coming later this week on our blog episodes!
Thanks Steve H for providing the JK clip. I can't say the snatch we heard of that Melissa Manchester clip struck me as very interesting. Jack and Diane is probably the best song of the trio, but is very American blue-collar in sound and only managed to get to 25 over here. As for Chicago, by now they had long lost any claim to hard rock credibility, and this gloopy ballad leaves me very cold indeed.
DeleteI have now also finally caught up with the JK segments from 17 June and 5 August. Nice to finally hear a snatch of that Phoebe Cates song, and amusingly JK's interviews with The Go Gos and Christine McVie in LA were characterised by a notable reluctance from all the interviewees to talk to him, Belinda Carlisle especially...
Yeah, I noticed that clip with Belinda Carlisle being very uncomfortable around him. Was it cos she was in her sunbathing clothes and did not know him well enough, or because she found him unpleasant?
DeleteThat may well be the case - JK was very much an acquired taste long before his legal difficulties began.
Deletedid anyone actually like king in the first place? like a certain tracksuit-wearing and cigar-smoking disc jockey of our acquaintance, i think behind the public persona he was not a very nice man and a control freak. except wasn't even perceived as a harmless buffoon in the public eye, but as a clever dick. certainly every time i saw him on the telly back then i probably felt the urge to want to smash his leering face in with a lump hammer!
DeleteWell, nothing on TV makes me feel violent, but JK always had a thing for insulting the Scots which didn't exactly endear him to me. One of his affectations he adopted to lend him personality, one supposes.
DeleteWell I have watched this one out of sequence, but was it worth the wait? A hyped up PP gets us going with one of my least favourite records of the time…
ReplyDeleteEvelyn King – Love come down – This kind of record just went right over my head I am afraid. Evelyn does look like she’s enjoying performing it though.
Dire Straits – Private Investigations – Now to one of the very best singles of 1982 for me and I see some other folk share my worship! I loved Dire Straits so much that I bought the 10” single of this before I had even heard it and boy I wasn’t disappointed. A fantastic atmospheric piece with Mark Knopfler’s muttering and mumbling completely fitting the mood. To hear this song live was simply awesome. The lengthy track is not given a complete showing here as expected and I realised that I had never seen the complete video so I checked it out on YT. The girl featured I believe is Cherry Gillespie, formerly of Pans People. I don’t think anyone has made that observation already?
Wonder Dog – Ruff Mix – From the sublime to the ridiculous. I don’t know whether it was the synthesised barking, the dancing dog outfits or the fact that I had a cat sat on my lap for the entire duration of watching this but I just giggled the whole way through.
Natasha – Boom boom room – Rubbish room more like… Great subject matter, not.
Have now seen the JK bit and it’s certainly worth it. Melissa Manchester reminds me of Sheena Easton. The John Cougar track was a minor hit here and finally, yes Dory you’ve hit the nail on the head, Chicago’s ‘Hard to say I’m sorry’ is just fabulous! I love the way the full track segues into the next song ‘Get away’ on the album. The film ‘Summer Lovers’ incidentally was set in the Greek Isles and portrayed a three way relationship with and American couple – Daryl Hannah and Peter Gallagher and a French woman Valerie Quennessen. I haven’t seen it but expect I’ll check it out at some point even though it was panned. Another great track was at no.5 in the US – ‘Even the Nights are better’ by Air Supply….and we get Wonder Dog!
Gillan –Living for the City – Ah our old friends Gillan are back yet again. This time with an awful cover of a song that I was not really that keen on in the first place. Yuk!
Shalamar – There it is – No moonwalking Jeffrey this time so we get Zoo instead. I always thought that this was called ‘Dairylea’ until someone told me the actual title. I note above that it was ‘Ferret ears’ to Noax. Should have been one on the Buzzcocks ‘Indecipherable lyrics’ round!
David Christie – Saddle up – Repeat showing for the lasso twirling cowboy! Well spotted John G on DLT being in the background. I had forgotten that this was from a YT show so would have been ‘new’ for BBC4 viewers.
Shakin Stevens – Give me your heart tonight – I actually quite like this now having heard it a second time.
Survivor – Eye of the Tiger – Still sounds great. The 12” release of this came out some time after the UK chart run and featured the ‘Special extended European version, not previously available in Britain’ which ran at nearly six minutes and comprised mainly of bits repeated rather than any extra music; but I think the fade out was longer.
Rockers Revenge – Walking on Sunshine – Couldn’t listen to too much of this so ended abruptly!
Good Lord sct353, you are correct that Cherry Gillespie, formerly of Pans People and then Ruby Flipper till 1976, suddenly appeared no our screens again here in late 1982 on this quality Dire Straits video. Thanks for pointing pout this valuable piece of trivia that all us regulars overlooked. How could we, with all that pop experience between us?
DeleteIt was a case of doing your own 'private investigations' and well done on spotting this. Suffice to say that video is avaialabe for purchase for a mere £1.89 on iTunes. I purchased mine some years back, and only just noticed this interesting observation.
Blimey! I missed Cherry because I gave Dire Straits ten seconds before FFing it. I must have a proper look at the video now!
DeleteIt's actually a top quality video where Cherry plays the part of a sexy girl alone in her apartment, and trying to fend of a would be admirer stalking her, hence "private investigations" in the song title. Didn't I read before that someone on this blog had Cherry as his favourite bird on Pans People?
DeleteThat would be me! Just watched the video at work while no-one was around (luckily my PC's mute) and skimmed through the band shots to witness the lovely Cherry. There is one laughable bit, though, just before the five minute mark where she goes to turn the telly on but the screen appears before she grabs the telly dial!
DeleteMust admit I like the Gillan track.
ReplyDeleteI first heard it, when I saw the promo video, as part of a freebie when we first rented a video recorder back in November 1983.
Anyone remember Wienerworld's 'VideoPop' which featured Virgin signed acts of the late 70's / early 80's?
Besides Gillan's video(set in a job centre!), there was a couple from Mike Oldfield(Guilty & Shadow On The Wall), Culture Club early singles up to Karma Chameleon, Fat Larrys Band, The Skids, Devo with Crack That Whip, Heaven 17 with Come Live With Me with its Yew Tree inspired opening line , ' I was 37, She Was 17', amongst others.
Must admit I like the Gillan track.
ReplyDeleteI first heard it, when I saw the promo video, as part of a freebie when we first rented a video recorder back in November 1983.
Anyone remember Wienerworld's 'VideoPop' which featured Virgin signed acts of the late 70's / early 80's?
Besides Gillan's video(set in a job centre!), there was a couple from Mike Oldfield(Guilty & Shadow On The Wall), Culture Club early singles up to Karma Chameleon, Fat Larrys Band, The Skids, Devo with Crack That Whip, Heaven 17 with Come Live With Me with its Yew Tree inspired opening line , ' I was 37, She Was 17', amongst others.
it may have been morally questionable to have a teenaged girlfriend young enough to be your daughter, but 17 was legal back then to my recollection!
DeleteStill catching up... Thought Peter Powell was overselling the Ruff Mix pun. "What is it called?" I cried. Checking this post... Oh, THAT is what it is called...
ReplyDelete