The Rolling "Top of the Pops" BBC4 Revival thread.

Ah, been catching up via good old iplayer on the wii.

Old enough to remember these episodes quite clearly in some cases.

Sad that they haven't gone back far enough in time to have Sparks on.

Still, don't recall that Gilbert O'Sullivan song though I must have heard it then.

Oh, last I heard, they are definitely doing this run for a year.

After that? Who knows...

Still, don't recall that Gilbert O'Sullivan song though I must have heard it then.

He was long gone as commercial proposition by 1976. That song sounded like a demo, did artists have to re-record tracks? I know they had to re-record vocals, hence the ubiquity of the Ladybirds. But then other acts obviously just mimed to the record.

They did 'have' to.

A lot of them switched the tapes post-session, apparently.

ooooooo-oooooooooooooh Vienna it's Slik

It's Midge Uuuurrrr...

And Paul knickerless

Jesus Christ, superstar?

DLT looks like Badly Drawn Boy.

This is sooooo much better than last weeks....

Only one novelty act so far.

Shit Brotherhood Of Man are still number one...

They were there for 6 weeks.

The guy without the 'tasche wants to die.

I still fucking hate the last line of that song...not for the paedo connotations...just cos i hate it...

So, there isn't a TOTP this week, but there is a "Primal Scream" themed evening coming up on Friday.

AAAAAAAAAAARGH

No, the band, not the Janov therapy.

You could kind of see why Midge Ure ended up in Ultravox, I mean "Requiem", the title sounds an like Ultravox song. Slik were a pretty cool looking band by 1976 standards.

Oh, it was very Ultravox, for sure.

I got tickets to see them live in 1978, Top Rank, Reading, thanks to being at the Radio210 offices at the right time: The whole band were there, I met them all, and got the signed piccies, and for some reason that escapes me two free tickets and a bunch of discount vouchers. It wasn't full to say the least, and the support band, "Screemer", were perfectly competent early seventies pophairies that would lose their career path in the wake of punk...

That 1978 should be (Nov) 1976 (oops), timings at that point in history are crucial.

Mud go disco, urgh...

Didn't the guitarist write 'Can't get you out my head' by Kylie...sounds a bit like it...

Frankie Valli's tired performance there. He really got a boost from appearing in Grease in '78, didn't he.

Sometimes I think Elvis died just to avoid crappy cover versions like this.

DEVIL WOMAN!!!
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LP_YP0I7zZY/SoFziAfbpiI/AAAAAAAAC-c/RoLUJLbssFU/s200/RikMayall.png

the shadows have let themselves go...

Mud go disco

Surreal

the shadows have let themselves go...

Even by 1976 standards that was one ugly backing band.

Was there anything good in this episode? Apart from Cliff?

The iplayer only has the 30 min version!

Blimey, Robin Sarstedt, what was that all about? Sutherland Brothers/Quiver was quite nice, not enough guys with combovers in the charts these days.

Guessing Annie Lennox has superseded the Sutherland Brothers as Aberdeenshire's biggest chart act though

The Sutherland Brothers and Quiver were pretty great, a lot of quality 70s country rock/AOR tunes. Never heard the Suths on their own tho.

odd that they chopped the Stones out of the longer version.

Robin Sarstedt song was familiar. probably from Jane Russell in The Las Vegas Story.

i think claire grogan has heard that fox single.

The Sutherlan Brothers did the original of "Sailing", and I knew it before Rods version thanks to a k-tel compilation.

Well....'punk had to happen' is a tired old theme, but IF it was ever true then this weeks shows why. Robin Sarstedt - just die you seedy bastard. Sutherland Brothers and Quiver - a soundtrack for cruisin' down the Gateshead bypass in your Hillman Avenger. The singer (Gavin Sutherland?) had great hair though. Frankie Valli, who I maintain it is impossible to dislike looked like he hadn't slept for a year. Manilow - unspeakably awful, and why did he have the piano stool so high? He could barely reach the keys. JJ Barrie - nothing can really describe the horror of this record, although he looked like a decent enough bloke. The Mud record was utterly bizarre - I have no memory of this at all. Even though it was a bit of a disco death-rattle from the bubble-glam stalwarts, they at least seemed enthusistic about it. And bonus marks go to Dave Mount for doing the 'let's arse about on the telly' walk around his drum-kit. What else was there? Ruby Flipper - what did Pan's People do to deserve this fate? Only bright spot was Cliff - crackin' song that with a lovely electric piano sound. The band were hod-carriers even by TOTP session-men standards. They made Sutherland Brothers and Quiver look like arch sex gods in comparison. Oh and of course Abba. But they faded it in verse 2 - bastards. A dire week but at least they didn't show Hank Mizell or John Miles. And how bored was Noel throughout?

Back in 76, I was still watching TOTP as a 14yr old, along with OGWT, but I don't think I was listening to anything much from the charts. I had some Pink Floyd albums, I think I'd just discovered the Syd era LPs. I had a couple of Status Quo albums (Piledriver, Hello) some Bowie and T-Rex, Story of The Who, some K-Tel comps. Within a year I'd be spending my pocket money on scratchy singles in home-made sleeves made by bands barely older than myself from Belfast, Manchester, Deptford and Ladbroke Grove. Happy days, and yeah they did HAVE to happen.

(Imagine a bootmix of "Give peace a chance" with the lyrics of "Sailing" over the top of it)

xpost obviously, blimey thread's suddenly busy.

Two of SB and Quiver played with Pink Floyd - Tim Renwick and Willie Wilson.

And Bruce Thomas was in Quiver!! But not in SB&Q, I think.

Tim Renwick? Something to do with Bowie too?

Muso note - Cliff's bass player was playing an interesting Burns Bison bass. And he looked like a bison too. A bespectacled bison.

xpost - yes, Space Oddity-era IIRC

Re: SB+Q, I like this idea of two struggling bands joining together a la Dagenham & Redbridge or something

A bit like Bob Dylan and The Band, with a shared credit!

Or do I mean Cliff Richard and The Shadows, but ran backwards?

Was Robin Sarstedt related to Peter Sarstedt? Were they even their real names?

Yes, they were brothers. Also Eden Kane, who was actually Richard Starstedt

although, you are also right, Robin's first name was Clive.

I thought they looked alike but I was worried I was just being racist. I love Peter Sarstedt, I'd love it if a performance of this turned up on BBC4.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRyIiutZ8ck

> Back in 76, I was still watching TOTP as a 14yr old, along with OGWT

that's something else they should repeat, whistle test.

Compare to how Mark Owen always looks like he's having a great time.

Oh here's Damon - at least the crowd here are singing along.

Weller looking a lot like mr Spock there

odd set tonight. and the way the style council were set up seemed odd too, all on top of each other.

i don't remember this episode at all

um, was i watching a previous recording rather than one from tonight? they aren't following the published schedule because of the snooker and the epg won't let me go backwards and see.

Last night the schedule was snooker from 7pm until 10pm, then an episode from 1984 followed by one from 1980.

yeah, the one i watched was this from 83 which is in the recent list on iPlayer but must've been recorded before last night (the pvr bundles things of the same name together so it got bumped to top of the new recordings list along with the new one, which turned out to be 30 mins of snooker)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08fsfy0/top-of-the-pops-31031983?seriesId=unsliced

I daresay iPlayer will be fine, but if you were wanting to see "NY at the BBC" and didn't set yr TiVo to record Christine and the Queens, then... yr out of luck.

It wouldn't be TOTP if you didn't occasionally miss it because of the snooker.

i got a 2 o'clock showing of totp 1980 and 1984 which both turned out to be david byrne at the union chapel.

iplayer will be fine, not least because these were pre-delivered - it doesn't record off air unless the programme's live. sometimes this can be missing bits if the schedule's changed but it's generally tidied up on the next working day. (unless it's the snowboarding on the red button which was royally fucked up but there were whole days cancelled and rearranged by the organisers so it's hardly surprising)

1984 had the bunnymen, Will with his teardrop vox(?) 12 string.

1980 was the cure again and bad manners again.

(my facebook history for friday was me railing against the snooker exactly two years previously, for similar reasons)

The post-Diana week must be coming up soon? Was it even on that week? Many BBC things weren't.

Normal service is resumed next Friday with two consecutive episodes from January 1996 (plus episodes from 1987 and 1976). Diana's death wasn't until August 1997. So we're quite a way off.