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March 29, 2024, 02:19:33 PM

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Top of the Pops on BBC Four - Thread Three

Started by daf, November 05, 2020, 08:25:18 PM

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daf


gilbertharding

This Redcoat bastard is stealing a living. And they must have been trolling Vanessa Paradis by having the Supremes on before.

The Rickingbirds I remember (a friend of mine was a fan) - they were pretty much the first 'indie' band to acknowledge the greatness of Country Rock as a genre. I liked the Byrds, like, but never saw the point of tribute acts.

Want to hear St Etienne's version of I'm Too Sexy now.

Jason Fucking Donovan yet. I can't remember exactly where I was on 12th November 1992 but I definitely wasn't watching this shit.

daf

#2822
Charles & Eddie - what a track!

daf


cosmic-hearse

Boyz II Men's vibe - baseball caps, suit jackets, shorts - is something to behold


daf



Norton Canes

#2828
So basically what you do, is swap out Little Angels with En Vogue and voila, you've given yourself a spare half hour. Simple huh.

Why did I italicise voila and not En Vogue?

Anyway

Red t-shirt Little Angel's my favourite, he looks the cheekiest and the happiest to be there. He breaks a string! Crazy! Sorry keyboards Little Angel, but your weird blink-and-you'll-miss-it boot-in-shot moment just doesn't cut it.  Little Angels eh, the biggest thing to come out of Scarborough since Dracula. Yes okay I know what you're all thinking, why couldn't they have opened the show with Rotterdam Termination Source doing Poing and yes of course, in any sane world that would be the correct descision but look, Little Angels were the highest new entry that week, apart from Erasure... oh, and The Shamen... so, let's not begrudge them a little limelight huh? Sorry, hang on... I've clicked on that link and I've still got Poing playing in the background... let me close that tab... Jesus, that's better. 

Quote from: Norton Canes on April 17, 2022, 11:23:39 AMLike the change in typeface for the You Make Me Feel Like Dancing flashback clip... oh my God they've only gone and used Della Robbia, I mean what next? The Specials performing Ghost Town captioned in Formula One? So disappointed they didn't caption Virginia Plain, is there some kind of copyright on Futura Bold?

Obviously not. Had they brought in Ian Levine as some kind of flashback caption continuity advisor?

Oh this is really nice - a pair-up of two of the year's best singles artists. First up a turn from Shakespears Sister that's absolutely to die for, with Siobhan and Marcella indulging in the sort of breathtaking fancy dress melodrama that Britpop wouldn't recognise if it slapped its face with a velvet glove and challenged it to croquet. I swear they've lit this so that Siobhan looks like she's in a black and white movie while Marcy's in glorious Technicolour. Love the way that the audience draw closer in about halfway through the performance; okay, I'm sure it was down to some edict from the gallery but it genuinely does look like they've suddenly realised how great this is and how they all want to be closer and more intimate. That close-up on Siobhan at about 7:37 on the iPlayer, with her ashen make-up and rags in her hair and the microphone right at her lips, that's awesome. Can't believe that apart from a valedictory performance of Stay on the Christmas episode, that's it from them as a duo. Too soon! But wait the awesomeness isn't over, because what's this oh it's only The Shamen's best ever single, yeah you heard that right, this one jacks in all the lippy hi-jinks of E. Goode and brings it right back to what the band were all about, marrying music and mysticism, serious and heartfelt, it reminds me abit of Omega Amigo and recalls that En Tact vibe. So many great things about it... they get the digital tribal beat spot on of course, the little cut up guitar sample is exquisite (oh hang on do we hear it in this mix?), the way it goes all mellow in what passes for a middle eight is fantastic... and perhaps best of all, it proves there's more to Mr. C's delivery than finger-wagging drollery (I look forward to your riposte, Mr Stubbs) oh and as if that wasn't enough, it contains the best line that's ever featured in any song in the whole of the top 40 ever: "Techno tribal, positively primal, shamanic anarchistic archaic revival". It's the past, attempting some kind of idealistic synergy with the future. The next time we see a similar attempt on Top Of The Pops it'll be Louise Wener wearing an A-line mini-dress.

"This is Liam from Flowered Up and Sarah from St. Etienne. But we don't want to give you them... we want to give you this!"

The Rockingbirds duly hove into view, achieving the astonishing feat of making Deeply Dippy less listenable than Right Said Fred. Lead singer Rockingbird looks like he's greying already. Tambourine Rockingbird looks like Steve Coogan doing an impression of Alan Partridge, if that makes sense. I mean Flowered Up and St. Etienne must have been desperate to do TOTP at this point in their yet nascent careers, and yet they still passed up the opportunity to parade their RSF covers in front of the watching millions. It's almost like they know something, huh. Something of which The Rockingbirds were clearly blissfully unaware. Do you think they got, like, suspicious, when two ostensibly higher-profile bands passed up the opportunity for a plum Pops spot? Ah, whatever.

Quote from: gilbertharding on April 29, 2022, 08:49:39 PMWant to hear St Etienne's version of I'm Too Sexy now

It's shit. Flowered Up's Don't Talk Just Kiss sounds exactly how you'd imagine Flowered Up covering Don't Talk Just Kiss woudlsound, and is therefore brilliant.

Breakers! Let's just pause to consider the Breakers for a moment. They're a real relic now, aren't they? Firstly because they've been around for so ruddy long, being one of the few things to survive and flourish after Year Zero; but mostly because now the show plays longer length versions of songs, there's something quaint about the blink-and-you'll-miss-'em Breakers, giving us tantalising snipptes of songs that often we never see on the Pops again. Respect, Breakers.

Arrested Development at no.2 behind Boyz II Men eh. Damn shame. See now I'm imagining that the "group of brothers buggin' out" who disrespect Speech's black queen are Boyz II Men. They look like the types.

Wait who's this? INXS? In the studio? Oh Tony, you could have warned us! The sumptuously, sublimely sexy Michael Hutchence struts supremely to the 'Sesses' gritty glamour groove, shifting up the heat with his simmering stage presence and smooth superstar countenance, the very essence of sultry 90's sex appeal and oh my word Judd Trump has just thundered in a long red from right off the cushion, that'll have Mark Williams on the ropes! Sorry, got the snooker on in the other tab, very distracting. Where were we, Michael? Oh you've gone. That's a shame.

So. Clearly I fazed you all with my radical interpretation of Sleeping Satellite, well, I can't claim that I'm going to do the same with End Of The Road but, something did hit me - it's like the best selling Motown single ever or some shit isn't it but people don't really seem convinced of its Motown credentials, saying it's flat and a bit lacking in that Motown panache. Well I think I know why that is. I think, it's because for all of their posturing and close harmonies Boyz II Men aren't a Motown band at heart. The nihilism of the lyrics should be a giveaway but this, once you get your head round it, this... is basically emo. We've been on the lookout for the first Britpop bands and been oblivious to the fact that the first emo band have snuck right under the radar. And it explains why they have a penchant for hanging around on benches under street lights, as emos have a wont to do.

Plus also do they win an award for most costumes worn by a band in one video?

Okay that's it it's been a long night I'm out of practice and there's still a whole 'nother show to do.  Catch you on the other side of the caffeine divide

Norton Canes


Egyptian Feast

Quote from: steveh on April 27, 2022, 12:30:02 PMThese new Story Of docs have also reduced the number of subjects covered in each one. Budget cuts...


Funny how three bands from the previous episode (Sleeper, Cast and Skunk Anansie) got interviewed again for the 1996 doc I just watched despite none of them being worth giving a shit about in 1995 either. Meanwhile fucking 'Firestarter', a song that was played on Top Of The Pops to clearly no reaction at all from anyone, was obviously not worthy of more than a passing mention, not when the bumpkin from Reef has some memories to share about that Minidisc ad.

These are getting worse by the year. I can't wait to see what they cobble together for 1998.

matjam13

Here's what they've cobbled for 1997's story of:

"Revolution was in the air for the long-running music show, both in terms of the music and the show itself. Techno-pop punk rock arrived in the form of Republica and frontwoman Saffron, followed by the likes of Placebo and Chumbawamba, who were all livening things up at the BBC Elstree studios.

The year also saw the emergence of reggae star Finley Quaye, NY trio Fun Lovin' Criminals, with their sample-driven tales of city life, and hogging the charts were Danish outfit Aqua with their own brand of plastic pop. With a new chief, Chris Cowey, in charge of the show, evolution was also in the air during another fascinating year in the life of Top of the Pops.

Contributors include Saffron from Republica, Sharleen Spiteri of Texas, Brian Molko of Placebo, Finley Quaye, Huey Morgan, Aqua, Chris Cowey, Trevor Nelson and Jayne Middlemiss."

bigfatheart

Wheeeeyyyyy it's back!

I blather on just about every week at this point about how such and such song was on Now 23, and that was the first cassette I remember having as a kid, so this song is lodged permanently in my brain, blah blah blah, well it turns out this Little Angels song was on there and the most I get from it is "uh... yeah... I think I've heard this before..." I mean, I was an avid Kerrang! reader as a teen (2002-2006 particularly) and I soaked up the names of hundreds of shite metal bands from years gone by that I had no interest in because I was just fascinated by the byzantine history of it all, and yet I have absolutely no memory of ever reading one word about the Little Angels, despite their 'Bon Jovi that could fit into Rock City' vibe apparently earning them a number one album in 1993. That's right, we've not even reached peak Little Angels yet. Still, undoubtedly there will be people out there to whom the Little Angels meant the world, and likely still do. There will be couples who bonded over their shared love of the Little Angels, who still bunker down for the evening with their Little Angels CDs, who'll still trek across the country to Scarborough for Angelsstock '22 (originally scheduled for 2020), who go into the office enthusing about how the last time they saw them was even better than in 1992, while people go "uh... yeah... I think I remember them..." Fair play to them, I suppose.

Tony's been practicing his dazzling satirical wit - not only was there his Boyz II Men/George Bush crack, but he said that Metallica had more energy than Ross Perot. If only the world had been watching! He could have left behind this music lark for his true calling, skewering the great and the good - to think, we could have had Dortie, Bird and Fortune. Oh well - satire's lost is BBC4 repeats of Top of the Pops' gain.

Undercover can fuck right off. 'Baker Street' was bad enough, but I bloody well love 'Never Let Her Slip Away' - the original, obviously - so to watch the poor man's David Coulthard listlessly half-arsing his way through it as if his mind's on his fag break, not even aspiring to the Paul Young 'good song sung well' baseline... absolute shit. Even the name! Undercover. Twats.

En Vogue, Vanessa Paradis, Charles & Eddie... all great. Not much more to say there, sorry. It's more fun to call people twats.

Which I suppose should lead us on to the Ambassadors of Funk feat. MC Mario, but I figure I'll give that as short a shrift as the show did. Instead, let's discuss the trifecta of moribundity: Donovan, Bolton and Diamond. It almost felt like the three stages of a singer's life, if it weren't for the fact that Jase is so clearly on the way down, more likely to be heard on Have I Got News For You as the punchline to a joke about Hampstead Heath than he is on Top of the Pops. There's something quite tragic about watching a former teen idol in this stage, desperately clutching for a respectability that will forever be out of reach. You're never going to convince people you're a serious artist - the audience you're reaching for now is only ever going to see you as the bloke who wiggled his arse on a hillside singing 'Too Many Broken Hearts', and taking a perfunctory stroll through a standard that's been recorded a thousand times before, and almost always better than this, isn't going to give anybody anything that they need or don't already have. Certainly not your pre-existing fanbase, who're four years older than when you broke through, an absolute lifetime in teenaged terms, and definitely not their younger siblings, who'll have Take That and East 17 to warm their cockles instead of you, Grandad. But what can you do when you're not cut out for any sort of artistic growth? Time for a few years of heavy drinking before you can hit the student union circuit, Jason.

Michael Bolton, on the other hand, this is his thing. He might have built his career on standards, but he does slather his songs with something that other versions likely don't have - a leaden, unsubtle, but crucially unthreatening machismo, like a rugby player crying in the back of a taxi, like an oily, semi-tumescent cock whipped out but then gently rubbed over the song with no penetration. You know he was a heavy metal singer before he started on the ballads? Do you reckon he was keeping the hair on the off chance that he'd get accepted by the metal crowd, and he'd be able to whip off the suit to reveal an Enuff Z'Nuff (see, those years reading Kerrang! weren't wasted) shirt and finally do what he really wants to do?

Oh, but Neil Diamond... fucking hell. We've had some incongruous old fuckers show up in the last year, whether it was Neil Sedaka and his technicolour jumper or Chris bastarding Rea, but this has to top them all, surely? It's not even in the charts! Who does this appeal to? Who looks at this and goes "Yep, that's what I want"? Even the elderly, surely there's something out there for them that's better than this. Surely?

Ah well. Good to have you back, Top of the Pops. And lovely to see both shows ending with pyrotechnics! Truly, no expense spared.

Egyptian Feast

Quote from: matjam13 on April 30, 2022, 03:11:21 AMThe year also saw the emergence of reggae star Finley Quaye, NY trio Fun Lovin' Criminals, with their sample-driven tales of city life,

I hope they mention the time their drummer received a police caution for making obscene phone calls to various women's gyms on their first UK tour. I always thought they should've done a song about that caper.

Egyptian Feast

Quote from: bigfatheart on April 30, 2022, 10:10:35 AMEnuff Z'Nuff (see, those years reading Kerrang! weren't wasted)

Thanks for the Proustian LOL. I was once loaned (probably around this time) an Enuff Z'Nuff record by a prodigious guitar playing classmate who thought it might be my kind of thing, which might have been a subtle insult I'm only now appreciating considering this guy thought I was a twat.

It really wasn't my kind of thing and I had enough sense even then to recognise these musicians as even bigger twats than myself, but I can't deny I got a huge kick from finding out their ridiculous, embarrassingly shit moniker was derived from the name of their bassist, Chip Z'Nuff, and went into another one of those extended laughing fits that confused and frightened other children.

Pauline Walnuts

Quote from: Egyptian Feast on April 30, 2022, 11:26:42 AMI hope they mention the time their drummer received a police caution for making obscene phone calls to various women's gyms on their first UK tour. I always thought they should've done a song about that caper.

That doesn't sound like it would be that much fun to me.

Egyptian Feast

It definitely wouldn't, but from various things I've heard about them over the years, it would be a more honest representation of their particular brand of Fun Lovin' Criminality than singing about running around robbing banks all whacked off of Scooby Snacks.

Norton Canes

#2837
int. BBC Headquarters, 1992

"Ah Stanley, do come in, take a seat. I understand you want to discuss your plans for the 1500th edition of... [looks down, consults memo] 'Tottup'?"

"Well Jonathan, Sir, it's all very exciting. We're going to open with a spectacular performance by one of the hottest groups in the world right now, En Vogue, an American girl vocal quartet who look incredible and are absolutely tearing up all kinds of prejudices and preconceptions about race and gender. They've got a fantastic song called Free Your Mind, a powerful statement about black female independence, which they're going to do on the big stage, just the four of them with all kinds of wonderful dance moves. It's going to look unbelievable and kick the show off with a real bang."

"I see. And who have you got after that..?"

"Oh, any old fucker with a Musicians' Union card."

Sorry, do stop me if this is getting a bit Who-centric. Nice to see the EV girls dressed in subtle variations of Lalla Ward's costume in The Horns of Nimon, though!

To broaden things out into the wider realm of TV SF in general ("Hooray!" - no-one), the rest of this landmark Pops does look a bit like those episodes in one of those US sci-fi shows where they have an interplanetary peace summit on a space station and all the alien delegates are actors with little bits of latex stuck to various parts of their faces. With his savage unkempt mane and craggy forehead, Michael Bolton is like the truculent Klingon type who you just know is going to challenge someone to single combat according to his planet's ancient law. Undercover singer is the coldly detached Vulcan who reacts with fascinated incredulity at the prospect of anyone releasing their emotions and experiencing spontaneous unbridled fun. Charles and Eddie are the kickalong comic relief buddies, who work down in the intergalactic container haulage section or suchlike and have brought the rest of their ramshackle, comically-attired oddball crew along to try and score some action with an emerald-skinned alien harlot. Jason Donovan's the ostensibly cute but incredibly creepy little shiny-skinned, boggle-eyed interloper who hangs around in the background smiling at everyone until the scene where his entire head splits right open down the middle turning into a gaping mouth filled with a thousand razor-sharp teeth before he devours the First Officer. And Neil Diamond, with his rakish burnt orange power blouse and tempestuous sideburns, is nothing less than the all-powerful godlike immortal being who descends suddenly, threatening to crush the entire space facility in a giant spectral fist unless everyone listens to him croak out his harrowing canticle.

(For the curious, Morning Has Broken was from Diamond's 1992 Christmas album. I guess since it was only November 12th, he had to perform this, the only non-Christmassy track)

No idea which SF archetype Vanessa Paradis represents, by the way. I know she's never the most animated or engaging of performers but here it looks she's been sedated and thrust on stage against her will. I almost expect Liam Neeson to appear halfway through the song and punch a burly Turkish thug before running on stage to rescue her.

Which just leaves the big draw of the night, Ambassadors Of Funk Feat. M.C. Mario's Supermarioland. Sure I read somewhere this was going to be a studio performance? Oh well. It's dogshit of course, which is a real shame, because the little-known non-charting follow-up, Sabreman, was much better:

In 1984 I first came to fame
I was made by Ultimate Play The Game
Thirty-two pixels high and usually white
Though the ZX Spectrum's limit of two colours per character square was pretty shite

Sabre Wulf was my first big craze
Hunting an amulet through a jungle maze
The maze was big and it was hard to find
But the natives flashed when with a piece of it they were horizontally or vertically aligned

My next big adventure was Underwurdle
Into a huge cave system a found myself hurled
The stalactite guardians were hard to pass
Though you could get through them without the correct weapon if you lined yourself up and were bounced through by another monster, which made the whole system of finding the correct weapons a complete farce

Finally Knight Lore was my most famous jam
'Cause I won't mention shit like Pentagram
With Filmation graphics that stole the show
But the Spectrum processor couldn't handle them so some screens were unplayably fucking slow


Come on 1992, we're nearly done. Let's not go out with a whimper.

bigfatheart

Quote from: Norton Canes on April 30, 2022, 01:14:51 PMWhich just leaves the big draw of the night, Ambassadors Of Funk Feat. M.C. Mario's Supermarioland. Sure I read somewhere this was going to be a studio performance?

That'd be me who said that when it showed up in the breakers - Popscene's 1992 listings has it down as a studio performance, but evidently they're mistaken. I feel short-changed.

Norton Canes


daf

5 November 1992: Presenter: Tony DOrtie

(22) | LITTLE ANGELS – Too Much Too Young
RPT | THE ROLLING STONES – Honky Tonk Women (TOTP 25/12/69 & charts)
(23) | SHAKESPEARS SISTER – Hello (Turn Your Radio On)
(06) | THE SHAMEN – Boss Drum (video)
(26) | ROCKING BIRDS – Deeply Dippy
- - - - - - - - - - - (Breakers) - - - - - - - - - - - -
(25) | METALLICA – Wherever I May Roam (video)
(24) | EN VOGUE – Free Your Mind (video)
(14) | CHARLES & EDDIE – Would I Lie To You? (video)
(10) | ERASURE – Who Needs Love (Like That) (video)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -



(02) | ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT – People Everyday (video)
NEW | INXS – Taste It
(01) | BOYZ II MEN – End Of The Road (video)

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



Norton Canes

Those peace summit delegates:



Mich'Ael Bolto'n and En Vogue's Dawn Robinson appear to be missing. Let's hope they're not in the solar stacks doing any of that "Teach me how Earth women kiss..." stuff.


Dr Rock

Be My Baby is top. The 45 also sounds good at 33rpm. Although not as good as Something's Gotten Hold Of My Heart does, obv.

Episode 1 - alright, I guess, and I rather liked the Deeply Dippy cover.

Episode 2 - wat.

As said, swap En Vogue in full earlier and there's 30 minutes to spend on something else.

gilbertharding

Also I forgot, but I was strangely interested by the mention of the Rolling Stones on the EPG - wracking my mind briefly to see if I could remember what awful-but-fascinating hit from 1992 which might be featured. Crushed, I was, to realise it was a 'retro' clip of Honky Tonk Women (number 1 the day I was born cheers)...

Quote from: Egyptian Feast on April 30, 2022, 01:55:36 AMFunny how three bands from the previous episode (Sleeper, Cast and Skunk Anansie) got interviewed again for the 1996 doc I just watched despite none of them being worth giving a shit about in 1995 either. Meanwhile fucking 'Firestarter', a song that was played on Top Of The Pops to clearly no reaction at all from anyone, was obviously not worthy of more than a passing mention, not when the bumpkin from Reef has some memories to share about that Minidisc ad.

These are getting worse by the year. I can't wait to see what they cobble together for 1998.

I just assumed they couldn't get hold of Menswear.

Chicory

I recall 'Firestarter' being something of a cultural phenomenon.  Everyone at work/school talking about Top Of The Pops the next day, (The) Prodigy getting catapulted onto the world stage, Keith Flint's gurning face on the cover of everything.  I can only assume the surviving members were approached but turned it down, even permission for their 90s selves to be featured in any significant way.

boss drum has properly burned its way into my brain this week.

Norton Canes

Brilliant innit. Let's have the 12" mix (or one of many, at least)

Wait here's the extended version of the Beatmasters' mix that got into the charts