Chart Music: the Top Of The Pops Podcast - #15: September 4th 1980 - BA Robertson’s Hairdresser Thinks It’s Fantastic

Episode Date: December 1, 2017

The latest edition of the podcast which asks: what is the least Mod Dungeons & Dragons character? This episode, Pop-Crazed Youngsters, has been cursed by the tang of man-flu and dodgy microphones, meaning it’s not at the usual hi-fidelity standard you’ve come to expect from Chart Music. But what an incident-packed go-around on the morbid carousel of Pop it is! There’s wave after wave of guest appearances from people who really shouldn’t have bothered, such as Cliff, his specky henchman Hank Marvin, and none other than co-host KEGGY KEEGLE HIMSELF facing down DLT in a perm-off. Thanks to Simon getting an unexpected birthday present, we have possession of a full shooting script of an episode from The Popses’ post-strike regeneration, and we try to break the codes therein. Musicwise, the Mod revival rides itself right off the cliff, Kelly Marie and Sheena Easton put on their best Bingo Jumpsuits, Cliff does his Danger Dancing routine next to a keyboard player in Alan Partridge shorts, Randy Crawford’s heartbreakingly brilliant performance is ruined by a vision mixer who makes her look like the alien off Alien, and Nicholas Lyndhurst, Martin Shaw and Dennis Waterman rule over the charts. Al Needham is joined by Simon Price and David Stubbs for a good hard leer at the autumn of 1980, veering off – as always – on tangents such as trying to be a 12 year-old Ace Face when everyone’s seen your Dad drag you out of a boating lake at Skegness Butlins, why adding the Poo-Poo drum machine over Joy Division records in clubs will never get old, having a good laugh at younger brothers who get beaten up in town for wearing the wrong badges, pathological hatred of Plastic Mods, and flares. And swearing, swearing, all the time swearing. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What do you like listening to? Erm... Chart music. Chart music. Hey up you pop crazed youngsters and welcome to the latest edition of Chart Music, the podcast that gets its hand right down the back of the settee of a random episode of Top of the Pops on Pit Deep. I'm your host, Al Needham, and as always I'm joined by two

people who are not afraid to pick up the droppings left behind by the hit parade with their bare hands. First up, the welcome return of Simon Price. Hey up, Simon. How are we? Hey, I'm all right, except I've got the common cold, so I'm going to be chugging strepsils like some kind of deranged junkie here. It's the hard stuff, I tell you. And my second guest is our dear friend who hasn't been on for a while, Mr David Stubbs. Hello, David.

That's right. Also with what appears to be a very common cold, but I'll try and keep the snot at bay and the mucus a mile away. So, anything to talk about, David, since we last met? How's your book coming along? Yeah, Mars by 1980. Yeah, it's pretty much done.

It's a pretty kind of invidious task to try and chronicle, supposedly, or to live up to a title, the history of electronic music. But it's really, it's not comprehensive. I mean, I've had to preempt in the intro, you know, the character, why haven't you included such a, I can't believe you'd write a book literally not include, blah, blah, blah. So I've tried to kind of preempt that in the intro. And it's just sort of angles and aspects. And it's not a techie thing.

It's really more about how electronic music is sat in the world, what it's meant to people, you know, the hopes and fears it's realised and stuff like that, rather than go too much into the, you know, how to make your own mini-moves and stuff like that. So who has not been mentioned? Well, I mean, I haven't really gone on an awful bundle on orchestral menus in the dark because I kind of feel that it's one of those

groups that, if they hadn't existed, it wouldn't have been necessary to invent them, sort of thing. You know, they're just somebody who were very prominent in kind of carrying forward synth-pop at a certain time, and Annie McCusker is a very good talker, but, you know, I'm just... Ah, typical. Typical anti-Skouse bias there from Stubbs. Yeah, I'm sorry about that.

Unfortunately, I do, yeah, it is, because I feel the same way about Echo and the Bunnymen in post-punk, really, that if they hadn't existed, then it wouldn't have quite, you know, even though I like them, that they don't feel kind of pivotal exactly. They're just, you know, so, well, controversy already. You with your Beaujolais-sipping, Arsenal-supporting ways, you know, you just don't understand you don't understand the pride and the passion

of playing for the shirt yes yes the shirt yes not fit to wear the grey buttoned up shirt do you mention the tweets

in the electronicas more than you do than orchestral manoeuvres in the dark oh it's shocking I mean Alf Ramsey gets as many mentions

in this book as orchestral manoeuvres in the dark which is probably it's that kind of book. It's referring outside of the hermetic world of electronica and what have you.

Seeing how it sits in the actual world and seeing how it has them right back to the early 20th century, right up to Strulex. How come Ralph Ramsey is mentioned? Was he in Chicory Tip or something? No, it's in the chapter about Delia Darvish here. I think I'm discussing the fact that she had to

adapt and speak a rather strangulated kind of posh accent to conceal her native origins. And that's what Alf Ramsey did as well. So I just sort of dragged him into it. And if Andy McCluskey had done that, they'd have snuck past your barriers there.

Yeah, exactly. So I know, this is it. I'm going to be on the defensive from the get-go when this thing comes out so this episode pop crazy youngsters funnily enough takes us all the way back to september the 4th 1980 now we've walked this way before in chart music number five and we're barely three weeks away from that episode and um you know i've got to say that if top of the pops was a big tenor quality street to my mind 1980 would be the fudge ones or the the toffee deluxe ones and i'm i'm i'm really trying not to get my hand around them and and cane them all while there's the toffee pennies of the late 80s and mid 90s to to consume so you know i wasn't gonna do another 1981 for a while but then something quite amazing happened to simon and when i found out about it i

thought we've got to do this episode as soon as possible simon tell tell the world why we're doing this episode in particular please yeah well it was my birthday quite recently and a couple of friends of mine uh big up to jimmy larga and annie o'rourke gave me an amazing present which is a ring-bound photocopied camera script from an actual episode of top of the pops from the one we're going to be yeah the one we're going to be talking about which is the 4th of september 1980 and it's and if that noise there is just me rubbing my thighs. Yeah, I could picture that. But yeah, it's something you can totally geek out over.

A lot of it's quite technical about kind of camera angles and stuff like that. But a lot of it's weirdly banal and it just tells you, for example, what time they had lunch. 13.15 to 14.15, by the way. What time they had dinner. 1800 to 1900. by the way what time they had dinner 1800 to 1900 and um it's a long two lunch and dinner oh yeah this is where our license fees were going on you know giving

egg sandwiches to cliff richard um sheena easton um it's a long old day as well they start at 11 a.m and uh that's the camera rehearsal and go on till potentially 10 o'clock at night. And I guess some of the pop stars would have been in makeup before that. So yeah, it's a long old haul. It's quite a commitment they're making by going on it. They're not just whisked in and whisked out. Yeah, and quite an instant

long haul commitment as well because this is the time when the charts came out on Tuesday dinner time. They've got to spring into action. The levers are set in lord bbc claps his hands together and all his little puppets dance absolutely one thing though if you've ever been to a recording of any tv show um danny baker talks about it but actually his new book it takes a horrendously long time it's a pretty miserable experience actually for the people there. I sometimes wonder why those little crowds at the top of the pop-up, they do

actually look thoroughly miserable. It's because they've been herded round probably for the last several hours. By the time we get to the end of this particular show, these people look genuinely weary. They look like they've been at Victoria Coat Station for like seven hours. You're doing a sort of wildcat strike. It's really

like you say, it's a long day. It's a very tedious process, you know, process making a TV show and considering, you know, then the sheer falsity of like pretending that it's all happening in real time and it's kind of, you know, zaniness, tinsley and wacky, you know, it's sometimes a bit hard to maintain that presence. And, you know, you actually see hints of like

the sheer tedium of the process. So Simon, when you went through this script, what was the first thing that jumped out at you? I think really it was the dinner stuff, it was just this idea of this, particularly when we, and we'll get to this in a minute, particularly when we see who's co-presenting the programme

the idea of this kind of meeting of minds of that particular co-host rubbing shoulders with some of the pop stars over some probably quite bad canteen type food well as long as it's only shoulders that are being rubbed well you know obviously you can't guarantee that in those days

I mean not wishing to make light of it but jeez but also just the sheer detail the fact that they go through the lyrics of every song, and it'll have how many minutes, how many seconds a particular line in the song comes in, and whether the camera should zoom in on acoustic guitar, or the drummer, or the lead singer at that point. And when you see that kind of detail, and then you think about how many times we've seen him get that wrong,

when he's zooming in on the wrong musician. Which is many a time absolutely I guess they were working under quite a lot of pressure quite a lot of sort of you know it all had to be done in one day so you can understand them screwing up occasionally but absolutely fascinating stuff and kind of quite

almost hypnotically boring at times as well as being kind of geek out you just sort of flick through and just see this kind of parade of words and numbers, words and numbers and baffling acronyms for types of camera. You were kind to pass on scans of it to both me and David

and my first impression by looking through it it was like a copy of Smash. It's produced by robots after a nuclear war yeah it's yeah it's actually it's excising all the magic and humanity from pop and breaking it down to the bare facts of minutes and seconds and words and camera angles which is quite cool in a way what was it is what pretty much we do isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what's in the news this week? Well, princess Margaret is spotted with her former knockoff,

Roddy Llewellyn at the Edinburgh festival. Ronald Reagan calls the Vietnam war a noble cause and cast doubt on the validity of the theory of evolution whilst campaigning for a presidential election. The Pope has announced that he's coming to Britain in 1982. J.R. Stetson fetches £420 at auction in Sotheby's for ITV's telethon. But the big news this week is that Ian Botham has decided not to sign a professional contract for Scunthorpe United. Oh man. It could have been a very

different 80s for English football if he'd have walked that way. On the cover of the NME this week, a certain ratio. On the cover of Smash It, Ian Dure. The number one LP in the UK is Flesh and Blood by Roxy Music.

And in the US, the number one single is Upside Down by Diana Ross. And the number one LP in America is Emotional Rescue by the Rolling Stones. So chaps, what were we doing in September 1980? It was back to school time, wasn't it? Well, I was just celebrating my 18th birthday. I was a very dark and serious boy then. And I had to be persuaded by my dad to go out for a kind of ritual first part. I wasn't interested in drinking at that point.

I remember going out and I remember my mate coming on. He sort of practically forced two pints of lard down. He said, get some drink down here, lad. And it was just like I really didn't fancy it at all. And made up for it later. But that was me and that was you know I was a very different

sort of creature but completely you know completely obsessed with it I would have you know you showed me that issue

of NME with a certain ratio on the cover I probably remember but it was chunks of various reviews and what have you I was probably like

you know I'll just read it and then you know it's not that my memory was better I think you just got a copy of the NME

you didn't just read it the once or only skim over half of it you read it then you read it again and you read it the once or only skim over half of it. You read it, then you read it again, and you read it again several weeks later and maybe a year later. It was a time when my peak absorption of the music press,

particularly NME, in 1980, I was definitely in a certain ratio, boy. Good lad. Simon? I was at the other end of my teens. I was 12, about to turn 13, and just about to start my first term at Barry Boys Comprehensive, having just come back from a boarding school in England where my mum had got a job and I had to go with her, and where my Welsh accent marked me out as a common peasant.

Oh, man. And on arriving back in Wales, I found found out I picked up an English accent that marked me out as a posh twat so it taught me the lesson that you can try as hard as you like to assimilate but you can never quite win and stop me if you've heard this one before

because we have dealt with this era quite close to it anyway but culturally I was on the overlap between pop kid innocence and teenage tribalism I had wavy ginger hair that i was about to have shorn off to make me look like one of madness and um my school trousers uh and i was mortified when i realized this but i was going to this new school with trousers that had a bit of

flair to them which uh i soon insisted my mum had to take in to drain pipe with. Yeah. And actually, I've still got a stamp album. And yeah, I collected stamps. By all means, you want to laugh at me. But from that era, and on the inner front cover, these plain white pages, I've stenciled two things in felt-tip pen. One is Abba, Abba, Abba, Voo, Lay, Voo.

And the other is Madness, Madness, Madness, One Step Beyond. So it catches me at this kind of brink, this kind of turning point between these two areas in my life but i think in my kind of self-mythologized version of my own story there's this kind of year zero this kind of this this flashpoint where i hear gangsters by the specials and then nothing is ever the same again but in fact this is kind of creeping overlap really that i was still into some some of you know some quite sort of innocent sort of 1970s style pop and and I was also just sort of starting to get into the more edgy sounds of the new wave actually that's interesting I don't know just recall actually yes style wise I think I was a kind of bit of a holdout I did I came slightly late to post but it was only right

now but when I got into it I get into all the more extreme things like Suicide Second Owl, you know, the full Jaw Division, whatever, public image and various other things and even more, the Cabaret Voltaire or whatever. But I was still wearing... Actually, my style guru then was Mark Easton. I love the fact that you'd wear those three-star jumpers and

the leather, whatever, you know, looked like a real sort of man-urchin. And I had a little sort of dodgy little rat boy tash as well. Oh, no. So I would change later on. Then I'd become more, I really would try and sort of, you know, dress again, like, you know, a member of a certain race or something like that. Trousers would come right in, you know, became sort of, you know,

the zeal of the converted when it came to tapering of trousers was something to behold. But at this point, yeah, the flares were still kind of flapping around my ankles, actually. But it was actually meant as a kind of Marky Smith type spirit. I was actually a bit of a witch finder general with flares. I became a bit of a zealot and a bit of a bully. I remember a couple

of friends and I going round the school playground, finding anybody who still had flares on. After I'd safely had my own trousers taken in. Finding anybody with even the tiniest bit of flare that you could even maybe fit a thumb inside or something.

Flares! Flares! Flares! I was horrible. It was really, really awful. It became a real witch hunt. It is strange, I should mention a certain ratio, because I remember for some reason in 1983 they played the Leeds Warehouse and Simon i should mention a certain ratio because i remember some reason in 1983 they played the leeds warehouse and simon topping at the certain ratio he was for some reason he was wearing a sort of pair of like you know wafty flurry trousers and i just remember that all through the gig the bloke next to me shouting fucking hell toppings flares so they

did this i mean yes they obviously the whole baggie or they kind of came back in but yeah the width of trousers you know was it was it was almost a moral issue, really. Yeah. It really represented a great deal. However, I mean, I would have had to explain to you, Price, you had to come around doing your Flair Police thing with me. You know, I was wearing them ironically. Oh, of course.

Because I'd also been about 18 and you'd been about 11. Who was it who said, like trouser, like mind? Was it Joe Strummer or somebody like that? Yeah, what, like trousers, like brain. Yeah. Yeah. And he was right. This whole thing backfired on me badly in the late 80s,

where I was a goth and I was wearing skin-tight trousers, and I was on the railway station at Caddickston, and there were some kids younger than me, sort of 14-year-old kids on the opposite platform who were clearly kind of Stone Roses fans, and they had massive trousers on. And they all started pointing at me, jeering, going, straight leg, straight leg.

You know, that was the one thing that our generation thought we'd got rid of. We didn't do much else. We created so much misery in the world. We've raised fuckwit kids who think beards and stupid tattoos are good. But the one thing we thought we'd done was eradicate flares. And it didn't even last 10 years, did it? Terrible. Because at this time, I was just about to start the second year at comprehensive school.

And I was a fully-fledged mod. And I'd started going out and hanging around with the mods in town on a Saturday, which basically involved meeting up in one shopping centre and then marching for about 20 minutes to the other shopping centre and back again and back again and back again. Did you shout, we are the mods, we are the mods, we are, we are, we are the mods? Probably. I can't remember an exact moment where that happened.

Quadrophenia style. No, it did, yeah. I mean, how much of a mod you were depended entirely on how many times you'd seen Quadrophenia. Yeah, because it was an 18 or an X, wasn't it? I think it was an X. Yeah, it did, yeah. I mean, how much of a mod you were depended entirely on how many times you'd seen Quadrophenia. Yeah, because it was an 18 or an X, wasn't it? I think it was an X. Yeah, exactly, yeah.

But, you know, you really had to hope that your dad had got a video recorder or you knew a mate who did. I think a lot more people claimed to have seen Quadrophenia in my school than had actually seen it. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was that year's Warriors, wasn't it?

Yeah. I remember one Saturday, probably this month, where me mum had laid me jeans out for me. it was that year's warriors wasn't it yeah i remember one saturday probably this month where um my mom had laid me jeans out for me uh i had two pairs of jeans at the time uh one of them was straight leg one of them was flared and uh the flared ones were dry and the straight leg ones were still on the radiator and my mates came round uh sadly not on their scooters because they were 12 as well and we were going to go into town and it's like, they said, you can't come out with us wearing those.

And I said, why? So the flares, mods don't wear flares. And so I went back, I said, ma'am, I can't wear these mods don't wear flares. And they're going to look stupid with my other mods outfit, which was a brown corduroy jacket with massive lapels that I'd sewn a madness and a specials patch to. And of course, you know,

encrusted one side of them with assorted badges. And me and my mum ended up having a screaming round where I insisted I wasn't going to go out until I put on the straight leg jeans. And, you know, in the end I won, but my arsehole eventually lost because it was my first occasion of piles. But, you know in the end i won uh but my arsehole eventually lost because it was my first uh my first occasion of piles but you know clean living under difficult circumstances very difficult circumstances i'll tell you how bad it got for me because i was kind of

into the mod aesthetic to some extent as well even though i was more of a sort of scar two-tone rude boy type um and you had to choose simon did didn't you? Yeah, I mean, I had a Harrington jacket. Or else you were called a plastic mod, which was the biggest insult you could have put on anybody. Yeah, I had a Harrington jacket, and I think I started off sort of hedging my bets and having badges of the jam and stuff like that alongside the specials.

But then I had to pick a side. I mean, I remember one of my mates getting punched in the face over Barry Island on a bank holiday for not picking a side I remember one of my mates getting punched in the face over Barry Island on a bank holiday for not picking a side basically but yeah I remember

how bad it got for me was on that Harrington I wanted to express my love of Northern Soul music because that was kind of like a mod thing you're meant to

appreciate a bit of Northern Soul but the badge I had of Northern Soul had a dancer on it with massive flared trousers and I thought I don't know, man.

I mean, on the one hand, keep the faith. On the other hand, lose the flares. One of my mates at the time, he became my best mate later on, but at the time he was just a lad on another street and he used to walk along with this massive parka and he painted the whole of the back of the parka, fishtail and all, with Walt Jabsco.

Oh, yeah. And he'd done such a genius job on it. And I'd look at him out the window as he was walking up the street, kind of like torn between thinking, oh, God, that's really fucking mint, and oh, you plastic martin. There was a badge that was being sold in town on one of the markets, and it was kind of like a checkerboard,

and down one side it had the word madness and on the other side kind of like like a crossword puzzle I know where it's going go on Simon, I know where it's going, go on, you finish it mod-ness no!

so wrong so wrong that was the ultimate plastic mod badge along with you remember those plastic badges of Walt Jabsco still got loads of them they did a competition in Smash It's to create

sort of Walt Jabsco badges for different songs and everything and some girl had done one for You Need Wheels by the Merton Parkers of Walt Jabsco and the beat girl and some girl had done one for You Need Wheels by the Merton Parkers of Walt Jabsco and the Beat Girl

on a scooter. I've got it. I've got one. Yeah. And that was somebody, some barra boy took that off the,

scanned it in or something off the page of Smash Hits and created a badge out of it and it was everywhere. You know, it was in Nottingham and it was in Barry so it must have been

all over the place and that was the ultimate, the ultimate betrayal. betrayal you know what jabs go wouldn't be on a scooter because he's not a mod my younger brother actually nick he um he decided to become a mod but he was it was well plastic as a mod um i remember he just had two or three little badges saying things i don't know time for action and another one said i think something like i like green onions um i think you realize about booker t and everything like that and i kind of mocked him saying things like, I don't know, time for action. And another one said, I think something like, I like green onions. But I think he realised about Booker T and everything like that. And I kind of mocked him about that at the time.

Anyway, he basically didn't have anything. He had a sort of parker of sorts, but none of the other kind of, you know, mob paraphernalia, just these two pathetic badges. And he went to Leeds City Centre on a Saturday and he got the crap peen out of him. Coming home crying and bruised. And I was like, guffawing at him, you know, like flares, flares flapping as I was kind of guffawing at him flares flapping as I was guffawing away branching my Faust album which I just managed to get Faust reissued

there is an alternative to this whole mod rocker thing I'd knock about with them and everything but I remember after about a month we were in the other shopping center's bus station and there's this one lad walking about on his own and he's got he's got air down to his

arse and he's got uh he's got a i don't know a fucking rainbow patch on his on the back of his denim jacket and he's just like right let's get him and about fucking 12 on him just jumped on him and kicked the shit out of him and it's's like, no, I'm not happy about this. I was thinking about this, because it was pretty much compulsory to be either a mod or a rude boy at my school. And the mods all wore kind of bowling shoes, you know, jam shoes, as they were called,

usually ordered from Melandi of Carnaby Street. And I was thinking, is mod the last time that British youth culture wore shoes instead of trainers or sneakers you know um i i think it is the last time that there was you know mass wearing of actual shoes as opposed to things that primarily intended for running and um i remember when a lot of the mods about 83 kind of time a lot of the former mods in my school started becoming football casuals yeah and they they were the kind, the people who switched first.

They were the first people to switch from shoes to wearing trainers. Yeah, I mean, there was a phase, wasn't there, amongst the scooter boys in like 82, 83, of wearing boxing boots. Yeah. I think, yeah, there was kind of like a Dexys thing. When Dexys went through that time of wearing, you know,

sort of sports gear and being very disciplined and running around, running, you know, footage of Kevin Rowland sort of drilling his band, forcing him to run around a track and all this kind of stuff. Yeah, that was the whole thing, wasn't it? Being, you know, purifying the body so you purify the soul, that kind of business. Yeah, since then it was like, oh, yeah, mods are fucking horrible, actually.

And even now, you know, I've got mates who are mods or have a mod aesthetic and they're fucking lovely people but if i do meet someone in a pub and they're a mod uh i give them two minutes not to say something about you kip especially if they're over 40 if they're over 40 and they're like and they've got kind of gray weller hair that's a weller dad look oh yes yeah yeah well in fact i i actually love weller dads because they crack me up you know yeah if i yeah if i actually love it they've got a kind of liam gallagher poor weller hair but gray and you see him around town it's it's actually it warms the heart a little bit they do cheer me up my dad's you know yeah, that's really weird that mods should be conflated

with English-British pride, actually. Yeah. Because the whole roots of it are to do with Europe. I mean, you know, to the look. That was imported. It's a European import. It's very Europhile, really. Yes, it is.

And, of course, music-wise, it's like getting, you know, it's great black American music. Yeah. So it is odd that it became, that kind of conflation happened. Yeah, I think people just look back at the Who in the 60s

with their kind of ironic appropriation of the Union Jack and just took it literally. Yes. And Roger Daltrey himself, of course. Yes. Oh, mods. When will you learn? Oh, God.

Daltrey. Watch your backs, lads, etc. Yeah. So, what else was on telly today? Well, BBC One has run Play School school the all-new popeye show young explorer sorry i'm laughing about flares the way you can't they were the most comical thing ever after about 1980 i mean like like you did simon i mean my mates used to go into town and we would we would go we we'd call flares

for some bizarre reason we call flares spats okay and we would just spend just just looking at the top of the bus and all of a sudden you make it go ah spats it was dan days dan days makes dan days makes sense it's rhyming slang but another one i never understood this one saxons look at those saxons i don't know why i don't know why but just a source of I remember one time me and my mates, we broke into my dad's wardrobe and he kept all his flares from the 70s

and they were proper. They had proper jumbo checks and just really nasty colours and we'd go we dared each other in about what was it 1982 to put them on and go down to the chip shop and

you know we I think we did invent the 70s revival that night he had a safari suit as well and it's like what the fuck have you got this for dad? We had this at school at the end of term one year we had a bad tie day where you had to come in and wear an awful tie.

And most of the other kids' dads didn't really have any exceptional ties. But my dad, having been a hippie in the 60s and just a bit of a sort of flamboyant character, had a whole load of these awful kipper ties. And I borrowed a bunch. And he was really offended that I borrowed about a dozen of his ties to share around the class that day. But the other thing I remember, we had this French assistant,

Assistan or whatever, that came in called Pierre. And because France was maybe a little bit different fashion-wise from the UK, he was wearing this bright blue suit with massive flared trousers. And we'd see him flapping across the car park. We'd see him out the window. And we'd all be shouting out the window, Pierre Le Flair. Poor bastard.

He'd come to this country to do his best to educate a bunch of us. And that's what he gets in return. And it obsessed him with the trousers. English in your trousers. It was brought to life in trousers. I remember by 1984, when we were in the last year of school, we were shown all these careers films

in a doomed attempt to try and get us work. And they were all from the 70s. And there was one where this bloke was, this young lad was, I don't know if you've seen this one. I mean, you just couldn't show it nowadays. It was where he was getting careers advice from an african mask on the wall and this mask did have the full-on jim davidson chalky accent no but yeah so and the and the lad was wearing the absolute biggest pair of fucking

swing-a-lingers ever and so you know here we are getting careers advice and half of the half of the assembly are pissing themselves laughing at the flares and the other half just staring fucking daggers at the screen and there was a lot of teeth sucking as well it's one of those things you know you couldn't do that now

you couldn't do that then it's just that they did yes but no it's actually going back to flares the last time I probably wore flares, ironically. We're not going to get off the subject of flares. I could talk about flares all day. I'm loving this.

Just, just last time, is, is, was a 70s revival party, which I'm going to, in early 1981. I know what's extraordinary about that is that already there was a sense of the 70s as distinctive

and kind of culturally distant way and completely, there's this complete radical turnaround, you know, from the spirit of the 70s. And I mean, you don't, I don't think subsequent decades, I mean, it'd be hard, I think, to get a handle on what the 80s were. It probably took until about, you know, about the mid-90s really to kind of be able to kind of

get that cultural distance and sit back and say, oh yeah, that was the 80s. So what was on telly today? Well, BBC One has run Play School, the all-new Popeye Show, Young Explorers, John Craven's Newsrand, Paddington, Nationwide and Raymond Baxter has just finished presenting highlights from the Farnborough Air Show. BBC Two has given over the whole afternoon to the TUC conference in Brighton, followed by the Open Université and a look at Belfast's oldest fair in the documentary series Network. ITV has covered racing

from York and the European Open Golf Championship from Tadworth, followed by Tarzan, the Dougie Brown sitcom Take My Wife about a northern comedian, then Popeye, University Challenge, Crossroads and the police sitcom Spooner's Patch.

A lot of Popeye on the telly today. All new as well, apparently. Who knew they were still making them? And of course, as we all know, being gentlemen of a certain era, when the phrase all new appears in a cartoon series, you know it's going to be cat shit. Oh, yeah, definitely. All new Tom and Jerry.

Yeah. When they're up and talking and stuff. I know. All right, then, Pop Craze youngsters, it's time to go in hard on the autumn of 1980. You know the drill by now. We may coat down your favourite band or artist, but we never forget,

they've been on top of the pops more than we have. It's Thursday, September the 4th, 1980, and Top of the Pops is still going through their relaunch, brought on by the musicians' union strike in the summer. Your main host for this evening is... Wack, wack, oops. Dave Lee Travis. He's currently the hairy overlord of Radio 1, high atop of the schedule as the breakfast show presenter,

where he'll stay for another three months before being usurped by Mike Reid. But we also have a very special guest. Born in Doncaster in 1951, Kevin Keegan played three seasons for Scunthorpe United before being signed by Liverpool FC for £35,000 in 1971, scoring on his debut against Nottingham Forest. He went on to help Liverpool to win the league three times, the FA Cup, the UEFA Cup twice and the European Cup in 1977, his last game for Liverpool before being transferred to Hamburg SV for half a million pounds. In 1978, he was named European Footballer of the Year.

Then he helped Hamburg win the Bundesliga a year later and played his final game for the club when they lost the 1980 European Cup final to a certain club that I don't need to mention. He returned to England in the summer of this year and he joined Southampton for £420,000. And this very week,

Southampton are currently top of Division 1 with Ipswich Town and Aston Villa. As well as being the most famous footballer in the country at the moment, he's also had a go

at this pop music lark, reaching number 31 in 1979 with Head Over Heels In Love. And his latest single, England, was released last month but isn't seeing any chart action at all. And rightly so, because it's a bit rubbish. He was the David Beckham of his day and then some, wasn't he? Yeah, absolutely. Oh, by the way, who would have thought that we'd already have mentioned Scunthorpe United twice in this episode?

Scunthorpe, the only British town name that used to get censored on internet forums for containing the C word. Yeah, so Keggy Kegel, as Brian Moore famously called him. Yes, of course. He was kind of, he was a hero of mine. I was nine years old when I became a Liverpool supporter in being a shameless kind of glory hunter in the spring of 1977. And that summer, as you say, Keegan left to play for Hamburger SV. And it was the first time as a football supporter I had that heartbreaking feeling you get

of your girlfriend cheating on you, metaphorically speaking. I only really had about two months of him being my hero before he was off and that made it all painful but it all worked out okay because we spent and you talk about remembering stats uh we spent 440 000 pounds of the revenue on kenny's al glish who became liverpool's greatest ever player can you imagine kenny dog leash co-presenting this fucking no that's exactly it you cannot imagine kenny's al glish co-presenting this? Fucking hell. No, that's exactly it. You cannot imagine Kenny Dalgleish co-presenting anything because he's very much not a people person. He's very kind of gruff and taciturn and reticent.

And you can't understand a fucking word he's saying. You can't understand a word he's saying, which probably we've lost all our Scottish listeners now by saying that, but I think it's a fair comment. But Keegan thinks he's a people person. He thinks he's got the gift of the gab and as we're going to see in this episode bloody hell but um but the thing with keegan is that as much as his playing career you i mainly remember him for his kind of off fields off pitch stuff

like scraping his leg falling off a bike on bbc superstars do you remember yes and um fucking hell yes and the weird kind of homoerotic shower room banter with Henry Cooper in those brute adverts splash it on all over and all that I think the thing

about Keegan is that I mean obviously even people like Trevor Francis seem pretty kind of rock and roll and glam

because they've just been because they had long hair basically once you extend your ears

you would kind of you know but clearly a difference between Kevin Keegan saying like

Stan Bowles or Rodney Marshall George Besses, they had this air of sort of flamboyantness and laziness or whatever, where he was completely the opposite of that. You don't get the impression he was especially a flamboyant figure. He had a sort of limp talent. He just made absolutely the most of his talent. He was just a very hard worker and a trier and a doer and stuff like that.

Had a great engine. Yeah, a great engine, of course. So why is he on here, then? God knows. Well, he's hurt his leg, hasn't he? We know that much. His foot, a great engine, of course. So why is he on here, then? God knows. Well, he's hurt his leg, hasn't he? We know that much. His foot, yeah. His foot, yeah.

But apart from that, yeah, I don't know. I think he thinks that if you just have the kind of, you know, there's that poodle hair perm, then that's pretty much going to do all the work for you. And then you see certain moments when he realises that, you know, you do actually have to kind of formulate words, senses, ideas or whatever. And again, you know, he's game for it. And I think he does metaphorically fall off his bike a few times in this one.

Yes. And he's got a record out. So maybe that's, you know, but it's stiffed as we know. So maybe that's why he's on there. Yeah. But presumably the season would have started with Southampton. So I don't know if he played a game and then hurt his foot or if he was out injured. He scored.

He scored the previous Saturday. Okay, right. Must have been a race his rocket type of shot or something because, yeah, he's hurt his foot. It wasn't exactly Beckham's metatarsal, but, you know, would have been a worry. So, Simon, we've spoken before about some of the really nasty, horrible, rubbish links that the presenters trot out.

So would you like to tell the audience, the pop-crazy youngsters, if you will, how scripted the introductions to Top of the Pops really are? Well, I mean, they're not... I'm just going to have a look. But I didn't see any links written down. No, so they've obviously just cooked it up between them with 30 seconds to spare or something.

Not that you can tell of anything. No, God no. Sadly, we couldn't locate the opening minute or so of this episode because for some reason it wasn't repeated on BBC4 and we're using a UK Gold repeat from the 90s

which whoever recorded it didn't press the record button in time. So that is lost to the winds of history. So, chaps, would you care to speculate what DLT and Kevin Keegan said at the beginning? I don't know. They seem to have got this whole thing going about how somehow they're kind of two peas

in a similar pod, basically, because of their appearance. There seems to be a running, running sort of deathly none joke to be a running, running, sort of deathly none joke to that effect. So they... Because there's matching black perms going on. I can imagine there being something like, oh, it's hello from me, and it's hello from him,

or something like that. And also, I'm willing to bet, because, you know, DLT would have had this feeling that he was being usurped by this bigger star appearing on the show. Yes, much bigger star. He would have sort of done a joking but not joking bit about that, saying, hi, I'm Dave Lee Travis, and I don't know who this guy is, or something like that.

There was some prize partridge in this one, definitely. Oh, God, yes. Yes, there's plenty of it, isn't there, from both parties. But I like to imagine that you just get a close-up of a perm, and you hear david travis's voice and you think oh my god i hope that's his hair and not his pubes and then the camera pulls back and it's actually kevin keegan because as as our dear friend taylor pointed out you know dave lee travis is in the full wreath stage of his beard at the moment.

And in this episode, he actually looks like a living Nasher badge. Yes. You know, the badge is in the Dennis the Menace fan club. Googly eyes. Yeah. If we ever do chart music merchandise and start a fan club up, that will be the badge. A Dave Lee Travis Nasher badge.

Christ. Hazel O'Connor and 8 Day. a fan club up that will be the badge a Dave Lee Travis Nasher badge Christ Hazel O'Connor and 8th Day Billy Joel still rock and rolling with the aid of the lovely Legs & Co

Cliff and his latest single sound called Dreaming Sheena Easton with one of two records in the chart this one

Modern Girl. The Beat, talking about their best friend. And one of my personal favourites around at the moment, Randy Crawford at One Day I'll Fly Away. So, let's kick things off with an excellent piece of music from Secret Affair. Welcome to Top of the Pops and the Sound of Confusion. There were people staring up to the sky Looking for a sign and they didn't know what to say So after a spoiler alert as to what's on on this episode,

Travis introduces an excellent piece of music it's sound of confusion by secret affair formed in london in 1978 secret affair were headed by singer ian page and guitarist david kent who were in the recently disbanded power pop band new hearts and recruited the remaining members of the band with an advert in Melody Maker which asked for ambitious young musicians who must have a grudge against the music business. After their first gig, supporting the jam at Reading University, they were approached by a load of mod revivalists who were looking for a new band to latch onto and were invited to become the house band at a mod pub in Barking called The Barge Around. Their first single, Time For Action, got to number 13 in September of 1979 but the follow

up Let Your Heart Dance only got to number 32 in November of this year. This is the follow up to My World which got to number 16 in April of 1980 and it's gone up from number 52 to number 45. So, this band, they're pretty much the figurehead band of the Mod Revival, aren't they? Yeah, they're the Lambrettas, yeah. Those two were the only ones that were kind of like chart regulars

in late 1979 and 1980. Yeah, I think the Merton Parkers might have scraped the top 40, I don't know, but yeah. They did, yeah. You Need Wheels, yes, they did. I think they were on top of the pop. And The Truth and The top 40. I don't know, but yeah. They did, yeah. You Need Wheels, yes, they did. Yeah, I think they were on top of the pop. And The Truth and The Chords. I don't know if they ever did.

Yeah, The Chords scraped in. The Truth were a little bit later. Who else was there? That's pretty much it, isn't it? There was Squire. Purple Hearts, but they didn't have a hit. No, neither did Squire. So, I mean, there were loads of mod revival bands,

but, you know, they were pretty much a bit cack, weren't they? Yeah. I mean, when you say sound of confusion, I used to remember hearing it at the time and thinking they were saying it was the sound of the future. In a sad kind of way, they were actually right. Yes, yes. Yeah, it's interesting why there should have been

a kind of a mod revival at this point. I don't think it's just because of the quadrophena. think that it was clearly this came out of the sort of punk post-punk thing and there was you know and it does it does seem to me there's almost like this kind of eternal sort of binding conflict between mods and rockers in pop culture you know for all kinds of various reasons and i suppose what punk did again it goes back to that kind of tapering thing you know which is very much sort of very much part of the whole you know tapered sharp whatever you know and it's um apparently david apparently it kind of started from a jam gig in i believe it was in paris where a load of where a load of jam fans had gone over on the ferret and they ended up talking about how they liked you know like the the mod aesthetic and you know

they they all decided to be mods and and bring it back again but i mean there was always that kind of small faces influence in you know a lot of the punk bands yeah yeah so so yeah it wasn't it wasn't too surprising yeah no no yeah it you know it definitely makes sense um but um but also it just shows that part of punk was a kind of post-modern moment and um you know things do you know it's the beginning of that part of punk was a kind of postmodern moment and, you know, things do, you know, it's the beginning of that kind of very sort of retrograde sort of stream, you know, in the culture. Tell you what gets me about this song, though.

Bloody hell, that sax solo that's cutting through. I mean, the saxophonist union at the time must have had some serious clout. Yeah. Because what the hell is it doing? Well, he uses two saxes, doesn't he? He plays two saxes at once, which is kind of, in a way, making up for the Candelabra treachery of the Boomtown Rats.

Yes, yes. But let's not forget that Indur and the Blockheads did it as well with Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick. So it's not a new thing. Ah, but there's saxophone solos and saxophone solos. And, you know, the one on Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick, that's a pretty decent one. You know, there's John Coltrane and there's Kenny D. And this is much more of that kind of, you know, the one on Hit Me With The Rhythms, that's a pretty decent one. You know, there's John Coltrane and there's Kenny D,

and this is much more of that kind of, you know, this is sheer cheese coming out of that hole. Well, that's the thing, that it's not very mod, really, because I take David's point about music being this constant struggle between stuff that billows and expands and stuff that shrinks down and tapers. And mod was meant to be all about that kind of sharpness, that uptightness.

But the thing with Secret Affair on this record is they don't look or sound very sharp. And there's an interesting thing about Mod fashion is there's a really thin line between Mod and Bank Clark. And that's actually something I like about Mod, that it's kind of a sort of hiding-in-plain-sight try, because you have to be in the know to distinguish between someone who's you know an ace face or and someone who's working but working behind the counter at santander yes you know and it's based on tiny

details it's based on the exact width of lapel or the number of buttons and that kind of stuff um so i i like that and and um ironically ian page the singer actually did become a banker i remember this um a few years later one of the music papers printed this corporate who's who from somebody's you know corporate literature with his photo and a little biog saying you know he used to be a rock star but now he's working for whatever bank it is and they printed it to take the piss out of him being a mob was more about kind of like wearing a suit or a boating blazer, if you were, you know, if you were looking,

as opposed to the music, because, you know, what is there that's new is very thin on the ground. I remember a lot of my mod mates would go off and buy Quadrophenia and, you know, I ended up listening to it

and it's like, oh, fucking hell, this is fucking hippie music it's a terrible album it's antithetical it's almost like Pete Townshend saying of course those are my

kind of crazy youthful days I've got past that now and I now make these kind of concept albums with shiny synths rippling across the top yeah yeah it's absolutely nothing

to do with sound wise or whatever and it's actually almost like it's a very condescending record actually towards the whole Mothling. There were two albums, weren't there? Sorry, David.

There were two albums. There was the Who soundtrack, which was all this kind of prog stuff, this grand operatic concept, and then there was the soundtrack album, which is actually really fucking cool, and it's got Shangri-La's and Booker T and the MGs and all that kind of stuff on there. It was fantastic. Well, yes. The fourth side

has all that old stuff on it. I remember going back and listening to it, there you know which is fantastic well yes yes the fourth side has all that old stuff on it and you know I remember going back and listening to it and you know that everyone involved in the making

of that album is wearing absolutely fucking massive flares you know right up until the kind of like late 90s

if I was ever at a second hand record shop or a record fair I would go and find the Quadrophenia soundtrack album the one we um phil daniels on the cover pull the records out of the sleeves and you almost

guaranteed that the first three sides of that album that the who did were absolutely pristine and the fourth side with the old song were absolutely fucking played to death i thought yeah i i felt your pain brother yeah yeah but it's interesting what Simon was saying earlier on about you know the thing about the suits and about the wearing the shirt and ties and the sort of in plain sight thing and the bank clerk type thing because there's a commonality there with our post-punk things like wire and even like people like this heat that people that would on even public image they would always wear shirts and ties and it was part of them saying there was two things I was saying like we're serious we mean

business it was also an anti wasn't just anti-rock it's anti-rock and it was part of them saying, there was two things. They were saying, like, we're serious, we mean business. It was also an anti, it wasn't just anti-rock, it's anti-rock. And it was the whole sort of, you know, slightly lazy, leathery, sort of hoary aspects of rock. That it was almost like standing in sort of sharp, there's a sort of sharp reproach to it, a sharp contrast to. And, you know, and the fact of celebrating, you know, great black music of a certain era that's kind of brilliant and immaculate. And again, a sort of repostal, kind of horrible hoary conceits of um increasingly bloated rock scene but which makes that saxophone cell all the more ridiculous because that saxophone cell is like the oral equipment of dave lee travis's hair i think they they actually got it right on the first single time for action yes the lyrics the lyrics of that song are all about, you know,

dressing up sharp for a night out and being laughed at on the train by horrible punks or whatever. Yes, the punk elite. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We hate the punk elite. Yeah. The thing with Time for Action is it's a live, or at least a pseudo live recording,

and at the end it's got this kind of crowd noise. We are the mods, we are the mods. But if you play it on mods but if you play it on vinyl if you play it and push the volume right up at the end you can hear the crowd chanting we are the mods we are the mods and just somebody in the background shouting wankers and it's the most brilliant thing i've ever heard because i remember i hadn't heard that song for ages but i went a few years ago i went to see From the Jam at Rock City. And beforehand they played that.

And there was a load of people there. And it was all ages because, you know, the mod thing just refuses to go away. And just everyone went fucking berserk. And I'm just looking at my mate with this absolutely massive grin on my face, thinking, oh, fucking hell, this is all right, actually. But but also i mean that the follow-up let your heart dance i think it's just as good but you listen to that and it's like fucking hell this is a this is a glam record the opening drum beat it's like a fucking sweet demo i haven't played that for years yeah you go and have a listen to it but but it was like, okay, these bands, okay, right, we're mods,

so we've got to wear this, and we've got to stand like that, and we need these instruments. But they hadn't worked out how they should sound. And there was a sense of confusion. This song is really kind of watery and wimpy, isn't it? It's not a mod record at all. And even the kind of, this is kind of um whoever's working in the gantry at top of the pops is playing with their new toys big time aren't they

yes they've got that kind of stuttery camera thing going on and there's a bit of phasing on the sound i'm not sure if that's on the record or that's totp dicking around with it but it is it is all a bit um ichiku park isn't it, at that moment? So, the following week, Sound of Confusion dropped 18 places to number 63. The follow-up single, Do You Know, would only get to number 57 in October of 1981, and the band split up in 1982. After releasing two flop solo singles and, according to Smash Hits, working as a crew PA, Ian Page spent the mid-80s writing a collection of fighting

fantasy books based on the Dungeons & Dragons character he played in the late 70s. Oh my god. Yeah, he kept that fucking quiet, didn't he? Including the titles Grey Star the Wizard, The Forbidden City and Beyond the Nightmare Gate.

Roll a D12 against your parker of invisibility. See, there's nothing mod about wizards, is there? Wizards are probably the least mod of all kind of fantasy characters. Well, you know, the whole outfit is a giant flare, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you like Redheads? Well, I like Alan Ball but my favourite at the moment is that young lady over there

Not Kelly Marie, oh you've got a good choice there lad Not Kelly Marie. Oh, you got a good choice there, lad. Travis, in a grey-blue shirt and trouser combination with the shirt open to the diaphragm and Kev, in a stripy polo shirt, discussed their opinion on redheads. After displaying a preference for teammate Alan Ball, they have a bit of a gurney lech at the next artist, Kelly Marie. Born Jacqueline McKinnon in Paisley in 1957,

Kelly Marie made a television debut in 1973 when she won Opportunity Knox four weeks on the bands with her interpretation of I Don't Know How To Love Him. After signing a deal with Pi Records, she became very popular in France, Ireland, Australia and South Africa but couldn't get a hit in the UK. However, in early 1979, she chanced upon a song lying about in the record company offices written by Ray Dorsett of Mungo Jerry, which he intended to pitch at Elvis Presley and liked the look of it.

It became a top ten hit in South Africa later that year but didn't get much play in the UK outside of Scotland. However, after it was picked up and re-released by Calibre Records, it finally broke into the charts and is up this week from number five to number three. Before we go into the song, Travis, you know, we don't see him much from the waist down, which is, you know, which is not a bad thing.

But, you know, with that shirt open as much as it is, Oh, man. It fucking is, isn't it? It's horrific. It's disgusting. It's terrible. not a bad thing but you know with that shirt open as much as it is oh man it's gross it fucking is isn't it it's horrific it's disgusting it's terrible but it is it's like seeing

one of your school teachers letting their hair down at the staff party and unbuttoning their shirt this kind of horrible milky white expanse yeah

as well as the war of the flares there was the war of the shirt buttons at that point you're supposed to have your top button done up. You know, never mind. It says absolutely Al Kilter with correct thinking at the time.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But in his defence, you know, that collar is not Condor-esque, is it? It's, you know, it's been reined in. No, but he has got some kind of gold chain medallion thing going on, hasn't he? He has again. But again, it's not massively chunky. So, you know, I think this is him transitioning through the Aventis. Oh, don't you start with Taylor Parks' Aventis.

Stop trying to make Aventis happen. Yeah, I think it's kind of a niche thing. I don't think it's going to... I think it's kind of a niche thing. I don't think it's going to... So anyway, the song written by Mutt & Chops himself with Elvis in mind. And, you know, apparently he wrote it

assuming that Elvis hadn't have killed himself on the bog. He would have, like everyone else, gone into a disco phase. I mean, can you see that? Can you see Disco Elvis? Well, he kind of did, didn't he? With Way Down.

Way Down had a bit of a... It's kind of disco meets kind of Osmond's Crazy Horses kind of stuff. Yeah, he was going in that direction, wasn't he? Yeah, and you can hear this song in an Elvis voice like, My head is in a spin, my mouth ain't don't touch the ground. Yeah, apparently on YouTube and soon to be on the video playlist uh an office impersonator has done it and it's like yeah right yeah you can actually hear it so so yeah yeah but this this kind of weird banter between um uh kevin keegan and dlt we can't not talk about this right that the whole the whole redheads thing

like do you like red is it? The whole redheads thing. Like, do you like redheads? Do you like redheads? And he says something about Alan Ball. It's kind of awful. Alan Ball gag. I never thought I'd say the phrase ball gag in relation to Kevin Keegan. But yeah, this weird kind of thing

of like perving at Kelly Marie before they, you know, lasciviously before they cut across to the performance. They're incriminating themselves and not even doing it convincingly. That's the sad thing. Yeah, yeah.

And Keegan keeps doing this kind of weird gurning, doesn't he? Yes, he does, yes. It's a Les Dawson. It's a Les Dawson reference, basically. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Do you think it is? Or is it just, I wonder if it's just kind of nervousness. He doesn't know what to do with his face. No, no, no. No, it's a Les Dawson. It's a Les Dawson it just, I wonder if it's just kind of nervousness. He doesn't know what to do with his face. No, no, no. No, it's a Les Dawson.

It's a Les Dawson. Yeah, I suppose you're right, actually. Yeah. I mean, as far as the song goes, I think it's fair to say that I hated this at the time. Partly, I think it was due to a bit of latent homophobia on my part. Oh, really? Yeah, because I think there's something about the dancers,

who obviously now, it's the campus thing you've seen in your life. Yes. These two guys, they're kind of, I think at least one of them actually is black, but nevertheless they look like minstrels. They're both black. Yeah, but they're kind of dressed in kind of minstrel style.

Yes, dark town strutters. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they've got kind of hen knight, hen knight gold sequined bowler hats on. Yes. But there's something about their kind of, and obviously it's sequined bowler hats on yes but there's there's something about their kind of and obviously it's just

the campus thing in the world as we looking from now but at the time I think there was just something about their over expressive exuberance

that made me uncomfortable even though I wouldn't have known there was anything in a bit of commas gay about it at the time yeah

I just think a lot of teenage boys go through a homophobic phase before before they grow out of it yes and I think there's just thing in a bit of comm was gay about it at the time yeah i just think a lot of teenage boys go through a homophobic phase before before they grow out of it yes and i think there's just something about this that would have made me kind of clench my buttocks a bit and just feel a bit wrong about it do you know what i mean yeah and of course the the idea of a a pretty white girl dancing with two statuesque black men you know yeah well it would have been quite contentious, but this is, you know, this is essentially not gossip, isn't it?

Yeah. But it is, it's a terrible record. I mean, the thing is, the song, and, you know, we've already done the whole Elvis bit, you know, Ray Dorsett has written what could, in someone else's hands, maybe, have been a really decent song. But in Kelly Marie's hands,

it's so kind of end of the pier it's kind of seaside special it's it's very seaside special isn't it yeah it's it's tea time variety show disco um yeah so um but it's oh and also sorry go on i was gonna say it's yeah it's that ridiculously over exuberant exuberant register i imagine it was played at gay clubs at the time though i imagine it was um yeah it's a slightly cheesy sort of thing i mean the only thing i mean there are various things that are wrong with Kelly Marie mainly that she's not Tina Marie you know it's always that kind of yeah but um but when election that's that's that's another weird thing because I don't think I mean she would someone like Kelly Marie wouldn't be allowed to

make those kinds of records and be on any kind of to put on top of the pops these days because she wouldn't pass the sort of ridiculous doll test that anybody that's making that kind of music has to pass these days. She, you know, she looks like a very, you know, sort of very kind of regular homie sort of person,

you know, which makes the kind of leching out her even more sort of slightly horrible. Yeah. It's, you know, because she's actually really, I mean, you know,

in terms of things in a sense are more advanced in terms of women being allowed to make that kind of music and not having to be sex objects, basically. Yeah. In terms of like whether she actually comes across. I mean, that's the one positive thing I would say

about that aspect of it. The weird thing about the black guys, they're doing this kind of weird robo-dance, actually. I mean, I could sort of plunge down a complete wormhole of the sort of the ancient thing, which I talk about in the book, actually, about this kind of incident between fear of robots and fear of robots taking over the world

and fear of, like, black people going to revolt. And there's actually all these... Historically, there's all these strong connections, really, between tales of robots and then rising up from their enslaved conditions and taking over with the kind of latent fear that black people might do the same, you know, in America. So it's quite weird.

There's a little... You know, she might have been onto that, Kelly Marie, or perhaps not. You know what? Tonight, I'm actually going to a talk by Animatronic

from the Scissor Sisters. And if anyone is well placed to talk about any kind of links between robot culture and gay disco, it's her

because she's actually written a book about robots taking over the world. Right. So, yeah, sorry, it's just an extraordinary coincidence and the other thing we can't not mention the noise on this record which um actually that i i do think this record killed whatever lingering love of disco i had for a half a decade or something right yeah just

because because of that that really annoying noise. Yeah, because the first time we really heard that would have been the year before with Ring My Bell. No, I think maybe even further than that, Love Don't Leave You Anymore, Rose Royce, it's all over that. Oh, good shout. That's really where it first breaks out, actually. It's all over it. And then I think by this time, yeah, it's got a bit played.

It's been used to excess now, isn't it? And I actually, I've got to plead guilty. I bought a drum machine in the 90s. Yes, you mentioned this, Simon. I've done it on a podcast before. Yeah, I will know. I'll do it quickly. It's one of those ones that's got the four circular pads,

like an electric hob. And it does go, boo, boo, if you want it to. And I went through a phase. And you do want it to. You do. And I went through a phase of bringing it with me to DJ gigs and really pissing people off by adding my own percussion

over the top of records to which songs? oh absolutely anything but it was around the time of no it was around the time of like The Rapture

House of Jealous Lovers which you know kind of lends itself to extra cowbell and extra boo boo yeah so yeah but I do think

that this if it didn't sort of stir some kind of latent homophobia that i didn't quite know how to put words to at the time then i certainly think it made me discophobic i think it made me think that this this whole disco thing it's over with it's got to be you know swept away um of course you know five years later when house music is coming in and suddenly disco seems like the forerunner of everything that's great and wonderful i yeah you know completely changed my mind on that.

But I think I had a decade's worth of cleansing the palette of disco and Feels Like I'm In Love was probably what caused it. Yeah. So the following week, Feels Like I'm In Love jumped to number one, staying there for two weeks. The follow-up, Loving Just For Fun, would only get to number 21 in November of this year, and she'd have one more top 30 hit in 1981. After taking a break

to have kids, she'd spend the late 80s as a high-energy artist. And to Kevin Keegan's dismay, she's now a blonde. Kelly Marie at number three not only a beautiful redhead but also a great dancer and singer and now one of my particular favourites of the moment in the charts

from the Nick Straker band are going to take you for a walk in the park. After making the schoolboy error of clapping with a microphone in his hand, Kev introduces one of his favourite songs at the moment. A Walk in the Park by the Nick Straker Band. Formed in

London in 1978, the Nick Straker Band were essentially a collaboration between Nick Straker Band. Formed in London in 1978, the Nick Straker Band were essentially a collaboration between Nick Straker, an original member of the British reggae band Mutumbe, who played work in men's clubs and British legions with Limmy of Limmy and Family Cooking, and Tony Mansfield, his former roader, who eventually played the same venues with Matt Kassoon and had already had three hits this year with his band New Music. And it's up this week from number 28 to number 22. Before we go anywhere,

New Music, they were fucking mint, weren't they? They were brilliant. And do you know what? I had no idea that there was this connection between them and Nick Straker Band. So that's blown my mind a little bit. Yeah. I don't think he's actually in this performance, but yeah, they were fucking great.

Hopefully we'll cover them at some point. Oh God, yeah. I mean, their single Sanctuary, I think it's's one of the greatest great lost singles of the early 80s yeah definitely but this song i mean the only thing i've got to to chuck into the pot here was i was working at the football program shop at the time and uh the other kind of like saturday lads was this uh was this like called melvin and every time this song came on the radio, which was very often, when the chorus came along,

he would sing, a wank in the park, a shit in the dark. And every time I hear that song, that's what the song's about now. It's made this lovely song about replenishment and finding a bit of solitude to really find yourself. It's just made it something really fucking seedy.

Base bodily functions, yeah. Speaking of bodily functions, this really is the poo-poo special, isn't it? Because it's got poo-poo all over it as well. I mean, I just have to return, though, to Kevin Keegan's intro here because it's a pretty miserable event. I mean, it's, you know, you think that Ian Curtis hanging himself was like the kind of saddest event of 1980,

but this little intro here that he does, Kevin Keegan, it's really, it's desperate because he's not got Dave Lee Travis as a crutch there. He's having to do it alone. And he can't, and it's almost like, in that moment, what am I going to say am I going to twist this and it's just like

well it's one of my favourite songs in the charts at the moment and he's like looking up in desperation he can see that internally he's having that moment that he had

do you remember at half time at the end of the England-Germany game he says I just realised I just don't have it at this level and he had that kind of very honest sort of retirement

I think he's almost internally going through that it's just so miserably inadequate it's like Stephen Gerrard trying to host Saturday Night at the London Palladium or something like that. It's just desperately, desperately bad. And he's cruelly revealed in all his desperate inadequacy. Yeah.

And I mean, I was really upset that, you know, it wasn't lip-up fatty or the re-release of Paranoid by Black Sabbath. Shame, Kevin, shame. But then Nick Straker does have Kevin Keegan hair. So they have that in common. It's a real kind of bubble perm special as well as everything else, isn't it, this episode? The only thing that's missing from it

is Benny at a crossroads. I'm interested by the appearance of Nick Straker band, who, much like DLT, just haven't got the memo that it's the 80s yet. They kind of look like a cross between a bunch of painter and decorators and because of the whole Dungarees thing and playaway presenters. And I've got to credit my mate Neil Sparnon, who watched this episode with me the other day, for pointing out the playaway thing.

They totally do look like playaway presenters. But I bought this record at the time um i it had this kind of weirdly uplifting quality to it that it's almost hard to pinpoint this i guess you know musically it does literally the chords do lift up as it goes through the song um but it's got the same kind of um uh idyllic utopian feel to it as um uh steve winwood's ark of a diver album from around the same time it's got a similar feel to it and a similar similar thing that it kind of reminds me of darth punk it kind of prefigures darth punk that kind of um it's not quite disco and it's not quite prog but it's you can imagine it going with um a sort of montage scene a sort of training montage in an 80s sports

movie or something like that but But I don't know. I remember finding it just somehow really invigorating and empowering. And it's ridiculous because most people would think it's a complete bit of cheese. I mean, I never cared for the record and I can't pretend to care for it now. But what is interesting about it is it seems to have,

it seems to be somebody speaking a kind of Euro-English. But in fact, the band are actually from London. But it sounds like somebody sort of pretending from a Euro perspective. I am in the dark. It's got this kind of Euro-English. But in fact, the band are actually from London, but it sounds like somebody sort of pretending from a Euro perspective. I am in the dark. It's got this kind of, you know, and it was big in Europe. It was a very big record in Europe.

But it reminds me of something that couldn't be like Steve McLaren when he was a manager at Einhoven and he started speaking in that kind of Dutch-English. It's almost like they've kind of internalised Europeanism from somewhere. Well, I've got the lyrics in front of me here on the uh the camera script from the episode and when you see it laid bare in in you know black and white in this sort

of you know typewriter font here it's it does sort of expose the sheer banality of the lyrics so it's um they for the sake of the cameraman they've they've broken it down very meticulously. It says four bars, four bars, three bars, one bar and two beats. And then a walk in the park, then one bar and two beats. I've got to get some sense back into my mind. I'm in the dark, one bar and two beats. And I can't see where I'm being led and so on.

And just something about that, it's almost like reading it out in a sarcastic voice, isn't it? When you see it just printed about that. It's almost like reading it out in a sarcastic voice, isn't it? When you see it just printed like that. And yeah, I mean, I think the tune does all the heavy lifting here. There's nothing in it lyrically. So you bought this as a 12-year-old?

Yeah. Which is quite a commitment at 12. When you're 12-year-old and you go into a record shop, particularly that one record shop in town. Yeah, and also, part of the thing of buying records in those days was to show off what you'd bought to your mates. Yes. I would have kept this very quiet. Yes, yes.

I wouldn't have told anyone about this. I'd have bought this from Woolworths if it was a guilty pleasure like that. Yeah. Or wait a month or two until it was 10p in the paper shop yeah but you are you know you are really hanging your your young credibility out on the on the counter aren't you when you're when you're asking for something like this presumably dressed up in your rude boy gear absolutely i just hope nobody sees me if i remember rightly as well it wasn't just a single it was a 12 inch on colored vinyl i really went oh yeah you'd have a job getting that back on the bus

yeah like yeah you run into one of your mates and they're going oh what have you got what you got let's have a look and it's like yeah no you're all right mate yeah yeah but i mean i remember going through a phase at the time that if i did buy something that was you know that i was trying to put across as part of me like you know you know, this week's number one and everything, I would go, I'd have gone to Fox Records for it in the Victoria Centre. But if I wanted to buy something that was out of my, you know, out of what I wanted to say, like, for example, Ashes to Ashes, which was the previous number one,

I went down the other end of the shopping centre where no one else went and went to Boots and bought it from there. So Bowie was seen as embarrassing? Well, not so much embarrassing, but I didn't want the glare from a record store vendor saying, well, hang on, you look like that, but you're buying this. And, you know, I couldn't pass myself off as a DJ at the time.

So, you know. So you could pass myself off as a DJ at the time. So, you know. So you could just about buy the first Bowie album where he's got like a blazer and sort of like mod hair and stuff like that. But yeah, yeah. So the following week, a walk in the park nudged up two places to number 20 and stayed there for three weeks.

The follow-up, leaving on the midnight train, would only get to number 61 in November of this year. And Nick Straker would go on to work with Linton Quasey-Johnson. Wow. Fucking love those tunes. Yeah. Yeah. Fucking brilliant.

And he wrote songs for Jelly Bean and Taylor Dayne. Whoa. What? He did write? Yeah. What? He wrote Tell It's My Heart? I don't know which ones.

But I mean, what? Linton Quasey-Johnson, what, was he on Forces of Victory? I I don't know which I don't know which ones but I mean what um Linton Quincy Johnson what was he on Forces of Victory I think so yeah I'm not sure oh Respect to the Straker wow

but yeah he should have gone with a wank in the park a shit in the dark he really should Nick Straker, thanks. And good music for Walking Apart. Well, one lady who must be counting her blessings today

is a young lady who's been travelling around the world quite a bit. Recently, she was in Nashville, and she was approached by a producer with a lawyer's stetson and asked if she'd like to audition for the part in a film called Breaking Glass. She did it, she got the part, and that's helped her on her way to no end although not too many people have seen it yet the lady's name of course is hazel o'connor and here's the current number five sound from her called eighth day In the beginning was a world

Man said let there be more light Travis, on his own, tells the story of how Hazel O'Connor was discovered while a clip of her looking like she's in Tron is screened. It's actually Breaking Glass, and this is the first song from it, Eighth Day. Born in Coventry in 1955, Hazel O'Connor ran away from home at the age of 16 to be a singer in German clubs for US servicemen

before joining a dance troupe in Tokyo and Beirut. On her return, she became an actress, an audition for Benny Hill's Hills Angels, but didn't get the job when she refused to cop off with him in his flat and pushed him over and fucked off. Well done, Hazel. A big break came when she beat out Toyah Wilcox for the lead role in Breaking Glass, a film about the rise and fall of a punkish female singer-songwriter that's about to be released at the end of the month. She offered to write the soundtrack for it and this is the first cut from the soundtrack LP

and it's up this week from number 13 to number 5. Okay, before we go into the song, we have to talk about the wrongness of Dave Lee Travis on the introduction. He claimed that she was discovered in Nashville and he assumes that it's, you know, Nashville in Tennessee. No, it was actually the Nashville Rooms, the punk club in West Kensington.

Oh, for fuck's sake. And the man in the stetson he refers to may have been the executive producer of the film Breaking Glass, Dodi Fayed. So, Hazel O'Connor. It makes sense to me that, I didn't know, but it makes sense that Toya was up for the role in Breaking Glass. Yeah. I've got written down here that Hazel O'Connor. It makes sense to me that, I didn't know, but it makes sense that Toya was up for the role in Breaking Glass. Because I've got written down here that Hazel O'Connor is a poor man's Toya,

who in turn was an even poorer man's Susie Sue. And maybe you've got to fit Lena Lovitch somewhere into that equation as well. I don't know. Yes. Shaking Wilcox. Shaking Wilcox. I'm just not having it. There's something so amdram about Hazel O'Connor.

The idea that punk equates to these kind of mad, starey eyes. It's basically... A snarly mouth. Yeah, and I've never... I mean, I've not seen Breaking Glass. I don't know if I'm missing anything. But just from the song itself, it seems like a kind of Jeff Wayne's War of the World idea of

punk, if you know what I mean and that whole message machine just got upset and you know, I guess it's topical now, right guys? A problem man had not foreseen as yet Yeah, all of that I mean, the idea of

punk being somehow that kind of didactic, educational thing rather than a kind of nihilistic scream, it just felt wrong. But clearly the people in the audience, they're buying it because they're pogoing like crazy, aren't they? Yes. Yeah.

It has to be said, though, that a few of them are pogoing possibly crazy aren't they yes yeah it has to be said though that you know a few of them are pogoing possibly so they can see themselves on the monitors there's kind of a lot of pogoing but not a lot of looking at the uh looking at haze yeah so punk has been around for you know the idea of punk has been overground for four years by now and you know it's just accepted that when a vaguely punky record comes on that's what you do you know yeah well it's either that or that dance where you kind of like kick and wave your uh windmill your arms about yeah which wasn't going to happen on this episode of top of the pops because you know cameras would have got broken i mean i wonder if some of them started gobbing at her and that's be objective

from the premises yeah yeah maybe so david i i mean to be i completely agree with simon i mean in my notes are very similar really it's it's um i mean she's not just a poor man's toy i mean you know she's an absolute sort of wretchedly sort of down to the bones of his arse homeless man's lena lovitch really you know that kind of gulping and burning and you know as a kind of signifier of punkiness plus you know you have your hair as a peroxide mess and therefore, like Simon says, this is signified as punk. Meanwhile, you know, you've got this bunch of nondescript session musicians kind of sawing away in the background. It's just, yes, and the whole sort of pop, you know, sort of pop punk type conceit of the whole thing, of the lyric and everything like that. I used to be punk.

I mean, I used to hate it hate the National Front at the time. I mean, it was just... It just dreadful. It's that kind of Rock Follies-type take on... It's like worse than Hitler. Yeah, pretty much, yeah. Or worse than Martin Webster. Yeah, it just felt like the most flagrant appropriation,

the whole thing. Because it needs to be said, there's still a lot of punks knocking about. it just felt like the most flagrant appropriation, you know, the whole thing. It was just, you know. Because it needs to be said, there's still a lot of punks knocking about. I mean, I used to go, after Top of the Pops was on,

on a Thursday night, I'd go to Top Valley Community Centre in my black and white check tie and my grandpa's gardening hat. And, you know, half of the know half of the youth club would be mods

and rude boys and the other half would be punks. It's weird we didn't have any punks in my school. Didn't you? No no no I think you know I'm not saying that we were super forward looking or anything like that but we you know my generation seemed to have left that behind pretty sharpish. I do remember two

years earlier seeing punks for the first time and you know relatively late in british terms 1978 um on the streets of cardiff and the streets of barry and being terrified but by 1980 even though again it was only four three four years previous it seemed like the desperately distant past and in a way that was emphasized for me by the fact that there was a charity shop on High Street in Barry that had a few Sex Pistols singles in the window, including Silly Thing with that kind of fake popcorn cover. And it had faded in the sun by being left in a stupid place to leave a record. So, you know, vinyl collectors will know that. But clearly the old dears who were running the shop didn't know that. So it is almost as if punk was

visibly fading away before our eyes. And, you know, it almost... It's kind of antiquity... Its antiquity had been exaggerated by being sun-bleached in that way. So anything else to say about Hazel? What's the script saying, Simon? I honestly don't think anything of interest,

but I'll just double-check. No, nothing. Sorry. I honestly don't think anything of interest but I'll just double check no nothing sorry we've done this episode just because we can talk about the script and now we're doing it we realise there's nothing really in it has it got the lyrics for this one no it hasn't I don't know why maybe because it just says

VT so I guess it means that it's already been recorded. There you go. So the camera crew don't have to worry about where they're zooming in on this occasion. Or it just means very tedious. Very tedious. Type is lost will to lose. Yes. So the following week, eighth day stayed at number five, its highest position in the charts.

The follow-up, Give Me An Inch stalled at number 41 in November of this year, but she'd have two top 10 hits in early 1981 with D-Days and Will You. Two months after this appearance, she toured the album with support from an unknown band

called Duran Duran. Ladies, take it over there. That's Hazel O'Connor doing very well in the charts at the moment. Talking of the charts, of course, now on our regular YouTube channel, Top of the Pops, which by now you're used to, we, of course, have a look at the charts. So let's start at number 30 right now.

Sleepwalk from Ultravox is number 30. At 29, You've Gotta Be a Hustler, Sue Wilkinson. Grace Jones with Private Life, down to 28. And up three places to 27, Best Friend, The Beat. Highest new entry is at 26, Randy Crawford, One Day I'll Fly Away. Ian Jury wants to be straight at 25, Paranoid with Black Sabbath, up three places. At number 23, Funkin' for Jamaica with Tom Brown.

Nick Straker's band, A Walk in the Park, is up to 22. One place jump for Shakin' Stevens with Marie Marie. And at number 20, it's still rock and roll to me, from Billy Joel. And back onto your armchairs, fellas, dancing's a bit of a nubble. Who else? It's Lex and Co. After the rundown from 30 to 20, Travis advises the dads to get a firm grip of their armchairs

as he introduces Lex and Co. dancing to Still Rock & Roll To Me by Billy Joel. Born in the Bronx in 1949, Billy Joel's first contact with the music industry was as a session pianist for Shadow Morton, the producer of the Shangri-Las, and he may have played on Leader of the Pack.

He claims that he either played on the demo or the actual song, he can't remember. He spent the rest of the 60s in a British Invasion's covers band, a late 60s band called The Hassles, and a psychedelic proto-metal duo called Attila, which split up when he ran off with his partner's missus. You heard their album?

No, is it good? It's fucking insane. Wow heard their album? No, is it good? It's fucking insane. Wow. After a suicide attempt, which involved drinking a bottle of furniture polish, which he later said he took because it looked tastier than bleach, he launched his solo career in 1970,

but it wouldn't be till March of 1978 when he first made the charts over here, when Just The Way You Are got to number 19. This is the follow-up to All For Lena, which got to number 40 in April of this year, and has already been a US number one for two weeks. Currently, it's stuck at number 20, so there's only one thing for it,

time for Legs & Co to work their magic upon it. So where do we start here, chaps? Do we start with the song or the routine? We haven't done Lex & Co for a while, have we? I was going to say, I'd love to know who's in charge of the costume here, but because I have the camera script, I can tell you exactly who's in charge.

It's somebody with a brilliant name of Nicholas Rocker. Yes, yes. Which actually sounds like a member of the Hives or something. But what they've gone for here is it's almost like they've grabbed two halves of two outfits. The dresses they're wearing look kind of like, you know, it's kind of rainbow, sort of reggae type, you know, sort of reggae colours. And they've got white cowboy boots.

It's kind of this weird reggae line dancing crossover going on here. Yeah, I've got Rusta Cowgirls on my notes. In the war for America. Actually, what they look like, you know when you're a kid and the ice cream van comes along and your mum goes out for it and she comes back with these really manky ice lollies, the only things that were left when you wanted a fucking cider

barrel or a strawberry mither yeah they're them and all the colors are kind of blended into each other and it's slightly wrong yeah yeah i wonder if they're trying to make a statement i mean you know it's still rock and roll to me that you can take something as diverse as country and western and this kind of maybe sort of afro reggae type look but the main thing is all these different styles they're talking about you got this you got that it's all reducible to rock and roll it's all rock and roll to me maybe that is what yeah which of course is a terrible terrible thing to do you know it's all still rock and roll to me you know it's like some sort of reggae that's you know saying uh post-punk doomcore um you know it's all reggae to me.

I mean, you know, it's just like, you know, why is rock and roll got this sense that everything's ultimately reduced to rock and roll? That's what I'd like to know, Billy. They could, I mean, if they were doing that, they could have really pushed the boat out and gone the full village people with it and have, you know, one member looks like a sort of 50s rocker and one looks like a hippie and, you know, all that kind of stuff. At which point I think Mr. Rocker would have, like, hippie and you know all that kind of stuff but at which point i think mr rocker would have liked pointing out the budget basically yeah yeah yes um

by the way i just want to quickly uh rewind to the chart rundown that we heard where yes please do just because you know you get a feel of what's in the chart and you know what what we could it's almost like here's what you could have won um and of course there's some fascinating records like sue wilkinson, You Gotta Be a Hustler, which I think did get... Yes, which we've already covered. Yeah, absolutely. Yes.

And DLT does that awful, I think it's awful anyway, of putting the song name first and then saying with, then the band name. He says, and then it's Paranoid with Black Sabbath. No! Yeah. It's not Paranoid with Black Sabbath, it's Black Sabbath with Paranoid, for fuck's sake.

That makes it sound like another Alan Partridge pitch at Tony Hayes, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it does, yeah. Yeah, mental illness with Black Sabbath. So, yeah, and Tom Brown Funkin' for Jamaica. So, which, again, maybe Funkin' for Jamaica might have made some sense of the reggae dresses

that Legs and Co have got going on. But the fact that the song's stuck at number 20 doesn't make it a prime candidate for being on top of the post, does it? No, it's not. And as David says, it's this kind of angry dad mentality to the lyrics. It's kind of so bitter and reductive.

Basically, Billy Joel saying, I don't understand new stuff and it makes me angry and and the worrying realization i i had when i was thinking about that is that that's me now that is how i feel about stuff now i don't understand new stuff and it makes me angry yeah well apparently he wrote the song when he read an album review by a music journalist. And he read the whole review and couldn't decide or didn't know what their band actually sounded like. Wow.

And so he said, oh, it's still rock and roll to me. Bloody poor morning. So, yeah, it's all your fault. Yeah, with Legs & Co, you've still got the same thing about how something manages to be sexist and sexless at the same time. Yeah. But I mean, they've mixed in a few kind of like gymnastics routines into this, haven't they?

But particularly ones that kind of like show off draws. But this song, we've seen the metamorphosis. I think he's in a transition phase here, isn't he? He's been that piano man and now he's starting to go back to his roots of uh banging on the piano to uh to the shangri-la yeah do this kind of retro pastiche because then he did uh what was it acapella one he did the longest time well yeah and tell her about it yes town so i loved that was a brilliant yes i totally agree with you on that one of course, of course, the whole Four Seasons thing with Uptown Girl.

Yes, yes. So he's in a period of transition, whereas Legs & Co are kind of just doing their thing, really, aren't they? Another week, another song. Yeah. But I think with Vigil, as well as that kind of retro thing that you were talking about in the past, he's also showing his reactionigil as well as that kind of retro thing that he took about in the pastiche he's also like the he's showing his reactionary colours as well

you know as Simon mentioned you know in terms of like you know that basically album we didn't get and then later on we didn't start the fire and all that kind of stuff so so the following week it's still rock and roll to me jumped five places to number 15 and would get as high as number 14

he then went on a run of eight singles that got nowhere in the UK charts until he dropped Uptown Girl, which stayed at number one for five weeks in late 1983. What was happening in 1983 to make the British public suddenly crave Billy Joel?

Decent song. Yeah. Yeah, I think you're right. Everybody's talking about the new sound Funny buddies still rock the road to me Great bit of gear there. Billy Joel still rock and roll to me. And of course, Les and Todd looking like an explosion in a paint factory.

Aren't they beautiful? Gay colours, that's what Top of the Pops is all about. And of course, charts. Let's continue now on from number 20, a little bit further up the charts. 19 this week, Roxy Music and Oh Yeah. ELO all over the world are down to 18. Up 17 places, Elvis Presley and Sony Love at 17. At 16, Gimme the Night from George Benson.

The Gap Band with Hoops Upside Your Head at 15. And at 14, Upside Down from the lovely Diana Ross. Sheena Easton jumps five places with Modern Girls at 13, and at 12, up seven, for The Clash, Bank Robber. Can't Stop the Music for Village People is up from 17 to 11 this year. Hi, yes. The fun hasn't stopped yet. Don't go out and put the kettle on yet, Mother, because...

No, we won't, folks, because we're here now to tear the hairs out of David Travis's chest and beard. Ouch! But while we do this, how about a few songs, at least one, by Clough Ratchard. Thank you, Hank. You're a wonderful, warm person. After running down the charts from 19 to 11, Travis gets his chest hairs and beard pulled by none other than Hank Marvin,

guitarist of the Shadows, who introduces Dreaming by Cliff Richard. Born Harry Webb in Lucknow, India in 1940. Fuck this, I am not going to do a pot of history with Cliff Richard because people already moan that we go on for too long. So suffice to say, Cliff Richard has racked up 124 top 40 hits, 68 of which got into the top 10, and 14 went to number one. He spent a combined 18 and a half years in the top 40,

and his 160 performances were an all-time top of the Pops record. I can't believe he's taken 15 episodes before he turned up. This is the follow-up to Carrie, which got to number four in March of this year. And it was co-written by none other than the old sailor. Yay! Cliff Richard. No, first things first. Hankank marvin fucking all the stars are

turning out tonight aren't they yeah now that's a bit confusing because um if you're watching that at the time you think well obviously the shadows are going to be on the show later on but but they're not but i can exclusively reveal from my camera script that they were being filmed for an extra thing at the end of the show after they finished with the Top of the Pops stuff, they were being filmed doing a cover version of Jean-Michel Jarre's Equinox. Oh, God. Yeah, which I've not heard. I'm in no particular hurry to hear.

But I don't know if that was... I don't think it was for Top of the Pops itself. It must have been something that was going to be dropped into another sort of tea time variety show. Two Ronnies or something, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, because i skimmed through i'm on the tvdb list of everything that's ever been on top of the pops i skipped through the next three or four episodes after this one and the shadows do not turn up on it so obviously the um the camera crews are multitasking and moonlighting and hank happened to be there but i don't think he actually says uh and we've got hank marvin from

the shadows no he just pitches up it's just this so so for anybody under the age of 30 you've just and Hank happened to be there. But I don't think he actually says, and we've got Hank Marvin from The Shadows, does he? No, he just pitches up. So for anybody under the age of 30, you've just got this weird little guy with a centre parting and big glasses looking a bit like, what's his name,

from Coronation Street, just coming in and, you know, sort of being a bit of a sex pest and pulling hair and, you know. It's about time, isn't it? This is how it feels, Travis. Taking his own medicine, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. But the thing is, right, see, I'm a bit older here

and I've got a slight advantage here. Clank Marvin and Cliff Ritchie used to have a kind of weekly variety show and Hank Marvin, his main contribution to the Shadows Apache, that is a genuinely kind of groundbreaking record, actually. Brilliant record, yeah, yeah. It has his place in the whole kind of rock scene and things. However, but he actually would would have been known his name would have been self-evident to audience at that

point who he was because they were on telly every week and you know while he can sort of twang him in guitar i mean the comedy is wretched but he was he was supposed to be a kind of comedy sidekick was hank marvin and his catchphrase wasn't even catchphrase it was a cough he'd go and everyone would like you know fall about in the aisles. That was his thing. And they did this true, I mean, as you can see, well,

it's that horrible comedy you get from people of a certain generation that think they're funny. It's got the contours of sort of banter and wit or whatever, but you actually analyse

what they're actually saying. It's just incoherent nonsense. You know, it's the kind of thing where it's funny to say, to mispronounce, you called him Clough Rutschard, you know,

that's hilarious because DLT was always the kind of person that would call Kylie Minogue Kylie Minogue, you know, and it's just like of thing where it's funny to say to mispronounce you called him Clough Rutschard you know that's hilarious because DLT was always the kind of person it was called Kylie Minogue you know and it's just like yeah that's fucking hilarious um and of course yeah and then later on became Jehovah's Witness um Hank Marvin so or was it Sion Targer yeah can you imagine you can imagine opening your door and there's bloody Hank Marvin with a copy of the watchtower and he starts pulling at your chest hair. You feel a bit cheated. Like, you know, you've got a choice of Hank Marvin or Prince and it's Hank Marvin as you draw.

Yes. And during the rundown... Sorry, Simon, can I just jump in? Equinox is currently in number 54 in the charts and the following week it would go up to number 50 and then just drop out of the charts. So I've got to make mention that i'm actually looking at the official charts here and in 1986 i'd never i'd never knew this uh the shadows

did two bbc theme tunes at the time like to take a guess what they were oh god um that's life and howard's way no that wasn't even the right era no i, I don't know. I don't know. Well, you got Howard's Way. Was that one of them? Yes. Oh, my God. David, guess what the other one? 1986? December of 1986?

EastEnders? Correct! Wait. Fucking hell, I bow to your two. I know some fucking intelligent people who just... I don't know where I plucked that from. Just know the fucking biggest load of trivial shit going. Love it, yeah. Just know the fucking biggest load of trivial shit going. So anyway, Cliff,

opens with a really nasty close-up of the pair of shorts that the keyboard player's wearing. The shadows weren't even in the charts, but DLT's given his little rundown of what is in the charts. And again, there's yet more. Here's what you could have won material, which just makes... So you've got ELO doing all over the world which I fucking love

and then you've got Diana Ross Upside Down which is one of the greatest records ever made which just throws into even sharper relief how bleak this

Cliff Richard record is yeah yeah and it is truly bleak yeah and those shorts they are they are shit

they speak absolutely 1980 I mean you can sort of they are 1980 yeah not even 1980s but 1980 those shorts 1978 uh um mario kemp yes that kind of those short very short shorts the silky silk ones you know

but now they've kind of migrated into the world of top of the pops i suppose yeah by 1980 so what the fuck is going so you've got this keyboard keyboardist and from the waist up he's wearing kind of smart kind of dinner dress, you know, as if he's going to an awards ceremony. And then from the waist down, he looks like he's going out for a jog. Well, what they shorts actually look like, they're the ones that Alan Partridge wore

in that episode where him and his assistant... Yeah, Tony Hayes, yeah. Yeah, when him and his assistant have problems with the telephone and, you know, ending with the line, the boys are back in the barracks. The inner underpant lining has perished. Yes.

Yes. And the inner underpant lining of this song went a long time ago, didn't it? The piss soaked in a lining of Cliff richard is exposed in this song i feel it's it's it's no wired for sound that's for sure that that would be a year later oh the thing thing with cliff i can't wait to talk about that one oh that's a tune uh particularly the video but um cliff around this time was considered a peculiar presence in pop you know that he was still hanging around at his age his previous album 1979 was called rock and in pop you know that he was still hanging around at his age his

previous album 1979 was called rock and roll juvenile you know making a joke out the whole thing um and when he released that he was 38 years old yes he's 39 by the time of this song dreaming and i know we've done this kind of this this awful kind of memento mori thing before previous episodes where we realized that people we thought were ancient were actually younger than we are now. Oh, there's a belting one coming up soon, Simon. Oh, right, yeah. But to put that in perspective,

and too much fucking perspective, Justin Timberlake is 36 now. Pharrell Williams is 44 now. None of us think of them as in any way old men. Cliff Richard was 38 and it's like, all right, granddad, what are you doing on top of the clock seriously i mean in the early 60s in melody maker there was a headline that said um ringo too old to rock at 24 yes 24 i think it's cliff i mean the thing is the reason that yeah he did have that kind of cash and he put that album out that simon

mentioned and it got a kind of you know it got reviewed and it'd be quite challenging because he got a lot of kudos for we don't talk anymore yes which was a year earlier which was definitely one of his very best singles you know why should have occurred at that particular point in whatever but but this this particular it's just this the remainder of those 80 and a half years away from this chance so much of it is just stuff like this he's almost like a kind of a bit like david bowie in a sense. They're two time lords, as it were, sort of floating around pop, except one has an absolute shrewd sense of zeitgeist and a kind of absolutely brilliant or, you know, perfectly sort of obsession of his craft and everything like that.

And the other one is just absolutely clueless. He doesn't have, you know, everything about him, you know, he dresses in a sort of, you know, from the keyboard to shorts, you know, to his own particular garb. It just feels very kind of rock and roll-ish but you're not rooted in any clue about what's actually going on what the significances are all these little kind of signifiers of the way that you dress and the way that you sound and stuff he just has no clue no and this is very radio 2 isn't it and

radio 2 in the old money it is but the but the thing is, We Don't Talk Anymore is directly responsible for this song because it was co-written and produced by Alan Tarney, who then went on to do this one. He got the gig for this one on the back. In fact, he did the whole album that this song is from on the back of having succeeded with We Don't Talk Anymore. But the thing that fascinates me about Cliff is his signature moves, his dance moves.

But that's another thing, yeah. He does that thing of getting low and doing danger dancing, doing these kind of... Danger dancing. Danger dancing. It's kind of as if he's telling a scary story to children and he sort of waves his hand across the camera in that way. Yes, yeah.

That's Devil Woman for you, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's locked into that Devil Woman groove. He is locked into Devil Woman, yeah. Yeah, still haunted. And, you know, his previous single, Carrie, that's, I pretty much like that. Yeah, I mean, you know, that's got something to it,

sort of missing person story and all that. It's quite unusual for Cliff to be doing, but this is more bang in the middle of his own, isn't it, dreaming? It's very nothing-y, and as David says, very Radio 2. Yeah, I mean, um you know before we move away from the from the keyboard play with the shorts we have to we're not mentioning that he's wearing matching gloves the gloves match with the source and they're not even fingerless gloves

which would have been acceptable for 1980 what with madness and everything i mean possibly he was a very serious keyboardist and musician and he's just sort of distancing himself, you know, by wearing his kind of surgical gloves. You know, I'm not touching, I'm having nothing to do with this. Yeah. I'm forensically removing myself from this Cliff Richards atrocity. And also the keyboard player's hanging, almost hanging off the end of the stage.

So there's some of the kids there who are standing there and they've got this satiny arse right in their face. Yeah, it's not right, is it? It's not right. Yeah, I'm sure there's something now in BBC safeguarding or compliance legislation that specifically mentions that. And again, I bet that satiny arse wasn't in there just for the two or three minutes of duration of the song. They'll have been all kind of cracked from the floor manager,

and they're like, oh, let me do that again. Okay, everybody keep their place for 10, 15 minutes while we fix the lights. So that in the arse would have probably lingered traumatically in their faces simon are there any uh any uh kind of like interesting notes for cliff richard's performance such as he's here now send the helicopters out no there aren't no there aren't sadly no and cliff um cliff's got a kind of a modified Saturday night fever rig out, hasn't he? But it's been tailored for the 80s. No, for the 80s.

Fuck it, I'm saying it again. Because, you know, it's white and he's got an open neck shirt, but it's, you know, everything, the lapels have come in, the trouser legs have been slightly tightened. You know, he's making a smooth transition, isn't he? Yeah, I suppose. But in a way, going back to that whole thing about people seeming old before their time in those days,

I think he is probably more a victim of it than anyone else because he went so middle of the road so quickly, you know, around the time of the sort of late 60s and the whole Eurovision thing with congratulations and all that. And he was so kind of mum-friendly, even by the early 70s, whereas there were plenty of people the same age as him who were still probably rocking out at the age of 38 and nobody thought anything of it.

But with his centre-parting, I mean, even his hair is barely recognisable from the kind of young Cristiano Ronaldo lookalike that he was. Yes, and he really was, wasn't he? Oh, yeah. If you look at footage of him on Oh Boy in 1958 or whatever it is, it is Cristiano Ronaldo.

It's extraordinary. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the following week, Dreaming nudged up to number eight, its highest position, and it also got to number ten in America. Fucking hell. The follow-up, suddenly, a duet with Olivia Newton-John in the movie Xanadu,

made it to number 15 in November of this year. Here you are Have you got a record out at the moment by any chance? I have. It's shooting up the charts. From number 181, it went down to 200 this week. Silly thing. Listen, if you're going to take my job over with my beard, pal, I can tell you that I'm a bit of an ace at football. Watch this. Cut for this. Hey, none of that body contact. Not with me.

No, I don't like all that. I wouldn't mind a bit of physical contact, like a peck on the cheek from our next lady, though. She is doing very well. Two records in the charts. It's Sheena Easton and Modern Love. He wakes and says hello Turns on the breakfast show She fixes coffee while he takes a shower

Travis is interrupted by Kev in a massive beard who looks like a Marxist with a perm. Paul Breitner. Yes, he really does. Travis responds by asking Kev how well his latest single is doing and then demonstrates his football prowess by heading a ball

while Keegan basically nudges him off it, doesn't he? He doesn't lose that competitive spirit for one fucking moment, does he? Fighting with Billy Branagh, elbowing Dave Lee Travis. It's all the same to him finally travis mentions that he'd like some physical contact with the next artist oh and then reigns himself in by saying like a peck on the cheek it's it is title partridge so he goes

he goes no body contact and then he goes i wouldn't mind i wouldn't mind a bit of body contact in the form of a peck of a peck on the cheek for my next guest. It is pure partridge, isn't it? It really is. And the artist in question is Sheena Easton with her new single, Modern Girl. Born Sheena Orr in North Lanarkshire in 1959, Sheena Easton was studying speech and drama teaching

and singing in a club band when she appeared in an episode of The Big Time, the BBC documentary series fronted by Esther Ransom, where members of the public were given the chance to do a high-profile job. During the show, Easter met and sang with Dusty Springfield and Lulu, and eventually landed a contract with EMI. Her debut single, Modern Girl, only got to No. 56 in April of this year, but when her episode of The Big Time was

broadcast in July, her second single, 9 to 5, got to number 3 a month later, and it's still in the top 10 this week at number 4. One Rush re-release later, and it's up this week from number 18 to number 13. I mean, that remark

that Dave Lee Travis made, it doesn't help that he makes those remarks at the most unassuming women who are not kind of like being about the sex yeah you're right they're not putting themselves out there as sex objects are they they're not kind of sleazy hot mamas or whatever you know it's just

kind of it's not Tina Turner is it so yeah I mean if he's saying that in public, in front of the camera, God only knows what he's like in the corridors, you know what I mean? Yeah.

Well, no, I mean, we do know, don't we? But anyway, yeah. Yes. She's like sort of young Daily Mail reader 1980, isn't she? Sheena Eason. And she's brought into being by Esther Anstew, who at that point has massive clout. I mean, that's life and all that kind of stuff.

And it's almost like pretty much a fait accompli that once she's featured in that way, you know, it's not going to be kind of plucky underdog or whatever. She's just going to kind of shit from a great height on everything and everybody else. And now at this point, she's absolutely dominating the charts. She is. She's got two singles in the top ten.

And of course, it's the most... It is a very sort of vapid sort of pair, you know, but contradictory as well. You know, modern girl, and then my baby takes the baby while she's shaking the axe she's covered all spheres

of early 80s womanhood here hasn't she someone who stays at home and someone who goes out yeah

what else is there yes absolutely going absolutely there's no in between so it's funny you know you

mentioned the whole thing about Esther Ransom and the big time making her into a star that sort of thing was almost unheard of at the time now that the phenomenon of pop stars being made by TV is just par for the course

to the extent that it's actually started failing now there's about 10 years where it was actually nailed on that if you won the X Factor you'd at least for about six months be a star um and maybe even get a sustainable career out of it but nothing i don't i don't know if anything like this had happened prior to sheena easton maybe maybe you can think of an example so yeah it was it was a it was a weird thing not in a competition i mean but the kelly marie you know opportunity not right well

yeah that's a different thing entirely, isn't it? Yeah, I guess not. Yeah, I suppose Opportunity Knocks, but yeah, I suppose that's more variety performances than pop stars usually. But this song, yeah, it describes a woman who does the walk of shame with pride and who turns up to work after a one-night stand

wearing last night's clothes and like, you know, what of it, you know? And, you know, somebody who haters would describe as a dirty stop out in in the old language so it's really quite a sort of bold forward-looking empowered lyric in a way but it doesn't it doesn't seem to match with it doesn't match with the feel of the song does it because she's no she's so kind of jaunty isn't it's jaunty and she's so kind of mumsy in her jumpsuit. She looks like an escaped Nolan sister. Yes, she really does, yeah. Or it's a really important night at the bingo.

You know, the jackpot's gone up to £500 or something. Did you notice someone pogoing to Sheena? Yes. Well, actually, pogoing and moonstomping. Yeah. Yeah. I love that in Top of the palms i love when people do that it's like okay you're not you're not you haven't got the cockney rejects or bad manners i'm

just gonna dance our dance anyway to any fucking thing and i don't care just to make sure my mates notice me on the teller i wonder if he got any shit at school the next day for moon stomping to sheena eastern i don't know if it's my school we think they're a legend for doing that yeah definitely yeah just even having two records in the chart was quite a noteworthy thing at the time a huge deal yeah you you normally only got to do that if you were a the jam or b you just died yes yeah definitely anything else to say anything in the notes simon nah? Anything in the notes, Simon? No.

Oh, hang on, in the notes. Right, I'll tell you one thing I noticed about this, this whole episode, in fact, is that they're fading the songs out really quickly, aren't they? I think there was... This lasted about a minute and a bit, didn't it? Yeah, I think there was at least another verse and chorus left of this. Yeah. And there's nothing in the notes for that.

I wonder if, you know... Well, it's to make room for the sketches. It's to make room for the sort of little pat-and-bite routines between... Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All the top bants between Keggy Kegel and DLT, yeah. I find it infinitely preferable to 9 to 5. Yeah. Maybe she was thinking of a trilogy or something

because, you know, she's singing about someone who's single in her early 20s and she's copped off with someone at the beginning of the song the end of the song he's come back and she's gone no mate i'm stopping at home to watch i don't know uh call my bluff or something so the first song's about a woman presumably in her early 20s the second song 95 is about a married woman maybe Maybe there was a third single rattling about being a non-or. Come on, I'll do your research. What was the third single? The next single

was One Man Woman. Oh yeah! So therefore, you know, maybe it's about a woman in middle age and, you know, her husband's ran off with a bar maid or something and she's like, no, I can't be bothered with blokes. I've had one, that's enough.

I'm washing... That's the last load of pants I wash for any fucker. Maybe. Which was the name of the fourth single, yeah. Yes, yes. So the following week, Modern Girl jumped up to number 10 and would get as high as number 8, and the follow-up one man woman got to number 14 in november of this year james bond was waiting and of course you know um

nine to five was a was a big hit in america morning trainers had to call it there yes they did yeah because of dolly potten so yeah so we mean, we go on about the British invasion and we talk about, you know, Duran Duran and the Culture Club. In actual fact, it was Cliff and Sheena who, you know, made the beachhead first. The Scottish Indian invasion. Yes. Throwing themselves over a fucking mine so a flock of seagulls could run over them.

It's typical, isn't it? It's just typical. Sheena Easton is British when she succeeds, Scottish when she fails. Yes. People fill her world, found no single man, but she's getting back to the top.

Sheena Easton, modern girl, number 13, isn't she just? You're tuned to Top of the Pops, of course. What else? And here are The Beat at 27 with Best Friend. Travis reminds us that we're watching Top of the Pops and introduces Best Friend by The Beat. Formed in Birmingham in 1978, The Beat were a multiracial, multi-age group

that signed a one single deal with Two Tone Records and had a number six hit with the cover of Tears of a Clan in January of this year. Like the specials, they ended up forming their own label, Go Feet, in a deal with Arista Records, and had two more top ten hits in 1980 with Hands Off She's Mine and Mirror in the Bathroom. This is the follow-up to Mirror in the Bathroom, a double A-side with Stand Down Margaret, which Dave Wakelin described in the wake of Margaret Thatcher's death as a song which said,

quote, which said, quote, stop showing off to everybody, humble yourself a bit, stop pretending you're posh, we know you're from Nottingham. It's up this week from number 30 to number 27. So fucking angry about that.

Grantham's fucking miles away, you bastard. I was just letting you see there quietly. I didn't want to say anything. So, Simon, before we get stuck into the beat, what are your favourite bands of the time? This here is your fucking hell, he's the same age as me moment, isn't it? What do you mean?

Who do you think? Oh, Saxa. Saxa, oh my God. So, go on, how old was he? Fifth day. Oh, Jesus Christ. Yeah, because it was a real novelty, wasn't it, old was he? 50. Oh, Jesus Christ. Yeah, because it was a real novelty, wasn't it, at the time that the Beat had a member of the band who was this sort of... Yeah, he was 50, but he looked like this old Jamaican guy who...

I mean, he could have been 70. He might as well have been, because just kind of culturally, stylistically, he was so different from the younger guys in the band. He even had a beard. People just didn't have beards and all of that. I actually met Saxo once. I booked the international beat,

which is a kind of fragmentary version of them after they split up, to play at a university ball. And he was quite a handful, I'll tell you that. I don't know how I can say this. He had an eye for the ladies. at a university ball. And he was quite a handful, I'll tell you that. I don't know how I can say this. He had an eye for the ladies, let's put it that way, to the point of being a little bit of a pest, but, you know, great saxophonist.

Didn't he have a go at David Bowie for not leaving any cans out in the rider? Is that right? Apparently so, yeah. Carry on blathering and i'll uh i'll look that up so i mean i don't think i'm going to get much disagreement from either of you here but um i think the beat are one of the greatest bands this country's ever produced and i think it's an absolute crime that they're not recognized as such the people go on and don't get me wrong rightly go on about the jam and the specials and madness and all of that stuff from that similar era but i i just think the beat are eternally eternally underrated um it's almost like that thing in in the 90s people would sort of buttonhole you and say um

all right who do you prefer then oasis or blur and you know the correct answer was pulp or or you know the correct answer was some hip-hop group or whatever that there was nothing to do with that whole um you know binary thing and it's a similar thing around the time of two-tone people would say who do you prefer then specials or madness well the beat actually the beat were probably the better group out of all of them what has to be said here now that we're seeing a lot of the mod bands around about this time in an absolute rut whilst at the same time um all the two-tone bands uh who you know who started only a year ago have had absolutely no problems in moving on and and progressing you know yeah they all sounded kind of similar at first now you've now you know the beat the specials and madness all sound like three totally different bands now, don't they?

That's right, which actually bothered me a bit at the time because I was only just sort of catching up with Ska and I thought, well, come on, guys. Stay as you are for a bit. You know, let me enjoy that. But, you know, looking back, it was actually brilliant what they were doing. And also, we've seen Secret Affair at the start of this episode,

nominally a mod band. There's something much more mod about the beat in terms of the kind of the sharpness of their music and their and their look everything about them um that the whole aesthetic if you look at that first album i just can't stop it um the art the artwork and just that the sound was so um uh kind of uptight and kind of wiry and um and fidgety and and it it sounded like a record that's entirely made on amphetamines and it makes secret affairs sound like fucking hippies to be honest with you

you know what i mean um and and you're right that they've moved on this isn't scar best friend is not a scar record and and it's on their first fucking album um it's it's kind of power pop really i suppose new wave whatever and it points the way towards the beat's amazing, but little heard third album, Special Beat Service, which is all about this kind of really beautifully crafted, mature songwriting. What Simon said, I agree with every single word. I always preferred them over Madness and the Specials.

There was this kind of razor-threshing sharpness about the music. And they weren't just a political band. Yeah, I mean, I threshing sharpness about the music um they weren't and they weren't just a political band yeah i mean i could rhapsodize about the beat all fucking day i just uh in in the unlikely event that anybody's listening to this who hasn't investigated the beat fucking hell do it particularly the the first and third albums i would say but just all the singles and um and dave dave wakeling i i think he he's quite an unassuming character he wasn't sort of you know mr personality like you know one of these one of these things like like weller or strummer but he he deserves to be seen in that light i think for being a brilliant political

song songwriter and also he he looked fucking amazing he's very very handsome man and uh and and and war um well as well as a cND badge in his performance, which was really powerful. He's wearing one earring. I think he was the first pop star on my radar to wear an earring and make it look heterosexual. So that David Bowie saxo story. So according to Dave Wakelin, they did a show opening for David Bowie. And he came into the dressing room and said hello to us, which was remarkable. While he was in his stage clothes, which were black pants and a black vest with a white shirt on.

He comes in our trailer and says, really great to be doing some shows with you. I'm very pleased. I just wanted to check if everything is OK. Do you have everything you need? Saxa, sitting in the back of the bus, says in a Jamaican accent, hey, sonny boy, come with me, and puts his arm around Bowie, dragging him to the fridge. Saxa opens it up and says, you see any red stripe in there? Bowie replies, no, I don't, to which Saxa says, ah, sonny boy, that's what we need. Bowie responds right away and dashes out of the caravan about 10 minutes later another

guy shows up with a case of red stripe saxa being all happy says nice man there who is him anyway coming in the caravan like that and i said well that's david bowie and sax replied me thought he was a waiter so the following week Best Friend moved up to number 22, its highest position. The follow-up, Too Nice To Talk To, got to number 7 in January of 1981 and they'd have three more top 40

hits before splitting up in 1983. Let's talk about ourselves a bit more I promise, talk about ourselves on the floor Let's talk about ourselves a bit more I promise, talk about ourselves again Debbie Come on, fellas Play the game Down

Zip, zip That's better All right, you two short, wonderful persons What about the charts generally? Kev and Cliff, how do you think the charts are going As far as sort of different types of music? I think at the moment There's something in the charts for everyone you know there's whatever your choice of music i think there's one in there which you like i mean i just think there's nothing as soon as him and that won't be long will it yes he's about 149

in the charts at the moment get down get down you know what do you think about elvis of course being in a chance back now well it doesn't really it really doesn't matter what i think b.a robinson's hairdresser thinks he's terrific b.a ro. Robertson's hairdresser thinks he's terrific. B.A. Robertson's hairdresser thinks he's terrific? Got no taste. That's B.A.'s hair, doesn't he? Yes, you're not wrong. I'll tell you what, British dumbfellas,

because now is the best record you've ever heard in your life. One of my favourites from Randy Crawford. And one day, I'll fly away. Can you stand the pace? If you fly away eventually, I'll wait. After forcing Cliff Richard and Kevin Keegan to kneel at his feet, Travis solicits an opinion from Keegan upon the state of the current hip parade. Keegan thoughtfully muses that there's something for everyone.

Instead of asking Cliff Richard about his opinion on the lamentable performance of England in that summer's European Championship, Travis asks Cliff on how he feels about Elvis currently being in the charts at number 17 with its only love. Cliff responds that B.A. Robertson's hairdresser thinks it's fantastic and casts suspicion on mr robertson's shit haircut has he just cussed elvis down there yeah he has which is weird isn't it who the fuck is he is he still bitter from from being written off in the early days as sort of britain's third race answer to elvis it still rankles this is quite the quite the tr, isn't it? Yeah. The Captain of England, the Peter Pan of Pop, and

Travis. He's treating them like dogs, doing that whole pants people down, sit routine, which is bizarre. Then Cliff says his thing. Why B.A. Robertson's hairdresser?

Have they cut a bit out that we haven't seen, why B.A. Robertson's hairdresser? Is there some kind of... Have they sort of cut a bit out that we haven't seen where B.A. Robertson is somehow relevant to this discussion? Well, he's had dealings with B.A. Robertson because he was the co-writer of Carré. So, you know, this might be a bit of a cheeky poke. All right, top bants, top bants. Cliff Richard's not very good at this sort of thing, is he? Now, you see, this is where I have an advantage.

I'm old enough to remember when Cliff Richard had his own weekly variety show. And this took up all of Saturday night. And this was, you know, precious time. The telly was on all the time. And this is what we got. What we got was this. So, yeah, Cliff Richard had, he fancied himself as a kind of not just a you know a song and a dance man but also a bit of a kind of a light entertainer

he had hank marvin as his sidekick and it was terrible terrible hank mark hank marvin whose idea of um comedy is to say clough ruchard rather than cliff richard it's bizarre isn't it um comedy is to say Clough Richard rather than Cliff Richard. It's bizarre, isn't it? Hank Marvin did great things. You know, with The Shadows, Apache, that's actually a seminal moment in rock history, in rock history's timeline.

But as a comedian, he was piss piss poor. He was like, you know, he was a homeopathically dilute version of Sid Little or something. And his catchphrase was to go, which would send studio audience into kind of gales of laughter. But yes, so my memories of Cliff and Hank Marvin are bitter indeed.

And referring to my camera script, I can see here that they were supposed to show a clip Of It's Only Love The song by Elvis Presley So that's probably why they asked Cliff For his opinion of it But then for some unknown reason That clip gets cut from the transmitted show

But they leave in Cliff's weird little bitter side swipe At Elvis So it sort of makes no sense at all, yeah. Let's face it, all jokes on top of the puff. Bar John Peel every now and again. Dire stray dog's death. It's strange, you know, you've got Kevin Keegan here

and Cliff and Dave Lee Travis. It's almost like, you know, jostling to be the best men in Britain, Britain's alpha males. And all of this, you know, the kicking about like a football, this nonsense about B.A. Robertson's hairdresser. Do you think Cliff thinks B.A. Robertson's a cunt like everyone else? It could be. It's very enigmatic. Future historians are going to be scratching their heads over this. It's a shame that, given that this is probably going to be one of the very few resources

that we'll be able to refer to, that we ourselves, so close to the event, can't discover what this is probably going to be one of the very few resources that we'll be able to refer to that we ourselves so close to the event can't discover what this is all about maybe the secret's buried underneath his vineyard with the with the no I'm not going to say it I'm going to leave it

I'm going to leave it no there's a clip on YouTube there's a clip on YouTube where this woman, and it was put out during the time when he was being buzzed by helicopters. And she said, oh, I've got these questions for Cliff Richard. And one of the questions she asked is, you have a vineyard in Portugal.

Is it true that you fertilize that vineyard with the blood of children? So maybe that was it. Maybe DLT was going to ask that question and he hasn't denied it I noticed I noticed Cliff Richard by his silence is making himself seem very guilty of fertilizing his vineyard with the blood of children maybe if he did say to Cliff Richard is it true that you fertilize that your vineyard in Portugal with the blood of children? He'll say, well, I don't know, but B.A. Robertson's hairdresser thinks it tastes fantastic. The thing about Cliff Richard is his wines are very good.

They may be, as a vintner, this may be his primary contribution to Western society. They're meant to be very good indeed. I don't know what he fertilises them with. Maybe it's the blood of B.A. Robertson. That's why Carrie doesn't live here anymore. She's pushing up the fucking Pinot Noir. Yes.

This extremely awkward dollop of banter is ended by Travis introducing the best record you've ever heard in your life. Just before we go into the song, Travis turns to Cliff and says, can you stand the pace? And Cliff says, if you fly away,

eventually I'll wait. What the fucking hell is he going on about? Yeah. Well, why don't you just say, fuck off, you cunt. But what stood out for me about this, and we've seen this phenomenon a few times on the show is that moment where the presenter is introducing a record that

they like and they think is quality um in fact DLT himself I think and he's hyped this so big DLT I think himself did it with um Elkie Brooks uh Fool If You Think It's Over on a previous episode that we looked at yeah and I think Simon Bates did the same thing. So here, he does this sort of headmasterly thing of saying, he says, now keep shtum during this. So he's basically reaching through the telly to every child or sulky teenager in every living room in the country, saying, now you might not like it. Weaving his chalk duster. Yeah, yeah.

He's saying, now you might not like it, but maybe the mums and dads will. So just behave. Behave yourselves, now, you might not like it, but maybe the mums and dads will. So just behave. Behave yourselves, children, while this song is playing. And it's no reflection on the record. It's a fucking brilliant record. But yeah, he just does that sort of cringey thing of saying, now, listen, everything else in this show has been a bit of frivolity, but now this is some proper music.

Yes. So, born Veronica Crawford in Macon, Georgia in 1952, Randi Crawford spent the 70s as a jazz singer who gigged with George Benson, Cannonball Adelaide and Fred Wesley, with a solo career on the side. But she first appeared in the UK charts when she recorded Street Life with the Crusaders, which got to number five in September of 1979. This is the follow up to Last Night night in dance land which got to number 61 in june of this year and it's this week's highest new entry at number 26 and yes like you've said

simon when when dlt said something good it's time to you know nip down to the pantry and get some toast toppers going but yeah this song's fucking mint, isn't it? It is, and do you notice that it gets played full length? A lot of the songs in this episode have been cut short. And I wonder whether this is DLT's own editorial influence going on here. Yes. No, I just think it's just a wonderful record. Something about the filming of it, I notice in the notes here,

everyone else is recorded, I guess, in a normal Top of the Pops studio, but in Shepherd's Bush. It says here, in brackets underneath her name, Music Studio, 1330 to 1630. So she's in a different bit of the building, a different studio. And I guess that's why you don't see an audience.

Is that right? Yeah, i just thought it was filmed uh on an from an american show it's got that kind of ntsc thing going on about it well it says music studio i don't know what that means but you know but it's got um uh sort of times it's sort of you know 30 30 60 30 as if she's doing her own little filming separate from the rest of the um stupidity that's going on and i don't know if that's her stipulation that she didn't want anyone pogoing during her song it's possible but but there we go but whoever's done it they've made a huge balls up of it haven't they

because i mean the one thing that needs to be brought out in the open straight away is that um you know you you look at randy crawford's mouth and you know straight away she's not British. She's got the most amazing teeth ever. And whoever's directed this has decided to emphasise those teeth. It is extraordinary. And it's emphasised by the fact she, I don't think she opens her eyes once during the performance. Her eyes are screwed tight.

So it's all teeth and smiles. And I wonder if that's a kind of shyness on her part whether you know she's not a not not somebody who's who's you know particularly comfortable um you know giving it the full kind of lead singer face that that you're meant to do i don't know yeah but it has to be said that um kind of randy crawford sings like that dog in that's life says sausages it's all about the teeth and it gets quite fucking terrifying near the end with the vision mixing because you see that they layer her face a few times and at one point her head has been tilted down but her teeth are shining through and it's you know if i was, I'm sleeping in my mum's bed tonight

because I'd have pissed mine in absolute fear of Randy Crawford's teeth. Are you OK, Al? I mean, you know, are you over it? It sounds like it's still... Well, I was extremely teeth-a-phobic as a child. My great-grandma, Kit, had really oversized false teeth. And they fucking terrified me to the point where every time I went to see her on a Sunday, I would say, oh, I'm not going to kiss you today, Grandma Kit.

And my dad would drag me outside and fucking tan my arse. But I was so terrified of her fucking teeth. But yeah, you're right. I noticed that when they sort of overlay her head on her own head um one of one of them is mouthing the wrong words one of them sort of singing a bit that we haven't come to yet like really visibly so it kind of doesn't work does it and it kind of looks a bit like alien when she does that as well yeah she just come out exactly um i know it's from the from the camera script here and it's so meticulous that um it's got the lyrics and then it's got obviously there's an instrumental break and it says two bars

capital letters then two bars capital letters then in brackets that that's how precise these camera this camera script is for this jesus can you imagine if the kgGB had discovered this Somewhere left in Someone's briefcase at fucking Paddington Station and think well this is obviously Important but what the fuck does it mean But I just think with this record At the time I wouldn't have

Understood The chord progressions The chord progressions are sort of out of musical Theatre rather than out of pop It's just too sophisticated For my palate at the time. Now, I absolutely love it. And I do think with Randy Crawford, what a singer. Why don't people go on about Randy Crawford

like they do about Aretha Franklin or whoever? Just an extraordinary voice. I don't know, what do you guys think? The thing is, I was so into clubs at the time, and dancing, that I was always a bit dismayed by ballads, so I really didn't appreciate this as much as I should have. But I did

worship Street Life. And, you know, Randy Crawford, what a voice. What a voice. Yeah. I mean, Street Life was a fucking gem. It really was. And do we all notice what DLT does in the outro there? Because with

Hank Marvin already having done a really bad Scottish Clough Ruchard thing, we've now got DLT doing this fake French accent and saying, now that is what I call a very tasty piece of music. For fuck's sake.

It's much more skin-crop. Yeah, why? I mean, it is a very tasty piece of music, but... So the following week, one day I'll fly away, soared up 24 places to number four, fucking hell, and would spend two weeks at number two, held off the top spot by Kelly Marie and Don't Stand So Close To Me by The Police. The follow-up, You Might Need Somebody,

got to number 11 in July of 1901. Yes, yes. Before we go, chaps, I need to ask, were there any performances on Top of the Pops that scared you as a child? Sparks. Yeah, basically, I think them doing Beat the Clock performances on top of the pops that scared you as a child uh sparks uh yeah um basically um i think them doing beat the clock uh and uh just ron ron male his his unnerving uh glares the camera

and his stillness that just absolutely fucking terrified me and also um anytime i saw twisted sister on the telly uh and by the way i i love sparks and i i i kind of love twisted sisters as well. But at the time, I was just bricking it if I watched that stuff. With me, right, late 60s, it was the Rolling Stones. It's along with, you know, Baked Beans on Toast or whatever. It's one of my little formative experiences. They had this thing, whenever they went on,

there was always this kind of slightly kind of anarchic breakdown between the band and the audience. And you'd have like Jagger pulling girls on stage or whatever and it genuinely felt, to me as a little kid, and you get a bit phased by these things when you're a little kid, that things were actually getting out of hand and that perhaps the police were going to have to be called. The punk bands always scared me

because they always had this habit of just singing and then suddenly just sticking their face in the camera. And there was one time, I mean, I was... My dad got a portable telly off the round, as I've mentioned before. So I mainly watched Top of the Pops in black and white in my bedroom. And typical boy of that age bedroom, it was a fucking shithole.

And so the lead was tangled up with God knows what else. And I remember one time I'm watching it and I'm standing up and having a bit of a dance to, I think it was, oh, She's So Modern by the Boomtown Rats. And all of a sudden, Bob Geldof sticks his face into the camera and I just jumped up and knocked the telly over.

And it lived. The telly lived. But the scariest thing, the scariest thing on telly ever for me as a child was, well, the Humphreys used to scare the shit out of me because you never saw them, so you just imagine the most horrible things ever. But the ultimate was the news at 10 theme

tune that shit me up so badly because it sounds like a knife attack and so i've been lying in bed and i could hear the telly downstairs because my dad had it on full blast and you know the the the the music at 10 o'clock kind of like put the shirts up man it's like oh my god i've got to be asleep before the fucking end music comes on, because that is the worst fucking horrible music ever. It just goes absolutely fucking mental. And I'd just be there. And if I wasn't asleep by half 10, I'd just be crunched up with like two pillars wrapped around my head. I think I think the most the most traumatic thing that was regularly screened to children

in that era and there's almost a whole separate podcast in this, is public information films for children and I actually as chance would have it, watched a bunch of them last night because my girlfriend hasn't seen any of this stuff

so Charlie says, it's fairly tame actually, but you know, a cat falling in a canal and all that kind of stuff. Oh, that's terrible, because it's the violin music, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You've got a cartoon cat in a canal. That's fairly sort of softcore. But then you get to,

you get a kid flying a kite near Pylon and Jimmy! And he falls to the ground in a load of flames or you've got well that's him getting his frisbee back isn't it there's two separate ones there's a kid breaking into the electricity

substation to get his frisbee back but the king of them all of course is the spirit of dark and lonely water of course Donald Pleasance voicing this kind of grim reaper as children are playing in an abandoned quarry or pond or whatever it is and uh yeah one one of whom is benny out of

grain seriously wow yeah and and it's pretty clear that the people who made these films were taking some kind of government budget and um you know using it as a testing ground for their um budding careers in making horror movies or something like that clearly it's what they wanted to do there's that one is it called um the the lot the late run or something it's a bunch of kids running across a railway track it's about 15 minutes long and oh yes and and it's almost like it's kind of hunger games or or um uh i i don't know um lord of the Flies type survivalist scenario where these kids are running back and forth,

or Battle Royale or whatever, trying to outdo each other and getting mown down. It's really quite graphic. You get this kind of hauntological quality, I think, to this kind of music. There's lots of analogue synths and stuff like that. Yes. There's also this kind of slightly lost sense of the state actually looking after you. It's very evocative yeah yeah you know this then the british state you know before

margaret thatcher rolled it back or whatever you know really was kind of looking out for you albeit in a very slightly kind of paternalistic sort of way um there's something sort of deeply lost and nostalgic about that but by by the 80s that had just become shrunk down to don't be gay and don't take heroin. That's all the government cared about. If you're not British and you want to know why we're so fucked up Charlie says One day

I'll die away That is what I call a very tasty piece of music. Highest entry at 26. Of course, when the more they all fly away. Now, how about a look at the top ten? They're like this. Flip Richard moves up four places to this week's number ten in the charts. Cliff Richard moves up four places to this week's number ten in the charts.

And after a few years away, Mike Berry in the charts at nine this week with The Sunshine of Your Smile. Down four, but still a winner. Winner takes it all from ABBA at number eight. A little controlled lunacy from the Piranhas and Tomahawks. Down to seven. Two places in the right direction for Gary Newman's I Die, You Die. First of three ladies together in the charts, Hazel O'Connor on the eighth day, up eight places to number five.

I'm in, I'm in Now, baby, it takes the morning train One of two records in the charts, from Sheena Easton, nine to five at number four. He takes another home again My head is in a spin, my feet don't press down Getting ever closer up two places from five to three Feels like I'm in love, it's Kelly Marie

Ashes to ashes, fun to fuck it We've no major talks And squeezed ever so delicately down to number two It's David Bowie and Ashes to Ashes Hi, pals Right, it's David Bowie, Ashes to Ashes. Hi, pals. Right, it's time for the number one, but I cannot announce it because I'm on a diet. Kevin Kaganos, come here.

I can't announce it. You know. You're on a diet, really? Yes, yes, sorry. What about a creamy, big cream cake? No, wrong, wrong. Greasy bacon sarnie? Wrong, wrong.

Jam. Jam. Yes, I like that. That's nice.arnie? Wrong. Wrong. Jam. Jam. Yes, I like that. That's nice. It is real, you know. It's not important for you to know my name Nor I to know yours As if we communicate for two minutes I would never be able to

After the top ten rundown, Travis and Kev indulge in a bit of food-related banter before introducing this week's number one. Start by The Jam. Formed in Woking in 1972, The Jam had eight top 40 hits from 1977 onwards before finally cracking the top ten with The Eaton Rifles in November of 1979. They kicked off 1980 with a double A-side Going Underground and Dreams of Children, which went straight in at number one in March of this year. This is the follow-up, which is the first and only official single from the forthcoming LP, Sound Effects,

which Paul Weller insisted on putting out over polydor's choice pretty green it was last week's highest new entry at number three this week's number one yeah paul weller with his lichtenstein guitar uh backed as always by martin shaw and dennis waterman um yes uh. Yeah, I had a theory about this song that anyone I've told this theory to just thinks I'm completely insane, but that the lyrics are somehow based on George Orwell's 1984. All the stuff about,

it's not important for you to know my name or I to know yours. If we communicate for two minutes only, it'll be enough. That's almost exactly something that I thinkia says to winston smith in 1984 and that that book although all the all the 50 year old prostitute with no teeth uh but that that book i mean the book 1984 was such a kind of touchstone for people of the post-punk generation and particularly with with actual 1984 looming so that that's my theory about the somewhat cryptic lyrics. No, that makes a lot of sense to me.

Well done, Simon. Obviously, musically, it's famously based on Taxman by the Beatles. But I think it's better. I think it's one of those things where it's just much better. And it's got this kind of fantastic contained aggression to it, which this is a mod record, never mind Secret Affair fucking hell this yeah there's something about this it's so minimal but it's got this kind of tautness and it's kind of thwack to it that um even some of the other jam stuff just lacked and i i think it gets overlooked people always think of town called

malice they think of going underground yeah this is what is it it's only about two minutes long it's a really short record it's's really self contained and it is just contained aggression, that's how I think I'd describe it I think it's a wonderful, wonderful record Do you think any jam single at this time would have got to number one? Yeah, songs like Funeral Pie and Absolute Beginners didn't get to number one

but they still zoomed bang into the top ten because they're quite, you know I mean Absolute Beginners wasn't the most memorable tune and Funeral Pie is quite challenging. It's almost like Gothic. But nevertheless, the jam were in such a kind of imperial phase at that time that they could put out pretty much anything

and their fan base was so loyal, they would just zoom out to the shops on the very first day and buy it. It was the kind of unquestioning loyalty. I think with the jam, it was an echo of Slayed the fact that like you got the impression that all the slayed geezers would just rush straight out and make sure that even stuff like squeeze me went straight to number one no messing um and you got that thing with the jam they always went straight in there straight in there number one they, didn't meander slowly up the charts

the way other things did. It was like absolutely right in there at the top. Yeah, yeah. And I think, you know, in a sense, it was almost like, you know, because it was football, you know, you had to be, you know, the gem had to be top dog, otherwise all was lost. Now, Star, obviously, as we know,

is based on George george harrison's taxman what george harrison when he was the beatles beatles taxman from revolver but it's better than taxman i think he's put to much better use here is this particular riff than this pathetic sort of george harrison whinge about the um tax rate that the beatles being forced to pay he was such a hypocrite because he would immediately follow these kind of petty rants about the amount of tax he was having to pay with tracks all about how he must kind of abandon the kind of petty materialistic concerns of the West

and take a leaf from the Orient and the subcontinent and their attitudes to the material world. I mean, what a twat. What do we think about the video? It's just a standard band performance with a few angles and switching from black and white to colour. It's nicely lit. It's under this, isn't it?

But I like that. Yeah. God, I really wish I had it in front of me, but has it got Venetian blinds in it? Because that's such an 80s trope, the Venetian blind in a video. Yes, it is, yeah. Along with swinging light bulbs and stuff like that.

It hasn't dated. Now, I think that's because it doesn't do any kind of video-y things. You look at some of the kind of ABC and that time, they're all trying to be kind of clever, clever, and it's all slightly kind of over-lit as well. I think probably that kind of slight no bullshit thing that well i probably had about being a video artist or whatever just simply kind of feeling performance actually means that not being ambitious in video terms i think has probably

served him well here because after all we are now living in the kind of post video age i even i even love the fact that it's got an exclamation mark in the title. It's really important. It's start exclamation mark. That's such a mod thing. It's such a pop art. It's a pop art thing as well, which echoes the guitar. There's no getting around it.

Weller's got a mullet going on there. Along with Bruce Foxton. And forever. It was only until I watched this video, you know, to do research for this, that I realised that Bruce Foxton's actually wearing a red jacket with a T-shirt with a red square on it, as opposed to wearing some red Rod, Jane and Freddie dungarees.

Oh, so that's improved slightly. He looks a bit like a mulleted Mario in this and yes as you as you said Simon Rick Buckler is the spit of Dennis Waterman yeah I actually yeah yeah I mocked up because this is how bored I get sometimes when I'm on a deadline usually and I mocked up a film poster for the jam the movie wither played by Nicholas Lindhurst,

which is not the best resemblance, but it's the only one I could get. But mainly so that I could point out that Bruce Foxton looks like Martin Shaw from The Professionals, and that Rick Buckler looks like Dennis Waterman. So yeah, it's a cheap shot, but I enjoyed it,

way of honing my Photoshop skills. If there was any humor in the world of estate agents they'd be a company called Weller and Buckler's right opposite Foxton's I mean at this time I mean I was I was a jam obsessive uh you know started off with going underground and uh the previous month I bought my first ever band t-shirt a screen print print from Skegness Butlins of the jam. Kind of spoiled it by having my nickname at work at the program shop over the top, which was Peanut. And yeah, and I was just walking around with my jam T-shirt. I'm thinking, yeah, look at me. I'm the face.

And I accidentally fell into the into the boating lake and uh got dragged out by my dad which you know kind of kind of ruined the ace face image i was looking for which ironically sounds like a scene from a later paul weller video from long hot summer yes yeah definitely yes dad was at hand yeah i mean i was trying to, I was trying to be an ace face while walking alongside my quiffy dad, which didn't help. Al, if only you'd paid attention to the Charlie Says public information film. Yes.

Cats Falling Canals. It might not have happened. Yes. The spirit of the dark and lonely boating lake. But yeah, I mean, I was one of those people who rushed out and bought this record the minute it came out. I was disappointed it didn't go straight in at number one but you know it got there in the

end did you even buy just who is the five o'clock hero on a Spanish import that somehow also got in the top 20 Dutch oh shame on me of course I did yeah of course I did and I and I was that person and sound effects was the first album I ever bought for myself. Even though it was a Canadian import and I can't understand why the cover was on the back and the actual cover was them standing by, funnily enough, a boating lake. This was the only week at number one for Start which dropped to number two the next week to make way for Feels Like I'm In Love by Kelly Marie. The next bit of jam action in the charts happened in February of 1981 when a German import of That's Entertainment

made it to number 21. The second biggest selling import in UK chart history after Just Who Is The Five O'Clock Hero by The Jam. The Jam, there I said it, the number one this week. Care for the end road this afternoon? Tremendous day. I've really enjoyed it. I'm going to come back next week, I've decided. I'm sorry, you're not going to come back next week

because the director says you're too good and you might scare the lads out of a job. But listen, anyway, never mind. We're going now, so say goodbye, and we wish you well. With a thought, hope it gets better soon. Take care of yourself. Good night, everybody, from Tom and Bob. See you next week.

Ah! Back! Back! I thought he was like Starboard, but he never heard nobody. He just loved to live that way, and he loved to steal your mind. After Travis informs Keegan that he can't come back next week, Travis tells him that he hopes his poorly foot gets better before they get bum-rushed by the kids in an explosion of streamers and balloons. And yes, Keegan pulls that face

Alan Partridge does when he gets angry. It's exactly, isn't it? And they sign off with Bank Robber by The Clash. Formed in London in 1976, The Clash, like the jam, saw their first eight singles fail to break the top ten. This song, the follow-up to London Calling, which got to number 11 in January of this year, was recorded in Manchester under the supervision of Mikey Dredd

and was witnessed by 17-year-old Ian Brown, who was walking past the studio like a monkey that shit itself when his mate got invited in. It's up this week from number 19 to number 12 and tacked on at the end because The Clash obviously swore down that they'd never play Top of the Pops, which is why two weeks previously it was danced to by Legs and Cumbia. I wonder at what point this

decision got made because in the camera script it just says goodnight and play out disc. It doesn't say what the song is. So maybe it's because nobody wanted The Clash getting wind of the fact that they're going to be on top of the Pops. Because famously, they never wanted to be

on top of the Pops. But they've sort of managed to get on there whether they like it or not. So what do we reckon to this? I mean, punk bands having a go at reggae. Clash have done it many a time and oft. Ruts have had a go since then. I've of come around to the clash myself in recent years i used to be a real kind of clash well clash skeptic rather than clash phobic maybe would be a fair

way putting it just because probably just because i i've always been annoyed by the way that people hold them up as the real kind of exemplar of real integrity and proper punk and all that kind of stuff um and you know there are even people out there who will tell you that the clashes version of police and thieves is better than junior mervyn's well you know in terms of them doing reggae which is absolutely fucking insane it's a real clod hopping version they've done of police and thieves um but you know bank robber yeah that's that's pretty decent you've got things like straight to hell and white man in hammersmith palais which obviously um was in reggae and yeah i think if you take them take them on their own merits they're they're pretty decent and also they were experimenting with with

funk and um hip-hop on something like uh magnificent seven um quite a long time before other bands of their generation cottoned on so you know I think maybe who am I to sort of tell everybody we should give the Clash more credit I think everyone gives them plenty of fucking credit I basically have a conversation with myself saying you know I need to get over it and because you know

I always had this idea either you're a Pistols person or a Clash person and I was very much a Pistols person but fair's fair you know they did amazing stuff, they really did. The one thing I can remember about this song is that I was listening to Radio 1 one night, I was starting to dip a toe into the non-Simon Bates output of Radio 1, and Annie Nightingale was inviting listeners to phone in or write in

and say, what does this song sound like? What does it remind you of? You know, they've ripped off something here with the, oh, bit. And I never found out the answer and it's bothered me for fucking ages what they thought the answer was. I think it's the theme tune to Rupert the Bear.

My daddy was a bank robber everyone knows his name. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rupert, Rupert the Bear, he never hurt nobody. Yeah, it works.

So the following week, Bank Robber dropped one place to number 13. And by the end of the year, The Clash had released Sandinista, and the first single from it, The Call Up, the follow-up to Bank Robber, would only get to number 40. They're still in the afterglow of London calling, aren't they, by this point? So what's on telly afterwards well BBC One follows up with the first in the new series of Blankety Blank with Barry Cryer, Katie Boyle, Val Dunican, Janet Brown, Lorraine Chase and Kenny Everett and yes it's the one where Everett bends Terry

Wogan's microphone what a fucking night television. They follow this up with a repeat of the first ever episode of Yes Minister, then the drama series Mackenzie, and they finish off with Russell Harty talking to authors about their phobias in all about books. Probably Randy Crawford's teeth were mentioned there by, I don't know. I think she has lovely teeth. Yeah, she's got

lovely teeth, but the way they present it is fucking terrifying. No, you're right, Simon. We need to get that over. Randy Crawford's teeth are fucking brilliant. And if I had them, I'd sing with my teeth as well. And they finish off with The Sky at Night. BBC Two is running a short film about a model railway in Small World,

followed by the band of the Coldstream Guards in concert. Oh, proper music. Then Leap in the Dark, a new series about the supernatural. Finishing off with Call My Bluff and the John Wells play Moving Pictures. ITV has just started the Benny Hill Show, followed by TVI reporting from Gdansk. The miniseries The Dream Merchants, News at Ten, and they round off the evening with Star Parade,

featuring the Bellamy Brothers, some French singers who I don't know and the James Last Orchestra. So, my friends, what are we talking about in the playground tomorrow? I think from that TV show you can really see how the punk elite has got a vice like grip on the nation's sensibilities.

Yeah. Yeah, that's it. I won't be talking about music at all. I'll be talking about Kevin Keegan being a fucking dick and about how my idol Kenny Dalglish would never do that. No, he'd go on Whistle Test, wouldn't he? Or Revolver. And what are we buying on Saturday? The Beat and the Jam, proudly, and Nick Straker Band, secretly. The Beat. Probably not not the jam you see because

having grown up and gone to university around that time i have to say that unfortunately the jam were kind of the enemy because bruce springsteen had a similar thing um the way that you know you have south africans and the apartheid era white south africans dancing to dancing in the dark i mean that may have been the last thing that Springsteen wanted, but that's what happened. Right, at university, Eton Rifles, you had all these kind of sweaty discos at the kind of Oxford colleges, and you had all the rugby twats kind of crowding out everybody and like sort of dancing along to these things, Eton Rifles, and it was just like horribly, boorishly white. Now, Paul Wellermoeve intended something very, very different,

but that's how it actually played out on the dance floor. And what does this episode tell us about September of 1980? Well, it's like Kevin says, there's something for everyone. Yes. And, you know, this is one of the things, episodes like this are a reminder of that. And I think pop was like that at this point.

There was always the trade-off between the sublime, the ridiculous and the Lena Martels and the David Bowies or whatever. There was always that. And actually, it was the kind of MMR stuff that was actually more predominant. It's like, you know, you get those things when you have stuff that was actually more predominant it's like you know you get those things when you have an old episode of Heartbeat and it's set in 67 to

establish at 67 they'll play Jimi Hendrix or Cream and in fact what they should be playing is Ken Dodd or Engelbert Humperdinck because that was what was actually being broadcast similar thing about the period pieces of 1980 now they always get it wrong it was a lot of the stuff that was in these shows it was that was what was actually being played. Yeah, I mean, I agree in the sense that, what does it tell us about September 1980? It tells us that the Curly Perm was still alive and well with a certain demographic,

despite the best efforts of young bands from Coventry and North London. So that closes the book on the latest issue of Chart Music. Once again, I remind you to check us out at www.chart-music.co.uk www.chart-music.co.uk We'll put the show notes up at facebook.com facebook.com

and you can join us on Twitter at chartmusicTOTP That's the end of Chart Music once again thank you very much Simon Price pleasure as always Al David thank you very much

David Stubbs thank you very much and all that remains for me to say is that my name is Al Needham and B.A. Robertson's hairdresser thinks I'm fantastic. Chart music. My Head Is Spinning Oh yeah, because it feels like, it feels like I'm in love Oh yeah, it felt this way before but I know what you're done

This time is something baby, I just can't turn around My knees are shaking baby, my heart is beating like a drum Oh yeah Because it feels like It feels like I'm in love Oh yeah My knees shake My heart beats like a drum

Oh yeah Oh