Tip jar

If you like CaB and wish to support it, you can use PayPal or KoFi. Thank you, and I hope you continue to enjoy the site - Neil.

Buy Me a Coffee at ko-fi.com

Support CaB

Recent

Welcome to Cook'd and Bomb'd. Please login or sign up.

March 28, 2024, 09:32:03 AM

Login with username, password and session length

Top of the Pops on BBC Four - Thread Four

Started by daf, June 06, 2022, 05:52:08 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

weirdbeard

Quote from: bigfatheart on June 11, 2022, 09:59:15 AMEast 17 didn't make much of an impression, besides Brian Harvey going a bit Jedward, and despite me being convinced they were the greatest group in the world around this time (I was three).

I did have a giggle at the first minute or so of the performance where you can just hear multiple people in the audience laughing. I never could tell if it was the haircuts, the set, the baggy suits or the rapping.

Norton Canes

#31
As always my appraisal of the shows is not complete until I've had Mrs Canes' comments. Here's her input for this week's fare:

  • She thinks that although East 17's performance was pretty comical, their dance steps were actually quite impressive. Also she noticed Tony was wearing a bent fork on his necklace (and I realised there were cameras in the portholes on both sides of the stage, which was neat).
  • She doesn't like Lulu. In fact it was worse than that - she compared her to Cilla Black. I replied that whereas Lulu seems like a great bunch of lads, Cilla Black had the reputation of being one of the biggest cunts in showbusiness. The matter remains unresolved.
  • She misheard Tony's poorly-enunciated introduction "Live from Elstree!" as "Live from
    Spoiler alert
    Auschwitz".
    [close]

daf

28 January 1993: Presenter: Tony DOrtie

(04) | 2 UNLIMITED – No Limit
(07) | USURA – Open Your Mind (video and charts)
(03) | WEST END feat. SYBIL – The Love I Lost
(12) | EAST 17 – Deep



(LP) | DINA CARROLL – Don't Be A Stranger
- - - - - - - - - - - (Breakers) - - - - - - - - - - - -
(19) | DEF LEPPARD – Heaven Is (video)
(15) | THE CULT – She Sells Sanctuary (Remix) (video)
(13) | BON JOVI – Bed Of Roses (video)
(11) | DURAN DURAN – Ordinary World (video)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
(14) | LULU – Independence
(01) | WHITNEY HOUSTON – I Will Always Love You (video)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -




DrGreggles

Quote from: Norton Canes on June 12, 2022, 11:43:17 AMCilla Black had the reputation of being one of the biggest cunts in showbusiness.

My mate used to work as an air stewardess for BA and she told me about the codes that had so that situations could be referred to in the cabin without notifying or alarming the passengers.
Anyway, if a passenger was acting the cunt the code would always be CB... followed by their seat number - in tribute to Liverpool's finest.
She worked there for years and this code always remained in place.

gilbertharding

Quote from: DrGreggles on June 13, 2022, 05:05:43 PMMy mate used to work as an air stewardess for BA and she told me about the codes that had so that situations could be referred to in the cabin without notifying or alarming the passengers.
Anyway, if a passenger was acting the cunt the code would always be CB... followed by their seat number - in tribute to Liverpool's finest.
She worked there for years and this code always remained in place.

https://popbitch.com/black-out/

QuoteWe've told the story of how Cilla Black got herself blacklisted at ITV many times (in short: she was an arsehole to a young runner over a salmon sandwich; that runner rose up the ranks to become one of the top bods at the station; they then stymied any attempt she ever made to get back on screen).

You might have wondered why Cilla never jumped ship to the BBC. Well, it was for much the same reason.

There's a BBC commissioning ed who likes to reminisce about the time he once held out his hand to shake Cilla's, only for her to dump her mink coat into it instead. He would laugh when telling it, before going on to point that she consequently had "more chance duetting with John Lennon than finding a show with the BBC."

Pauline Walnuts

QuoteThere's a BBC commissioning ed who likes to reminisce about the time he once held out his hand to shake Cilla's, only for her to dump her mink coat into it instead. He would laugh when telling it, before going on to point that she consequently had "more chance duetting with John Lennon than finding a show with the BBC."


Norton Canes

Sure I've posted this on CaB in the past already but for old time's sake here's my favourite Cilla Black come-uppance story. It was from a caller to Simon Mayo's R1 Confessions' slot. He was in charge of the smoke machine during Cilla's run at some theatre or other. The machine was basically a trough of water and a big fan. Dry ice was dropped into the water and the resultant 'smoke' was fanned across the stage. Except one night, just as Cilla's big number started, the guy realised he'd forgotten to fill the water trough. He had no time to get to a tap. Catastrophe loomed - what was he going to do?

Answer: yellow smoke

gilbertharding

Quote from: Norton Canes on June 14, 2022, 01:14:17 PMSure I've posted this on CaB in the past already but for old time's sake here's my favourite Cilla Black come-uppance story. It was from a caller to Simon Mayo's R1 Confessions' slot. He was in charge of the smoke machine during Cilla's run at some theatre or other. The machine was basically a trough of water and a big fan. Dry ice was dropped into the water and the resultant 'smoke' was fanned across the stage. Except one night, just as Cilla's big number started, the guy realised he'd forgotten to fill the water trough. He had no time to get to a tap. Catastrophe loomed - what was he going to do?

Answer: yellow smoke

Cool - but I prefer Tommy Steele in Singing in the Piss.

daf

What a Glorious Feeling
My Aim . . . It's can't miss

daf

Chris - What was that Tom Jones bollocks?

Must have been for charity!

daf

Nice hat Mr Steerpike!

(Good chorus on this!)

gilbertharding

There's a heavy whiff of folks hanging around waiting for Jools Holland to invent Hootenanny in 1993. Wholemeal soul.

Icehaven

Take That's clothes are all massively oversized, it makes them look like children. Was that a thing?

gilbertharding

Quote from: Icehaven on June 17, 2022, 08:48:28 PMTake That's clothes are all massively oversized, it makes them look like children. Was that a thing?

Christ yes. The entire 90s was the XXXXL decade.

gilbertharding


daf

#45
Yes - due to Rolf.

Someone's handily stuck it up on Youtube  -


gilbertharding


Norton Canes

#47
Never mind Running Up That Hill, can we get Ground Level to number one?

We're sick of seeing poverty
We're sick of seeing misery
We're sick of the fatality
In every locality


Nice of Rob to get freshly embalmed for the performance, too. Stereo MCs performed all four of the Connected singles in the TOTP studio and were the show openers each time. There's a reason for that. (For their only other studio turn, 2001's excellent Deep Down And Dirty, they were relegated to second spot behind Bbmak. Go figure)

Rich pickings tonight, so much so that I genuinely don't know where to start - especially after factoring in the Rolf-blocked show, which I took the liberty of watching earlier today. Thankfully we seem to have suddenly recovered from the recent penchant for cover versions, with Whitney's two efforts and Rolf's Zep spoof the only played-in-full homages. In their place we get all kinds of fascinating new stuff, mostly with the sort of gravitas that already makes much of 1992's lightweight fare look pretty vulgar.

Take Sting, for instance. Of all the artists featured tonight he's probably the most rectally situated. He gets a couple of pops at If I Ever Lose My Faith In You and in that first one he's rocking some serious Trumpton chic. I mean that is a seriously rustic Windy Miller vibe straight through. And, what I think is the best thing about it is, he's realised: the hat looks stupid. It's a statement hat, but inherently risible. So, how does he mitigate against that? Make it less risible? No. That would be a betrayal of his philosophy. What he does, is give his guitarist another stupid hat. But in a stroke of genius, it's not a more stupid hat. Because, there's a pecking order, and he's at the top, right? He's Sting. He gets the most stupid hat. Brilliantly, then, he gives the guitarist a stupid hat, but a marginally less stupid hat. It's still indisputably stupid. But not so much that you don't forget it's Sting, and Sting only, who decides who gets the most stupid hat.

And then, two weeks later, up he crops again. But this time he's in Daredevil's apartment in Hell's Kitchen. And that Windy Miller shit ain't gonna wash in NYC. No, today's dress-down Thursday. Sting is very much keeping it real and stupid hats are off the table. What happened? Did Sting learn something? Did the hats just get lost in transit? Doubt we'll ever know. Personally, I like to think he'd just heard Anyone Can Play Guitar and realised his woeful arse was toast. I wonder.

Look there is so much more of this tiresome shit where that came from but I'm off downstairs to catch up on Russian Doll with Mrs Canes. Haven't even mentioned Gloworm yet

Sebastian Cobb

Just catching up with 14 January 1993: Presenter: Tony DOrtie and PWEI and there's some quite heavy strobe-action from the mirror-lighting, given the fact 70's/80's versions seemed to get greyed-out on this sort of thing I'm  surprised that these weren't ran through a video 'legaliser'.

It's been a while since I watched TOTP but I can tell they're no longer using smeary tube cameras, and the lighting seems to have only got more aggressive in response.

daf

4 February 1993: Presenter: Mark Fr@nklin

(09) | M-PEOPLE – How Can I Love You More? (Remix)
(06) | DURAN DURAN – Ordinary World
(13) | DEF LEPPARD – Heaven Is (video and charts)
(08) | THE BELOVED – Sweet Harmony
(22) | RAPINATION feat. KYM MAZELLE – Love Me The Right Way
- - - - - - - - - - - (Breakers) - - - - - - - - - - - -
(21) | ULTRAVOX – Vienna (video)
(19) | TOM JONES – All You Need Is Love (video)
(15) | EXTREME – Tragic Comic (video)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -



(20) | GLOWORM – I Lift My Cup
NEW | STING – If I Ever Lose My Faith In You
(01) | WHITNEY HOUSTON – I Will Always Love You (video)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -



bigfatheart

Apparently - according to Google anyway - the Tom Jones "All You Need Is Love" thing was for Childline. So that explains that, although I'm not sure why, when raising money for charity, you wouldn't try to do something that wasn't fucking abominable. It was like something produced for a sketch, surely nobody involved thought that was any cop?

Gloworm, well, crikey. Not sure what to say there. They're at least more overt in their God-bothering than Lenny Kravitz, since I only just learned that's a bit Jesus-y, via Top of the Pops Facts on Twitter. Ah well. "Are You Gonna Go My Way" is one of those songs where I'm not sure if I like it or if I just heard it a lot as a kid. It does feel a bit more of a pastiche than an actual song. Better than "Fly Away", nowhere near as good as "It Ain't Over Till It's Over", anyway.

Thunder keep up the trend of hard rock/metal bands who only ever show their sensitive sides, so that there's no real impact in seeing them there, perched on their stools like Westlife would be in years to come. They're beating Extreme and Poison in that they're not relegated to the Breakers, although that's probably because they're British and therefore can make it into the studio. And they've not quite mastered Extreme's synchronised nodding and foot-tapping, but hey, they've had plenty of practice by now, because I would not have expected to hear so many Extreme songs as I have from these episodes.
Also, wasn't grunge meant to have killed all these fuckers off by now? Shockingly, it turns out once again that the received wisdom that [genre x] was responsible for the death of [genre y] trns out to be utter bollocks. Who'd've thunk it?

I quite like "If I Ever Lose My Faith In You", although it's a classic example of a song that hangs around, listlessly scratching its balls for the verses, because it knows the chorus is strong enough to carry it through (a.k.a. Love and Pride Syndrome). Although the lyric about politicians all seeming like game show hosts is very "Those clowns in congress did it again". And by the time of the satellite performance he could have added "You may say I've lost my faith in that hat I was wearing". Still, nice to feel warmly to Sting for a little bit.
I also quite like "The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite", which I suppose is meant to be as embarrassing as liking a mid-90s Sting song. But I've got less to say about that, so I'm only hoping that, in making this bold statement, I will empower other people to go "yeah, I quite like that one too" and maybe put up a more spirited defence than I can.

Rolf... well, it's not like watching a Savile episode where you're looking for clues and warnings. Mostly it's something that would have been a harmless, maybe cute, maybe irritating diversion, depending on your tolerance for this sort of thing. But, you know, obviously now it's a nonce in a shit suit, and it's a reason to keep the improved second performance of "Deep" off the air.

Hang on, Rod Stewart got a lifetime achievement award from the Brits? I didn't know his lifetime was 1967-1975.

But never mind, because 2 Unlimited are number one! Fucking hell, that's probably the most satisfying number one of the 90s so far, a lovely Dad-baiting banger that fucks off all the bland tastefulness we've had to endure to shout "TECHNO! TECHNO! TECHNO! TECHNO!" at us from inside a giant pinball machine. Lovely.

Also, while Rolf may have foisted a Dortie-free week upon us, it was nice to see him using Twitter to vent his fury at Craig David for being arsey at passport control yesterday.

Norton Canes

#51
Might as well crack on with the new number one, 2U's brassy banger that John Lydon might have pointedly titled 'This Is Not A Rave Song' and I'm calling 'Pretty much the best number one single of the decade'. Don't know if it was by expedience or meticulous calculation but they've chosen what must be the most obnoxious sound they could for that main riff, massively enhancing the song's punk credentials. Extra points to them if it was a preset. Thank you Tony yes I will whack the volume up for this one, as Anita's iconic metallic corset makes its studio debut. It always reminds me of those fancy colanders that open up with like a circle of steel petals. Anyway here's the first weird thing: for a song that basically exhorts you to jump the fuck around like a lunatic for three minutes thirty seconds, it's strange that the vocal hook is an unforgiving "No no, no no no no", which as delivered by Anita is like being admonished by a dominatrix. Of course it explodes into a jubilant "There's no limit!" and we're off, but it's a nice little trick. Also, though the verse is really just filler and could even have been jettisoned along with Ray's raps, it's lovely that it ends with "we'll do it with Pride". But what of Ray's remaining contribution, "Techno -techno - techno - techno"? Hang on, are we missing something? Take the 'tech' out of 'techno' and what have you got? Aaah! Were they just trying to coin a new, abrupt contraction of the genre's moniker? Well..?

+++ BReAKerS analysis +++

Yeah that Tom Jones effort is something. Bit annoyed because it's shattered my theory that every cover of a Beatles song is better then the original by simple virtue of it not being performed by The Beatles. Still, Childline, so thanks Tom. Unfortunately karma will find a way of evening things up on the next show. Absolutely fantastic to see Deacon Blue persisting with their blatant Achtung Baby plagiarism - this is a phase of their career that surely warrants further investigation. If you are intending to watch the Rolf-blocked show then do be aware that it cuts to John Secada pulling a very distressing expression. And I thought it was remarkable, given how well Automatic For The People was selling, that none of its first three singles got a full play (Everybody Hurts was also relegated to the Breakers but finally had an airing a couple of weeks later)

+++ BReAKerS analysis ends +++

So last thing for now, I suppose it's worth just mentioning The Beloved, good to see them back with a great song but it does look like they were participating in a Taskmaster task where the first part was 'Perform your single in a really good way' and the surprise second part was 'Perform the song again, trying to make the second performance exactly like the first'.

Norton Canes

Props for handing over the mantle of contemporaneous pop commentary to SELECT, daf. By '93 it had become a more entertaining read than the declining Smash Hits.

No way is 808 State's Gorgeous worth 3/5 though.

Pauline Walnuts

Quote from: Norton Canes on June 18, 2022, 10:36:43 AMAnita is like being admonished by a dominatrix.

I couldn't imagine her being admonished. :QuizicalFace:

daf

Quote from: Norton Canes on June 18, 2022, 11:57:41 AMProps for handing over the mantle of contemporaneous pop commentary to SELECT, daf. By '93 it had become a more entertaining read than the declining Smash Hits.

Cards on the table - the supply of online Smash Hits scans ends in a few issues time, so I needed to find a replacement.

Glad you approve - I think it became the definitive pop mag during the Britpop era.


Catalogue Trousers

QuoteBut what of Ray's remaining contribution, "Techno -techno - techno - techno"?

But is he also responsible for the preceding, pained-sounding 'Ow ow! Ow ow ow ow!' bits?...

daf

11 February 1993: Presenter: Tony DOrtie

(12) | SAINT ETIENNE – You're In A Bad Way
(03) | ANNIE LENNOX – Love Song For A Vampire (video and charts)
(05) | EAST 17 – Deep
(18) | THUNDER – A Better Man
- - - - - - - - - - - (Breakers) - - - - - - - - - - - -
(31) | DEACON BLUE – Will We Be Lovers (video)
(25) | POISON – Stand (video)
(23) | JON SECADA – Angel (video)
(17) | STING – If I Ever Lose My Faith In You (video)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -



(09) | ROLF HARRIS – Stairway To Heaven
NEW | CHARLES & EDDIE – N.Y.C.
(01) | 2 UNLIMITED – No Limit

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -




Spoiler alert

daf

18 February 1993: Presenter: Mark Fr@nklin

(19) | STEREO M.C.'S – Ground Level
(05) | WHITNEY HOUSTON – I'm Every Woman (video and charts)
(11) | LENNY KRAVITZ – Are You Gonna Go My Way?
(14) | STING – If I Ever Lose My Faith In You (via satellite)
- - - - - - - - - - - (Breakers) - - - - - - - - - - - -
(22) | REM – The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite (video)
(21) | METALLICA – Sad But True (video)
(17) | ROD STEWART – Ruby Tuesday (video)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -



(02) | TAKE THAT – Why Can't I Wake Up With You (via satellite)
NEW | PAUL McCARTNEY – C'Mon People
(01) | 2 UNLIMITED – No Limit (video)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -



Essentially Sting on 3 episodes in a row.
Brilliant.

"We're go and pogo the night away, see if Rolf Harris will knock out ... "

and CUT