Chart Music: the Top Of The Pops Podcast - #70 (Pt 2): 17.4.86 – The Rishi Sunak Of TOTP

Episode Date: April 15, 2023

Neil Kulkarni, Sarah Bee and Al Needham get stuck into the hellscape of 1986, and discover that it’s not that rammel, actually. We gaze upon the even-toed ungulate splendour of Gary Davies – a man who divides his time between going out on the pull with Brian Tilsley, bringing peace upon the houses of Fine Young Cannibals and Matt Bianco, and making the sex workers of Amsterdam plunge through windows to get at him, only to discover that he’s got a horrible jacket on. Big Country prepare to get properly massive, but und up buried under the weight of their record company’s expectations and really expensive Success Coats. Falco gets reduced into a tiny box, like the baddies in Superman. And A-Ha get all creative with a keyboard and some masking tape… Video Playlist | Subscribe | Facebook | Twitter | The Chart Music Wiki | Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Um... Chart music. Chart Music. I'm Al Needham, she's Sarah B. Ahoy. He's Neil Kulkarni. Indeed I am. And I didn't sleep very well last night, me dears, because I fear that I may have misled the pop-crazed youngsters

when I compared the episode of Top of the Pops we're going to tuck into as, quote, an open-faced shit sandwich. It was a tad harsh. Well, when you think about it, surely an open-faced shit sandwich is going to be worse, isn't it? Because you're not disguising the shit with an extra slice of bread. No.

And there's a much greater shit-to-bread ratio. So, Neil, sandwich expert, help me out here. You're an adjudicate. Would you rather eat a shit sandwich or an open-faced shit sandwich? I was trying to say that this episode for 1986 isn't as bad as you'd think it was going to be no it isn't but i mean truth be told to choose between a shit sandwich and an open-faced shit sandwich yeah i mean the bread's not going to help either way but let now i want to move on from that that's just a grotesque image okay i feel like this episode is more like uh it

appears to be an open-faced shit sandwich and then when you actually brace yourself for a bite turns out to be delicious meat paste. Oh shippums. Yes not shittons, shippums. All right then pop craze youngsters it is time to go way back to April of 1986 always remember we may coat down your favorite band or artist but we never forget they've been on top of the Pops. And here to start us off, Big Country and Look Away. We're immediately thrown towards a neon purple proscenium arch, which looks like a gazebo for a garden party in Tron, as the disembodied voice of Davis gets the party started with Look Away by Big Country. We covered Big Country in Chart Music 60,

when they made their first appearance in the top of the pop studio to perform their first hit Fields of Fire in April of 1983 which helped it get to number 10. Since then they've peeled off a run of six top 30 hits peaking in January of 1984 when Wonderland got to number eight and their second LP Steel Town entering the album chart at number one in October of that year. However, by January of 1985, after the band had recorded the soundtrack to the Scottish comedy film Restless Natives and contributed to Do They Know It's Christmas by Band Aid, Stuart Adamson, burned out from four years of relentless touring, writing and recording

Demanded a time out and spent much of the year running his pub in Dunfermline Even though he'd gone on the wagon the year before While the rest of the band chipped in on Roger Daltrey's solo LP Under the Raging Moon And Pete Townsend's White City a novel And drummer Mark Brazicki went on loan to the cult to finish off the Love LP after the sack Nigel Preston, and even appears on the video for She's So Sanctuary, despite not having played on its recording. By the end of the year, and with Adamson ready to jump back on the treadmill, Mercury, their label, decided it was time that the band were kicked up into the big league

alongside their counterparts U2 and Simple Minds. And to this end, they replaced their regular producer Steve Lillywhite with Robbie Miller, who had worked with Sade and Fine Young Cannibals for their next LP. Although no one really liked the results, and he was replaced by Walter Turbitt, who had worked with The Cars and Malcolm McLaren. This is the lead cut from that album, The Seer, which will be coming out in July and it's the follow up to Just a Shadow which got to number 26 in January of 1985. 1985. It entered the charts at number 18 last week and a screening of the video in last week's breakers section has helped it jump up eight places to number 10. And here they are in the studio in front of the Top of the Pops neon set which was introduced in late 1985 and will loom

large over the show until mid-1987. Chaps, before we tuck into Big Country, let's talk about that set, because it's a radical departure from the usual Top of the Pops sets, isn't it? Apart from a few tweaks with the lighting, it's an incredibly monolithic structure, and it's changed the vibe of Top of the Pops, in my opinion, from being a pop show in an obvious tv studio to one in a gig venue yeah i'm guessing that is what it's attempting exactly and and you know we're firmly in that period now another thing with this this set and also it should be mentioned that this new half

hour time slot means that the title sequence it literally lasts about six seconds before you're in. And then we're in this set, which... I mean, the thing is, that attempt to kind of make it like a venue, I guess, make it like a very bells and whistles venue, I should feel a bit more of a sense of identification with the audience. Whilst the pop stars would provide the alienation, the audience might provide a sense of identification. But actually, with this set, it's the audience I feel most distant from because all you see is incessant clapping happiness and shit

dancing and shit clothes it's just this neon frightmare really so yeah it's already not looking good in terms of the production values of the show i think yeah i mean it's cut any interaction between presenter kids and act hasn't it yeah yeah so you get no more shots of sulky girls chatting shit to each other while a band attempts to put their new single over no more shots of gormless lads trying to chat up said sulky girls no more kids looking at themselves in the monitor it's essentially a nightclub setting where everybody involved knows their place yeah and the nightclub setting which essentially then engenders a certain response from the audience which is nothing but yeah whooping and frothy happiness these are valid

criticisms but for me this is kind of in my brain what top of the pops looks like those little blocks of flashing neon although they're set for big country they're obviously like in a corner which is more like a sort of industrial perspex greenhouse with like big banks of different colored bulbs it's like they're in a grow tent yeah i do think of this as kind of a classic set i know it's very busy and i realize that it kind of changes the relationship between the bands and the viewers and the audience probably for the worst but i can't help it i i just i don't think you can have too much neon i just just think neon is the, neon, it just means glamorous nighttime stuff for me. Did you know, by the way, where most of the world's neon comes from?

Go on. It is a gas and it's around us all the time. It's what gives that distinctive alluring glow. Most of it comes from Ukraine. Oh, really? It's used obviously in lights, but it's used in in the manufacturing of microchips and stuff as well. And basically, the Soviets during the Cold War were really into the idea of making laser weapons,

which you need neon for. So they just amassed huge amounts of it. And then afterwards, there were just loads of neon facilities doing nothing. So they started selling it to the rest of the world. And it was expensive before, and inevitably it has now gone up by, it says here, 5,000%. Fucking hell. to the rest of the world. And it was expensive before, and inevitably it has now gone up by, it says here, 5,000%. Fucking hell. Imagine if Top of the Pops was going now.

It'd be an absolute crisis. Oh, God, yeah. There was a call in the Metro newspaper last week to bring back Top of the Pops, but I think this kibosh is the idea. Yeah. If there's a dry ice shortage as well, yeah, we're fucked.

But the problem with this is that Top of the Pops have obviously pushed the boat out, but they've inadvertently set up a tableau that's going to suit certain acts down to the ground and be absolutely unsuitable for other artists i mean sunita and man to man with man parish are going to pitch up on top of the pops look at what they're going to be performing in and go oh yeah we could do some fucking business here but others are going to look massively out of place as we shall see later on yeah and would you include big country in that because to me in their performance and this is something you start detecting from here on in really in the top of the pops

yes like you say certain bands absolutely suits them down to the ground certain bands will smirk about being on such a stage and they'll show that in their performance. And I get a bit of that from Big Country. I think they're sincere enough, but just knackered. I don't know. So, Big Country, they're forever lumped into the windy Celtic triumvirate of the early 80s with U2 and Simple Minds. Both of those have absolutely soared into the pop stratosphere. But while the former played Wemmbley and the latter played philadelphia big country's only appearance on live aid was as part

of the herd during the rendition of do they know it's christmas at the end in between roger daltrey and adamant and apparently that's down to richard jobson the former lead singer of the skids who heard on the dunfermline grapevine that Big Country were off the grid, assumed that they'd split up, and that information got passed on to his recently divorced wife, who was doing the PR for Phonogram at the time, and she passed it on to one of her artists, a certain Mr Bob Geldof. Right.

So the invite never went out to Big Country, because he thought they'd split up and even 10 months after the event the pop world still divided between live aid acts and non-live aid acts and big country have found themselves in the latter camp yeah which is odd because you know in 84 stuart adamson says in an interview there's only four rock bands left in the world us you two simple minds and the bunny men and out of them it's definitely you two and simple minds who are ascending at this point and big country i mean look before we go on i've got to get this out of my system because i'm duty bound because i'm a music

journalist um big country big country more like so i just had to get that out oh man that has fully ruined the thing i was gonna do i had an entire bit well i mean i must admit that the last time i did i think i did big country on cmp with with pricey and what pricey was saying it did kind of open my eyes a bit early on in big country's career there's no reason i should have sort of snobbly shunted them aside when i do love a lot i mean i love early 80s scottish bands basically i mean to me scottish bands of the early 80s Scottish bands, basically. I mean, to me, Scottish bands of the early 80s, Altwood Images, Simple Minds, Orange Juice, etc., they're far more important to me and part of my listening than, say, the much more lauded Manchester bands of that era.

But much as by 1986 I'd started loathing the sound of Simple Minds, I'd really started properly hating Big Country as well by 86, I think. I didn't like that just juiceless big sky clattery big room sound um that rock had at that time and and big country seemed to absolutely enshrine that out of those three bands of course you two were gonna be the winners in terms of that big sound but this is big country's biggest and consequently most ubiquitous hit you know how most of the time when you think of a band there's like a first song that you think of with big country is actually that

big country one but then it rapidly transmogrifies into this record that if nothing else i think we can entirely blame for the likes of um delametri and diesel park west and fucking bands like that it's their biggest hit but it's just a half decent chorus in search of a verse that isn't dog shit really and there's all kinds of little horrible details to the sound and a fundamental lumpiness to the groove of this so what i was i was watching it just thinking thin lizzie would have done this about a billion times better i mean by the way i was idly jotting whilst watching this and i jotted down a quick worst ever Scottish ban list. Not including big country. Number five, gun. Number four, run rig.

Number three, Texas. Number two, wet, wet, wet. And number one, although this is stretching it a bit in terms of them being Scottish, but fuck it, any excuse. Primal scream, it's got to be for me. But I mean, look, I think my problem with Big Country is the same problem I start having at this time, aged 14, with Simple Minds,

and particularly you two, actually. I mean, there are aspects of those bands that I like, but by 86, it's not just the sort of increasingly flatulent sound of their records that I don't like, but it's simply the fact that they're so positive and happy i kind of like guitar music to not be happy at this point in my life i like it not to be anthemic but kind of introspective and not to be stirring and emotional and positive but but far more sort of mindless and angry and negative really um this kind of period 86 is part of my start of coming

back over to metal a little bit and stopping laughing at it all which i had done for previous years because the wobble home got so preposterous and because i've been digging back into the 60s i was looking for rock that was badly produced and murky and kind of properly heavy rather than just all this well-appointed uber produced guff which is what big country seem to be doing for well-produced stuff i wanted it to be pop or hip-hop at that time because those productions were so much more exciting to listen to in this period than the way rock sounded especially this kind of big rolled up sleeve long coat rock like this it's just so passionate in this kind of fist clenching way it's very um

outdoorsy this music um yeah it's kind of go-outdoors warehouse of rock. And at age 14, I already knew that the outdoors, particularly the outdoors outside the city, you know, smelled really. So I wasn't going to get fooled by Big Conti. And in terms of this performance, as soon as it started, I was watching it

and I thought, Gary Davis is going to say what a great way to start the show. So it proved. I mean, it's only been a year and a bit since her last single, but so much has changed in the world of pop that this is very much seen as the comeback record. So what's changed since the skull of the MXR M129 pitch transposer

and the cry of, SHUT UP! stirred the Celtic heart of a young Simon Price and led him to a car park where Ian Asprey was shagging a groupie up against a coach. Well the look has changed hasn't it? Oh god yeah, I mean the most obvious change is that Big Country have

lobbed their flannel shirts onto a bonfire and are now suited up to fuck. Bad 80s suited up to fuck at that with the sleeves rolled right up and adorned with globular brooches and boot lace ties. Oh dear me. Stuart Adamson's got on a sort of oversized

striped Hessian bathrobe. It's a success coat as Simon calls them. It is remarkable. It looks like Howard Hughes' dressing gown, doesn't it? I mean, it's not so much a success coat as a i've just won a californian powerball lottery coat yeah he didn't fucking get that from millets let me tell

you they all look terrible i think apart from tony butler on base yeah and his coat fits the rest of these bean poles they just look malnourished they look like robney does when dell gets in a sheepskin that's way too big for it yes yes i bet they always regret it that camel coat yeah exactly big coat tree if you were a tree big coat down is what we're doing yes um comfort is important to me increasingly in my dotage you know and it's like god you're gonna be too hot not in the kind of pleasing sheen of sweat under the makeup kind of way just like people just never learn on top of the pops big fucking coats all the way it's awful and you look at that coat you just think well you can't go out in that you certainly wouldn't go into the pub with it no you'd be absolutely terrified of people nubbing the fags out on it

accidentally or otherwise i just realized it's actually the same coat that one of the Corys wears in The Lost Boys when he first goes into the comic shop. And they're like, we're just scoping... What are you doing, man? Yeah, we're just scoping your civilian wardrobe. As we're going to see, there's a lot of bad coatiness going on in this episode. There is.

I've got to say, for all the talk of bigness, I don't receive this as a big tune. It's kind of a sketch of something big. But it's just it's all quite chuggy with quite forgettable vocals. And there's like no top line. You know, there's nothing you can really play on a penny whistle. And yeah, it's kind of the same issue that I had with Deliverance by The Mission, which was an opener of an episode I did a while ago. And it's like, yeah, this is here we come with the big song.

And it's like, it's here we come with the big song and it's like it's okay but where is it you know it just it's kind of quite um if we're talking about you know the outdoors it's like a sort of cloud of a rock song yeah you know it looks massive but there's kind of no substance to it you know and also in the performance I mean maybe this is my smuggery detector is a bit too sensitive but I get the sense there's a slight smirk to this appearance. And at the time, I remember getting the sense in interviews at the time that Big Country were usually scornful of pop. I mean, Bruce Watson says in an interview this year, you know, I'm not a pop star.

I hate that word. I just want to play my guitar. And Stuart Adamson, in the same interview, he says it would have been easy for us to come out with the crossing volume two it would have been a wise career move and we could have done it in two weeks because nobody can pastiche us as well as we can ourselves I don't do things to make career moves for the sake of selling an extra few hundred thousand records so they've got that smuggery but at the same time this is totally trying to be a charge smash yeah and the way they're dressed it does appear like a decision was made yes you know that this is our look now someone chomping

on cigars banging on the table going big coats that's it but it is only the bass player looks at halfway decent he looks okay actually his coat kind of suits him although there's a bit of shawody waddiness to it as well oh yeah's got white shoes on, which is white shoes and white trousers. He's gone double white there, which is a bold move. But the other guitarist, I forget his name, he looks dreadful. And the drummer appears to have a leather coat on. But again, it's that sleeve rolled up thing. Why fucking do that?

It's 1986, though. Yeah, I know. It was the style at the time. I know, I know. But that's an unrehabilitatable look, though. Yeah, I know. It was the style at the time. I know, I know. But that's an unrehabilitatable look, that. As we've learned in previous charm music, Sarah, you're a bit fond of a bit of man wrist, aren't you? I am a fan.

And I'm equal opportunities as well with women, too. It's just, you know, a good leather jacket. It's acceptable on women. On men, though, Neil, come on, back me up. Not on big coats, though. I would draw the line at the forearm because it's it's that dissonance isn't it it's like you've got a big coat on yeah but you you want to expose your forearms what's going on there if you've got a big coat

on and you're rolling the sleeves up you're obviously fucking sweating cobs just take the fucking coat off mate i don't know i mean i might try the look i've never done that look i might do it i might try i'm off out tonight to Brum. Free the forearm, man. I will do the forearm. Is it both forearms or is it just one? No, that would look strange, wouldn't it? Both.

That's Mason's territory, Neil. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, you can't just have one. That makes you look like you've just come off a long shift assisting the country vet. Ah, yeah, of course. Yeah, up to me elbow. But no, actually, oddly enough, I'm off to a Masonic bash later on this month. Oh, you know. Ah, yeah, of course. Yeah, up to me elbow. But no, actually, oddly enough,

I'm off to a Masonic bash later on this month. Oh, you know. Oh, yes. You can't tell everyone that. God, they're not going to let you in now. Oh, no, no, don't worry. It's all above board. It's all above board.

My friend is the Grand Worshipful Master this year. And my even closer... Yes, and my even closer friend is his partner so she's got to do the ladies night and i've got to refer to her as lady sarah all night which i'm looking forward to but crucially it's at warwick masonic lodge and i can't wait to stumble down a corridor and stumble into some arcane ritual that i really shouldn't bear witness to um but i might do the long coat that night good lord wow okay and when it is ladies' night, Neil, don't forget to tell Lady Sarah that everything's going to be all right.

Of course. The major thing that's pissed me off about Big Country and them being on this episode is, obviously preparing for Chart Music Podcast, yes, I found out that they backed Roger Daltrey. Yeah. His 85 solo album, Under a Raging Moon. They were watching his back.

But it made me inevitably have to Google the sleeve, which inevitably made me physically sick. Oh, go on, go on. Cheers, big cunty. No, I mean, it's just the facial shot of Daltrey. That's all I need for that emetic trigger. Not being a centaur, though. No, he's not being a centaur.

He's never going to top that for bad LP covers. No, he's not being a centaur he's never gonna top that for bad lp covers no no ride a rock horse my final thought on big countries that i always think of them as big country because of the song in a big country which they wrote and could have written to scan however they chose but they kind of did i mean that sort of erroneous emphasis can be really fun and playful but you've got to do it like deliberately. And this is like a metal guru, but in a bad way. But, you know, in a big country, you sit on sofa, play with Roger Daltrey and eat some pasta. This is the single that was going to kick them up into the big league. And yeah, you do get this feeling of slight smugness,

as if they're saying, oh, here we are on top of the pots but get a good eyeful of us while you can because we'll be doing bigger things from here on in but you could argue that it actually turned out to be the single that killed them because apparently phonogram was so desperate to get them over in america that their new producer walter turbot was caught by guitarist bruce w larding the tracks in the studio with his own guitar parts, which led to Stuart Adamson, who formed the Skids and felt that Richard Jobson had aced him out and took over, believing that it was happening all over again

and everything was coming out of their hands once more. Right, right. But, I mean, the trouble is with Big Country, they have this unerring belief that they're real musicians and if they were just left to make real music everything would be all right but what actually emerges from their albums is fuck me apart from the singles jesus it's dreary dreary shit really really really is so they were never ever in a million years going to get as big as you two and simple minds who were both a bit more playful with pop i mean granted just as big and wide and

flatulent but you never got the feeling that you two, I don't know, sort of had contempt for that. I'm not saying Big Country had contempt for their audience. But U2 were happy with any audience. Whereas Big Country, you felt they wanted specific, you know, proper real music fans to be into them. And that's just going to alienate everybody, I think. They did really try for the Yankee dollar, you will in the next album which turned out to be the lowest selling big country album in America so yeah they fucked it yeah they fucked it are we counting them as shaking minds at this point then oh yeah yeah that's it so the following week look

away nudged up two places to number eight its highest highest position. But the follow-up, The Teacher, would only get to number 28 at the end of June. And although the Sear entered the LP chart at number two, they finished 1986 with Hold The Heart, only getting to number 55 in December, the first big country single to miss the top 40 since their debut single,vest Home in September of 1982. Although they came back in 1988 with King of Emotion getting to number 16 in the singles chart

and Peace In Our Time getting to number nine in the LP chart in August, diminishing returns continued to set in throughout the 90s and they finally split up in 2000 what a great way to start big country and look So, all on my own in the studio tonight. Well, not exactly on my own. Also in the studio, we have George Michael, we have Aha, and it's immaterial. But first, here's this week's top 40 over this video from Falco and Rock Me Amadeus. We're whipped back to Davis, standing in front of the disgusting new Top of the Pops logo, sporting an appallingly oversized light grey jacket, which appears to be made out of an elephant's hide,

with the sleeves rolled right up the elbow, over a disgusting blocky multicoloured shirt and matching grey trousers. Oh dear, oh dear. Big Country had their sleeves rolled back as well, but they were playing instruments, Gary. What's your fucking excuse? I mean, the overall effect is Miami Vice YTS, lad, isn't it? I mean, he is a medallion man, you know,

revealing that chunky Seiko on his wrist. But the shirt's buttoned right up, isn't it? Oh, yeah. No, I can't be doing with that. I must point out, by the way, the way to do the sleeves pushed up is you push them up you don't go past the elbow that's the thing once you go past the elbow all is lost and wait a minute i've got to check this shit because i might be wearing this later um is it just a push-up should i fold no no no no just just just push up yeah okay i mean some garments will not allow this you know but ideally you want it to just under the elbow i don't know i don't

know anything about more than us i live with a man who has long arms and is usually a tall man with long arms who normally most jacket sleeves too short for it he has to you know like it's just it's it's utility but you know it he makes it work okay um anyway but yes don't go over the elbows because then you know you do get the elephant hide effect. So, yeah, just shove them up until they come to a natural stop just before the elbow. Okay, I'll bear that in mind. Thank you. Yeah.

To be fair with Gary's fit, there's a pearlescence to his oversized doctor's coat, isn't there? You know, but I like it not. And that is a blouse. It's definitely a blouse, which is fine. Men can wear blouses in the 80s and indeed any time but it's sort of purple and peach and orange and it's it's a lot going on yeah i reckon that's a casio as well not a psycho oh well spotted what's a great way to start says davis before informing us he's without a partner tonight oh but not for long, knowing Gary Davison is stable.

Right. And then spoilers a sizable chunk of tonight's bill of fear before throwing us into Rock Me Amadeus by Falco. Born in Vienna in 1957, Johann Herzl attended the Vienna Conservatoire,

Austria's version of the Kids from Fame, at the age of 16, but could only stick it out for a year and ended up doing national service for a bit. In the late 70s, he gravitated towards the Weimar Republic-like nightlife of Vienna, playing the bass in local band The Hallucination Company, before switching to the alt- rock and narco band dradi warble and adopting the stage name john defalco where he wrote and performed the song ganz vn which he would play as a solo interlude at their gigs which featured the line all of vienna is on heroin today when the manager marcus spiegel sawentitled Falco perform the song at an

anti-drugs benefit gig in 1980, he signed him up to a solo deal and he put it out as a single in 1981, where it was immediately banned by Austrian radio. But when he put out an English-language version, it got to number 11 in Austria, but failed to chart anywhere else. At the end of that year, he lined up a follow-up single, Helden von Heuter, a tribute to David Bowie's heroes, but his label preferred the B-side, Der Kommissar. And although Falco was convinced that it was too extreme for the pop-crazed Teutons, as it was mainly a rap that leaned hard into Super Freak by Rick James,

it soared to number one in both Austria and West Germany. And although it did nothing over here, it became a top ten hit across continental Europe and got to number 74 in America. And an English language cover by After the Fire got to number 47 in the UK in April of 1983. An attempt to capitalise on the success of De Commissar failed when his second LP failed to do anything outside the Germanosphere,

so in 1985 he linked up with the producers Rob and Ferdy Bolland, the South African Dutch brothers, who had a number one hit in Finland and Norway with their synthy Vietnam War song, You're In The Army Now, in 1981. Yes, that's You're In The Army Now. Stand up and fight.

This is a lead-off cut from his forthcoming LP, Falko Drei, which is due out in October and has been put out by his new label A&M. It was inspired by the 1984 film Amadeus, which won eight Oscars only three weeks ago, and the original version has already ripped through Europe last year. But when it was remixed for the USA and UK with beefier drums and some bird on vocals vocals it entered our charts four weeks ago at number 58 then soared 31 places to number 27 then another 17 places to number 10 after he appeared on top of the pops this week as it begins its third week at number one in America it's nipped

up two places over here to number three. And as he's already been in the top of the pop studio twice, here's our first chance to see the video, sort of. Where do we start, chavs? Because we've got a bit of a problem here, haven't we? What? Faster Slots. Well, because 40 seconds in, this happens.

Well, we don't really know what he's singing about, so we might as well have a look at this week's top 40. Down to number 40, it's Culture Club with Move Away. Ah! What the fuck are you doing, Top of the Pops? Yeah, it's bad. It's very bad. It's so fucking rude.

I hate it when they go, hey, that was great when it wasn't, but it's a lot worse when they go, well, who cares? We don't know what you're singing about anyway. What a senseless diss. The video gets squeezed into a little box so Gary Davis can shit out the charts from number 40 to number 11. So there's no band pics. There's no respect given to the charts and no chance to enjoy the number three single in the land properly. In a world where there's no MTV for most people,

no access to cable or satellite for most people, how else are they going to see the fucking video if it's not on top of the pops? Yeah, it's really bad. This is so clearly a bad idea. Obviously, it's not Gary Davis' idea, but whoever's idea it was. It's the worst idea, I would say,

since very early, let's do the top ten rundown at the very start of the show thing i'd have been only 14 but i would have been sat there just thinking frankly this is a shambles i mean it's chaos yeah and it's an absence of sort of thought absence of vision for the charts it's exactly what you see in the rundown here it's really poorly formatted every single bit of it the script that davis has to speak it's kind of geeky but imparts no information at all and the one thing that really angered me was this occasional deliberate refusal to name the records they're talking about they just name the artist it's written so i'm like a spod but it's infuriatingly imprecise

yeah i mean the assumption obviously is that, oh, well, the kids watching this will know what the name of the song is, but I don't! Not from a fucking distance, I'm an old man now! This is it. And the decision to have Davis speak over Falco is kind of disastrous, both for Falco but also for any idea of actually

knowing what the hell's going on in the charts. And it's just kind of demonstrative, I think, of the general lack of care that's going on here and that rush that we were talking about engendered by the switching time that now set in so let's put three different things on the screen none of which are going to make any sense because they're cancelling each other out i mean even the top of the pops of the 90s have more respect for the charts than this and that was very little it's like the nine o'clock news running a story about the bombing of libya and then sue lawley's saying well oh you know how this is going to turn out so here's some pictures of a fucking fur get that i mean what sarah said is spot on i would

have been really pissed off at that line that davis says you know about oh well you know we don't know what he's on about yes we fucking do yeah and and if i'm superstar for fuck's sake but also like what's it to you i mean because it obviously it's a double dose of disrespect there because it's like well you're talking over the you know an artist's work after the first verse but also it's like oh it's in foreign who gives a shit exactly i would think that was his interjection but yeah i mean the thing is that my bloke somehow managed to get into his 40s without ever having experienced Rock Me Amadeus or Falco at all. What?

I know, I know. It's just something that passed him by. And he was like, what the fuck is this? I was like, OK, I'm going to stop this here and I'm going to pull up the full thing on YouTube so you don't have to have your first experience of this tune ruined by Gary fucking Davis barrelling in and going in and going hey well what's over there which is you know in this kind of attention apocalypse if any video doesn't need reducing to about a third of the screen it's this one yeah yeah yeah should we talk about falco now

fuck gary davis let's talk about yeah why not yeah fucking falco and fucking rock me amadeus what a wonderful thing and it was so great to see the sheer delight on on my bloke's face like what could this be what is this delightful nonsense like it's it it's bonkers it's so brilliant and so not like anything else and i remember this striking me at the time when i was a kid and going having that same response really like what yes even with less context about music you know as i was sort of forming my opinions at the time you know it's really hard to describe it and it's very hard to critique it because it's i think bonkers is the word it's so joyful and it's kind of you

don't even think of it or i don't i don't think of it as like oh it's it's a white guy rapping because it's not really it's like anti-flow it's like he's cutting up what he's so it's sort of in deutschlish and german kind of consonant clusters and the shape of words in german sort of lends itself more to this kind of non-flow than english and he's sort of bending the language into different angles as you go as if that's just a thing that you do as if like yeah this is what i'm doing and this is completely appropriate yeah he's establishing himself for the rest of the world as like the a son of vienna you know like oh you know like like mozart you know no big deal me and wolfgang just hanging out in history you know having some nice cakes i'm a cool austrian guy and you know who else is a cool austrian guy No, no, no. No, no, no, no. Mozart. It's cool.

I mean, this is not something any of us could attempt at karaoke, let's be fair. No. I don't think anyone can or should attempt it. But it's like, you need a concrete diaphragm for it. He must have had abs for days like that for three minutes straight. Oh, you could grate cheese on them. Yeah, I mean, only he could do this. It's not coverable.

You're absolutely right. And obviously it has a great chorus that once you have heard it is just graven into your skull forever. It's so simple. It's kind of almost insultingly simple and daft and glorious. I mean, it's... If you could remain kind of stony-faced watching and listening to and experiencing Rock Me Amadeus, then, you know, there's you're going to have to leave my house. I'm afraid I'll never come back.

I'll come back to that word bonkers there because I think it's bonkers lyrically. I mean, but every single second of this record is bonkers, like the sound of it's nuts as well. And I think we underestimate in this country, you know, Falco is a complete hero in Middle Europe, in Austria and Germany. He really is hugely venerated, which is odd, because ultimately he was always just chaos, really, Falco. I mean, as a human being as well, you know, he was... It's funny that he was spotted doing this anti-drugs thing, because that certainly wasn't something that he adhered to.

Yeah, while doing a drug song. Yeah, yeah. He's a relic of an age, really, in which pop stars could be totally out of control when all that post-punk artiness and be appreciated for indeed and he's coming from that post-punk kind of arty thing but he hits massive commercial success so rot me amadeus is just this weird outlier of a record its impact here was definite because there was that elemental confusion in all of us who first heard it is this got anything to do with the film is this on the soundtrack you know is it part of it yeah it took some time to establish that you know the song wasn't at all in the film although the

film's kind of punkification of the of mozart's look does extend here a little bit um i don't think that mattered in the states at all which is where it became majorly big to the point where in 86 Falco is considering moving there permanently but the other touchstone for this that it reminded me of is Adam Ant not necessarily sonically but the video has a lot of similarities to Adam Ant

videos and just being these big epic productions that are absolutely dazzling and it's the first record in my recall really in my life to put germanness or rather sorry austrianness in our charts since da da da really life is life with last year yeah there is that but it's in terms of austrianity opus last year falco this is it's just a golden age for urs rock, isn't it? Indeed. And there's an actual clip on YouTube of Opus and Falco together performing this song.

And it's fucking really good. Opus are fucking brilliant, man. Oh, wow. I've got to seek that out. It'll be on the TMP playlist. Video playlist. Yeah, brilliant. By the way, you've got to put Decomissar on the playlist.

Oh, my God. What a tune. What a fucking tune. And, you know, doing cmp for this has reminded me of duck homicide and i just haven't been able to stop playing it so fucking good yeah it's it's amazing and this is the same reaction happened i was like all right here he was his first single over here and bloke was like beside himself how have i never heard this what i am now the biggest it's astonishing that wasn't a hit and hilarious video with because

it's about a couple on the run from the law with a giant bag of coke just going oh there's a cop better run away and he's kind of doing that it's a really bad kind of green screen thing with like cop cars and he's just doing that terrible like on the spot running yeah and then occasionally just wiping his nose in a very sort of yeah oh no i have been very naughty and i mean that's the thing falco is extremely i will often say that things have gone coke as a you know as a negative which it usually is like london having gone coke and a lot of me you know a lot of things having just gone brash and shallow in the worst way but falco was very coke in the best way yeah yeah if the commissar came out like today with that video,

you know, people would be going fucking nuts about it. It looks like a TikTok video, doesn't it? It does. But luckily, Rot Me Amadeus isn't necessarily something I'm playing every week. I'm glad I experience it every time I experience it. I mean, lest we forget, you know, we have to be grateful it exists

because if only without Amadeus, there'd be no help me dr zeus that wouldn't be a life worth living can i play the piano anymore of course you can well i couldn't before but also also beyond that right rock me amadeus is is illustrative of something that's going on in the charts throughout 86 yes the dinosaurs still walk among us but there's been a kind of minor extinction event as well previous to 86 radio one didn't really have a daytime playlist and that's why sort of a lot of their djs could just play any old shite that they fancied this daytime playlist sort of gets reintroduced 86 and it's to do with what radio on djs predict might be a hit yeah so

what starts happening with that kind of more organised playlist based around new songs that could be hits is that in the next few months in 86, we're going to get really big hits from unknown artists fundamentally who make the list. So, I mean, none of them are remotely as good as Falco, but, you know, It Bites have a hit and Hollywood Beyond have a hit and Owen Paul and Cutting Crew and Robbie Neville and all these people.

Ooh, golden days well quite but you know there's also conspicuous failures by artists who could previously has counted on radio support you know howard jones nick kershaw these people yes ultravox they all have singles that don't chart and it's quite disruptive to the charts in a sense the trouble is all these new bands coming through have no big fan base and they usually disappear when the follow-up you know doesn't make the cut or isn't a hit or doesn't get unwoken that's it and the older acts they got kind of branded as failures and they can't come back i mean it creates a sort of vacuum in the charts really that's going to last the rest of 86 i mean jack your body is the first number one of 87 and it gets no radio play and then we have an onslaught of stoic and Waterman after that.

But this is this weird period where, yeah, the big dinosaurs are about, but they're mainly rock bands. Pop dinosaurs are going. And they're being replaced by odd little records like Rock Me, I'm a Deus, Gatecrash and the Charts. The great thing about the video is that it puts Falco over as a right Euro Ponce. And to my mind, that's always a good thing yeah your pons has always

livened up the charts in the mid 80s whether you like the song or not you know i'm thinking about people like ryan paris but my favorite euro pons of the era has to be sabrina's keyboard player in a clip i found on spanish television that sadly doesn't seem to be there anymore because he is poncing it up on that keyboard so hard that you actually forget that you're supposed to be looking at sabrina's breasts but volco here he comes off as someone who would drive his audi right onto the beach at marbella take the union jack towel that you've hung over the sun lounger at four in the morning rub it against his arse throw it in the seat and then spend the rest of the day just lying there in some very expensive pants waiting for someone to fetch him

a malibu looking down his nose at you and your crappy cna shorts yeah apparently he did have this extreme self-confidence that uh you know that was quite hard to take sometimes it was very exact about i always love that when I perceive it. I mean, yeah, of course people like that can be a massive pain in the arse, but they can also just get some really great stuff done because it's like, no, this is how we're doing this. Which is something backed up by every single interview

I've ever had with Falco. He's just fucking hilarious. It's an image that Falco's happy to play up in an interview with the NME in a london hotel this month where he flicks his fag ash into a complimentary bowl of dry roasted peanuts tell simon witter that he's very good mates with mozart and saw him in the pub three days ago yeah yeah stops talking every now and then so he can watch his eyebrows go up and down in the mirror

tells the photographer to take one picture and get out arsehole yes kicks the light over while the photographer's setting up and then locks himself in the toilet for a bit eventually comes out hugs everyone in the room and concludes by telling the readership of the enemy i fuck everybody i fuck you all that's what you want out of your pop stars yeah yeah completely that's not just a coke thing I feel like that's you know

coke takes the edge off that sort of personality you know but I do think that if there's any reason for us to be here as tragically overdeveloped creatures that we are I mean other to be like kind and all that shit it's to give the fullest and most honest expression to whatever ideas happen to come to you and they might not be whatever the value or worth of the ideas they might be something or nothing but if you have them and you have the wherewithal you should express

them with your entire self and blow the bubble as big as you can for the world to see and that's what falco did here with his bizarro little bop about a tragic 18th century musical genius which is why we're talking about it 37 years later and 25 years after he died so you know he he did he did it right maybe some austrian will do a song about him in a 200 years time who knows maybe so maybe hope the video's good it'd be holograms by them wouldn't it or or a pill that you take maybe where then holograms will be old hat and people will be kind of doing the thing of going back to more like practical real shit you know but like actual candy floss for a wig we need to get over to europe because i've got a friend who was in belgium over over christmas and new year and apparently after new year's eve sort of

goes you know after midnight loads of stations just start playing fucking folk over here which i think is brilliant that'd be a great way to see new year yeah the following week rock me amadeus took one more step up the ladder and sat there at number two for two weeks biding its time before finally assuming its place upon the summit of poppenberg where it stood proud for a week before being deposed by the chicken song by Spitting Image the follow up

Vienna Calling got to number 10 but he never troubled the top 40 again and he became a German speaking concern only eventually dying in a car crash in the Dominican Republic in 1998 at the age of 40. But the song became and remains the first and only German language number one in the UK

and the first foreign language single to get there since Jetem by Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin in 1969. And of course, the song lived on in the musical Stop the Planet of the Apes I Want to Get Home starring Troy McClure I'm a big ol' ol' ol' ol' ol' ol' Falco and Rock Me Amadeus right now in the top of the Bob's studio at number 8 in the charts with Train of Thought. Here's Aha! Davis, standing in front of the new Top of the the pops logo which was introduced a few weeks ago

said something that i can't fucking remember for the life of me as i was too busy staring at the shitness of the new top of the pops logo why it's fucking disgusting isn't it we've said it before but fuck me this is is awful. Quite busy. Yeah, somewhat overly busy. I mean, the perfect logo for its time, but perhaps that's why you hate it so much, Al. Yeah. It does look like of the top pop.

Of pop the tops. He eventually gets round to introducing Train of Thought by A-Ha. Formed in Oslo in 1978, Bridgers were a Norwegian rock band formed by the drummer Pal Vaktar and the guitarist and vocalist Max Führer-Holmann. After recruiting more members

and Vaktar switching to keyboards, they put out their debut LP Fakultog in 1980. And while touring that LP, they played a gig in Asker, where one of the audience, a young lad called Morton Harkett, introduced himself to them afterwards with a view to having a go at singing. After Bridges set to work on their second LP in 1982, Wachtar and Fiora Holman, who had always written their songs in English, felt the band had gone as far as they could in Norway and pushed for them to relocate to London. But when the rest

of the band didn't fancy it, they dissolved on the spot, the LP was unreleased and the duo spent six months on their own in the UK, to no avail. On their return to Norway, they linked up with Harkett, who by that time was fronting the covers band Soldier Blue, and invited him to start a new band, which got their name when they riffled through Waktar's songbook for a word that was used in both Norway and England. They returned to London in January of 1983 and recorded and shop shops around a demo.

And by the end of the year, they signed a deal with Warner Brothers, who linked them up with Tony Mansfield, formerly of New Music, and prepared an old Bridgers number called the Juicy Fruit Song, which Harkett heard at their gig and liked, and had worked on together in Norway. That song, by now renamed Take On Me, was put out as their first single in October of 1984, but only got to number 137 over here, although it got to number three in Norway.

However, the parent company in America got a glance of how the band looked and signed them up over there, telling them to get rid of Mansfield get in Alan Tarnay who wrote and produced We Don't Talk Anymore and co-wrote Wired for Sound for Cliff Richard and had spent the early 80s writing January February for Barbara Dixon and co-wrote Orchard Road with the old sailor when it was recorded and put out again in april of 1985 it flopped over here once more but over in stateside usa warner brothers pushed the boat right out for the band forking out for a massively expensive video which took four months to make when morton was displayed in all his

pencil gorgeousness which was played on on MTV and in clubs for a month before it was released in America, where it immediately got into the Billboard 100 and eventually got to number one. Emboldened by said video, it was released for a third time in the UK in September, and by the end of October, it began a three-week stand at number two,

held off by The Power of Love by Jennifer Rush. The next single, The Sun Always Shines on TV, went one better, spending two weeks at number one in January of this year. And this, the follow-up, is the third cut from their debut LP Hunting Iron Low, which entered the album chart at number 24 in November of 85 and immediately slid down, but then rallied in the wake of the success of The Sun Always Shines on TV and spent five weeks at number two in January and February of this year. It entered the chart at number 23 a fortnight ago,

and they were immediately invited to cluster under the neon on Top of the Pops, which helped it soar 14 places to number nine. This week, it's only nipped up one place to number eight, but that's not stopping them from making a return to the studio. Looks like Top of the Pops has given up on that let's repeat old performances bit. Which is a good thing, I think.

Anyway, aha, as they were saying in Norway around about this time, Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet, Hollywood Beyond, Bluey Sum, Wixi out of EastEnders. Can you hear me, Maggie Thatcher? Your boys took one hell of a beating. Because at this moment in time, the kings of pop, the vikings of pop, if you will, they're from Norge and, ooh, they're fucking gorgeous.

It's more foreigners, hooray. What Gary probably said is, Oh, some more people from somewhere Yeah, where are the English people in Poh? What's going on? Here's the thing Why did this not open the show? Whose idea was it to not have this? Because this is not my favourite of Aha's

Many, many, very, very good songs But it's really not bad It's propulsive without being too hectic I know it's got some sort of compressed pant pipes in there but you know we can we can forgive that yeah but it's you know this is this is what should have started off the show i think i have some bad luck actually maybe it's just me i can't remember the last time that we did an episode and i was like wow that actually was a great start to the show yeah yeah it's usually something that's a bit lacking i think sarah if say before um sunaway shines on tv got to number one that would be a definitive show opener it couldn't go

anywhere else yeah whereas this yeah it is propulsive but it's a little bit more melancholy and a little bit more down so maybe they shunted it on um in preference of the big blustery nonsense from big country instead yeah it's a's a commute song, isn't it? Apparently based on the works of existentialist Norwegian writers and Dostoevsky, which is, you know, it's a bit of an advance on lovely girls and nice relationships, which bands of this ilk are supposed to be singing about. It's essentially cardiac arrest by madness without the horrible ending.

Right. I'm not sure they've ever fully gotten their due as a really, really good band. They are, aha. And they're still going out. It's not bad for a heritage act, you know, because their music is quite sort of grand and sophisticated with sort of a bleak English as a second language lyrics.

And, yeah, this sort of pervasive melancholy. This is not like a melancholy-led tune, but it's definitely in there. Oh, yeah, yeah. You know, it permeates their whole sound like a sort of gentle mist. I just have to point something out, by the way, that I didn't spot this,

but they've taped over the yam in Yamaha. Powell's Yamaha keyboard, he's blocked out the yam on the side. Well done. So it reads aha. Yeah. And then he picks it up and wanders over to Morton so they can do a bit of a quote.

Yeah. Which is nice. It looks really heavy as well. I think you regretted it. Yeah, it's not a keytar, is it? It's not a keytar. Although I should say,

in the Moonbears, I did stick, I only want to help you in front of Roland on my keyboard. Yes. It's a classic way. How do we feel about keytars by the way if there was one line about

i'd definitely have a go on it so clearly one of those things where someone had the idea and went well is there any reason we couldn't do this like no maybe the trouble is they've become hipster um now whereas there is one photograph for which i excuse the existence of keytars and that's of james brown at his worst looking really groggy and bigtars, and that's of James Brown at his worst, looking really groggy and big and fucked. And he's playing a keytar with a big grin on his face. Anyway, more Euro-ness. And of course, until very recently,

the British opinion of Norwegian pop was that it solely existed to provide a string of entertaining null-pointers in the Eurovision Song Contest. But last year, the hardcore rockabilly sound of Bobby Sox took the continent by the throat with led a swing, a led a rock and roll. They'll be hosting Eurovision in a couple of weeks time. And now a horror have come along. Fucking hell, everything's coming up Norway.

And the Norweiness is important in as I mean I know we shouldn't draw national characteristics like this like but we're going to we're going to well I mean you do start thinking of wintry kind of melancholy and gloom um that that is threaded through throughout A-ha's work and I totally agree with Sarah A-ha are majorly underrated their first couple of albums are fantastic records but they were never comfortable really I think with the roles they were being shoved into in 86 Pop needed in a sense a new Duran Duran yes this new monolith and I feel A-Ha was sort of somewhat unfairly ushered into that role with Harker as the new

Le Bon because he was so fucking gorgeous yes and you mentioned them actually Al if you can say this sort of big three of pop were on their way out you know Duran are failing at this point Spandau are definitely failing and Wham are splitting up then Ahara the kind of only likely contender yes to replace all those posters on the wall you know and get that screaming hysteria back and you look at the two other big pop happenings of late 85 86 Curiosity killed the cat and five star they're not going to fill that space no but you know it's very telling as well that aha rapidly become not only a watchword for pop but you start seeing in interviews you know proper bands saying you know we're not fucking aha yeah much as they would have said you know we're not fuckingam! or we're not fucking Kajagoogoo a few years earlier.

In other words, we're not successful. But that's it. I mean, all of this masks the actual kind of melancholy and gloom of Aha's work. They start off their career with one of the biggest pop video smashes of the entire 80s and then they seem to spend the rest of the 80s kind of retreating from that glare of attention that they get.

You know? I can't say I was actually massively into Aha early on because take on me grew old pretty fast for me right but the sun always shines on tv that turned my head around completely because i thought it was ace and then the album also had a couple of corkers on it non-singles yeah but also this and there's this kind of interesting rub in a heart between the obvious total hotness of Morton Harkin. Well, they're all good-looking lads, aren't they? They are. They're a good-looking bunch of lads, but there's this dismalism in the lyrics.

The music's kind of big, but it's also kind of Associates-like. It's kind of Ultravox-like, which contrasts with the role they're being set up for. They were never going to be, perhaps, as consistently massive as Duran were early on. But there's some amazing, you know,

Hunting High and Low, Cry Wolf, things like Train of Thought I actually really like. And I really like Manhattan Skyline as well, even though they're never really going to bother the top three. Duran kind of had this thing, not desperation, but I'd say Duran always managed to add something new every now and then to show that they were sort of vaguely attentive to what was going on

and sort of progressive. A Hard didn't, they were not that kind of band. They were much more, not traditional. They were almost an indie-minded band who'd become pop stars. They just seemed massively uncomfortable as well with a vital part of the pop process, at least in the UK, which is being a gobby bitch in the pages of smash hits you know confessing all they never really did that i mean even at this point they've had a number one hit

you know and they've got this massively selling album out you know what did we really know about aha that wasn't sort of dragged out of them reluctantly in interviews they're quite serious they're kind of amused at uk pop daftness yeah they're not really participating in, they're quite serious. They're kind of amused at UK pop daftness, but they're not really participating in it. They're more likely to discuss Kierkegaard than bitch about Pete Murphy or something. So there's that kind of little bit of Nordic distance as well. I mean, they're all good-looking lads, but then again, I've been to Norway,

and trust me, you could go anywhere in that country and swing a big fucking long chain about and ensnare three other blokes who were just as good looking because norwegians man they're an extremely dolly looking race of people you know when i went there the minute i stepped off the plane i thought a fucking l is proper code b i've never seen a sky that pale blue before and c immediately feeling like fucking Gollum you just looked around and thought oh please don't look at me I'm English I was there about 23 years ago to give a speech at Bylarm their music business conference about how the porn business was making loads of money

off the internet while the music business was losing it and when I got there I was told that it had been an ongoing local news story expressing outrage that a respected industry event was about to be sullied by a smut peddler from London. And I was told, and I never saw this, and I fucking wish I could see this. I was told that there was even an editorial cartoon about it consisting of someone who was supposed to be me

in a big white fur coat and a gold chain drooling over the fair maidens of Tromso. So you can imagine their disappointment when I fucking turned up in my suit looking like a gay football hooligan. But yeah,

you just looked around and went, fucking hell, everyone's attractive. Even the horrible cunts that you see in any pub, they were attractive. I was having a piss and the bloke next to me said hey english i fuck your bitch and i just stood there had a bit of a shake and just thought to myself well i haven't got a girlfriend at the minute mate but if i did yeah she'd definitely think about it

because you're you're a decent looking bloke what's up with you go talk to some women instead of me but anyway this single i really like this track i really do yeah it really works as the second track off the album as well because it's straight after take on me and it suggests the album is going to be different from that although i should say you know we're saying oh i'm majorly interrated there has been something of a resurgence in recent years in terms of like you know serious bands saying that they were years in terms of like you know serious bands saying that they were massively influential on them so you know Coldplay did an interview where they went on about um AHA and Keane and Liam Gallagher and Adam Clayton said in an interview right um from U2 he described AHA as a rather misunderstood band they were looked upon as a

group for teenage girls but in reality they were a very creative band you know as if teenage girls can't be into anything creative i don't want coldplay or keen to be their legacy but they're they are majorly underrated actually aha and and i i like this track i mean perhaps it is my brain being racist but there's a sort of impossibility throwing off the dim traces of abba and what they do I hear a slight similarity to lay all your love on me in the verses in the groove of it they were like you say that they're meant to be the next Duran but they what was beautiful about them um beyond the cheekbones was that they always seem reluctant with that um they'd made themselves stars and then they kind of spent the rest of their time retreating away from that spotlight yeah I think that happens with a lot of people because you can't possibly know what it's like until you're there you know it's like

anyone else they wanted to do the thing and they did the thing and then some stuff came with it that they probably had to just endure yeah i don't want to do this interview on fucking saturday superstar can't you just draw a cartoon of me talking to mike reed please they do resist being anyone's like favorite band just because there's a certain and again i don't want to draw the kind of broad cultural assumptions either but people grow up in a culture and they reflect it you know and it comes out there's a certain aloofness you know there's this great magnetism that you are drawn to and then there's an aloofness that keeps you from fully madly loving them you know like i i, I am very, very fond of A-ha,

and not just because, as previously stated, Morton Harker is a singularly handsome man. The thing is that with, yeah, they're all good-looking, but it's like he's just preposterously, like, he just, and he kind of knows it as well. Yeah, and he's stayed good-looking for ages as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like forever, basically. well like yeah basically yeah

yeah yeah that's but that he has this little smirk that is very is a very knowing smirk that he sort of wears all the time he just has resting smirk face really um which is great which is a great thing for a pop star to have where it's just like that confidence that puts you at ease and goes yes i'm looking at a pop star now and everything is right with the world. That person should be on that stage, you know. But yeah, also, I don't think people are really responsible for whoever is influenced by them. You know, that's something that happens, you know. But yeah, sometimes you do get a bit Johnny Marr about it and just go,

who said, why do you, David Cameron, you don't like the Smiths. I forbid you, I forbid you to like it. And also they look very 1986, but they don't look like a bunch of cunts, do they? No, no. I mean, this is the era of the ripped jean. One of the few fashions of the era that have been picked up upon

by our worthless and disappointing youth. Morton's look like he's put them through a fucking wood chipper man they are shredded i reckon they were expensive as well like i've seen there's a video um i can't remember which one it is now but he's wearing those exact same ones with the exact same rips in a video so they're obviously faves of his and maybe this was like a challenge within the group like see how long you can get away with wearing these jeans before they actually fall apart they've been pre-ripped yeah because there's no there's no rippage around the crotch do people do people actually do that i thought that all the ripped jeans were just like it was because

they were poor and they had to just wear the same jeans all the time seriously this has blown my mind like people actually who would do that who would wear deliberately ripped jeans i mean that's i would send them back i would say i've i've received these jeans in the well no it's it's 1986 there's there's no such thing as receiving jeans in the post i suppose well i would go i i i didn't realize until i got them home these have got tears in them it was an era of jeans adaptation wasn't it really yes sitting in the bath with them and all that yeah sorry i fear that i'm not taken seriously when i say things on this podcast and it's like do you think i'm some sort of child of the forest who has been a foundling who didn't know about ripped jeans but it is it's a class this is i think he wears this quite a lot

and it really suits him it is a classic look isn is, I think he wears this quite a lot and it really suits him. It is a classic look, isn't it? White shirt, black belt, ripped jeans, black boots, bracelets, big hair, necklace, cheekbones, sweet Morton Hawkins. What's the most ripped jeans you've ever worn? You see, I never did. You know, now, when you get ripped jeans, it's like there's rips up the thigh bit.

Yeah. For me, it was always about the knees. Just the knees. Yes. To the point where, it's like a chelsea grin all the way around and your knee was sticking out yeah it was always a knee thing not those upper rips which seem to be all the vogue these days i don't know if they still are but i've got some from a few years ago that are black with like a scattering of subtle sort of frayed bits on the thighs slits yeah just like little you know so you can't really see you you know it's it's they're not sort of frayed bits on the thighs. Slits? Yeah, just like little, you know, so you can't really see, you know, they're not sort of, but yeah,

I've seen some that really, really push the boundaries of actual garment. I had a mate at university whose jeans were severely fucking ripped to the point where there was more holes than denim, but also around the crotch, and he teamed up with boxer shorts with a hole in them

so we'd be sitting on the tube but i'd lean over and go mate your fucking bollocks are hanging out that's the swiss cheese thing isn't it it's like when the holes align and it's all it's all over yeah also sorry when you rip your jeans right you know you got all these like big strands hanging down what'd you do with them did you clip them or did you just leave them yeah because mine always got too bloody long to the point where the threads were sort of dangling down my fucking shoes i was like just look roger daltry's fringe jacket that's it i could never quite get that look right but it's a remarkable year for them really they have a number one single they have a ton of hits yeah i mean they've got they've got a fair few records getting in the charts this year it is their it's

their big year isn't it for us yes they've just announced their first tour of the UK at the end of the year, which has immediately sold out. They played two dates at the Royal Concert Hall in Nottingham, which was a huge fucking deal. Morton's also about to come the first teeny lust object to have socks thrown at him at gigs instead of knickers. Apparently, during a tour of Japan, he was interviewed and said that the downside of being a pop star was that he never had the time to wash his own socks

and had to lob them out after wearing them which resulted in thousands of Japanese fans sending their local label socks rather in the manner of the ATV studios being deluged by knitted woolly hats when Benny couldn't find his in an episode of Crossroads

but as it was Japan, you can imagine there were really nice socks and really ornate packaging. That's brilliant. I mean, for me, he's like Nick Kershaw, man. If I met him, I would not be able to speak. Because he's just too pretty, isn't he, Morton? He still is. I didn't know this. You equate

Morton Harkett with Nick Kershaw on that. They similarly would leave me speechless in a way that sort of more important figures to me musically wouldn't. Right. Because I'd immediately just blush and giggle. I never knew you felt this way about Nick Kershaw. Oh, massively mad. I would agree.

Massively mad. And he still looks amazing, Nick Kershaw, as well. There's just something about him. Yeah, he is adorable. Wouldn't it be good, eh, Neil? I've got two strong arms. And they absolutely belong on top of the pops. They're so good on this show.

You know, in contrast to the kind of slightly embarrassing things they're forced to do elsewhere, at the end of this appearance, I think Gary Davis mentions the tour. Yes. That's coming up later and you know when that tour um actually starts later on in the year the kind of first tv appearance of a in that period is on blue peter um yeah and he's on blue peter that for some reason you know it's

actually blue peter is the show on which the cry wolf video makes its debut really yeah and and you've got jan Ellis there going, and here's Morton just back in the country making friends with Bonnie. And there's, you know, Morton being slobbered over by Bonnie and the big blue Peter Labrador while Janet asks him questions about the tour.

And the other presenter, Mark Curry, he tries to give Morton a blue Peter badge. Right. And he says, just in case Cry Wolf doesn't get to number one, which I'm sure it will, you'll have to share it with the whole band. It's a weird first appearance back,

but they're much more comfortable in this milieu on Top of the Pops. I've been on the piss with Janet Ellis. She's fucking mint. About 20 years ago, I was doing an article for the Daily Mirror where I was essentially being Jimmy Savile and getting in touch with people who wrote TV shows

like Jim will fix it or Blue Peter to do things and they never got a response. So I'd make their dreams come true. One woman wrote to Blue Peter, never got a response. So me and Janet Ellis went round her house and we made a dog cake. It was really good good i was really impressed and we went to the pub afterwards and yeah we had a bit of obsession janet ellis by that time

had developed the filthiest laugh i've ever heard on a woman it was just like oh you're fucking mint that was the article where we went around tony hart's house as well so yeah you went around tony hart's house glory days how was he he. You went round Tony Hart's house? Glory days. How was he? He was mint. The only thing about him was he didn't have a cravat on. He had his shirt open, but no cravat. So, it was like he was standing there with his bollocks on.

But a lovely bloke. Yeah. So, I imagine Janet was. You can tell. With some kids' presenters, you can tell that they're a bit naughty off screen. So, the following week, train of thought dropped five places to number 13 the follow-up hunting high and low got to number five in june and they finished off

the year with the singles i've been losing you and cry wolf getting to number eight and number five for two weeks in october and january of 1987 respectively and their second LP, Scoundrel Days, got to number two for a fortnight in October. And they spent the rest of the 80s and early 90s as a regular chart concern until they split up for the first time in 1994. All right, Improv Craze youngsters, we're going to step back and catch our breaths for a little while and come back hard tomorrow for part three of Chart Music 710.

Don't forget, if you want the full episode without any advert ramble, you've got to get yourself over to patreon.com slash chart music and stuff this g-string full of lovely money. On behalf of Sarah Bean, Neil Kukane,

this is Al Needham telling you to just stay pop crazed. Shark music.