Friday's 40th five (no.51/80)

Week by week we're listing 5 tracks which were big music news in the charts, on your radio or even in your record collection 40 years ago, this week in 1980:

1. The Beat - Too Nice To Talk To In a fairly stagnant chart (with John Lennon outselling everything by several miles) this is the highest new entry this week down at no.31, and opening this week's Top of the Pops.

2. Specials - Do Nothing. Another new entry at no.34 and also on Top of the Pops this week.

3. The Clash - The Magnificent Seven. Their triple album Sandinista is a new entry this week at no.19 (Super Trouper manages to hold back John Lennon, dec.) 

4. In Camera - Co-Ordinates. Quirky indie track of the week, recorded for Peel session broadcast 16/12. Signed to 4AD.

5. Gary Numan - Photograph. Numan was back in the charts, and on TOTP, this week with the single This Wreckage, lifted from the Telekon album. This is the previously unreleased B side.

One for the Dads

Can't believe there is actually a blog specialising in cheesy 70s/80s dance routines off TOTP and such, bu here's the very wonderful One for the Dads .

You can also download the videos, presumably so you can store them and get 'em out when you're by yourself at home, with nobody around to interrupt your, er, pleasure.

Enjoy!

Top Pops

Interesting chart over on Yes It's Number One, the top blog for all things Top of the Pops. It's a Top 30 based on artists' TOTP appearances over the years.
Unsurprisingingly UK charts/TOTP stalwarts such as Cliff Richard, Slade and Robbie Williams are high in the top 5 although I was surprised to see The Hollies as high up as no. 3.  Pretty amazed to see chaps like David Essex and Gary Glitter fairly low down - they always seemed to be on.
On the 80s front, Erasure ironically come slightly higher than Depeche Mode thanks to just one more appearance although 80s kings seem, quite rightly, to be Pet Shop Boys with 35 showings.
It all struck me as being very male-artist orientated although then again such is the nature of pop music I suppose. Lulu and Sandie Shaw hold a joint no. 9 position (with Mudd), followed by Kylie Minogue at 18 and Cilla at 21.
I'd be interested to know how YINO went about doing this chart although they are all pretty much experts over there so jolly well done.
There have been many memorable TOTP moments for me over the years although here's one of my faves. They didn't chart - anywhere.

we are the goon squad..

Everyone seems to be celebrating David Bowie's 65th birthday with fitting tributes, so here's something quite un-fitting complete with decidely un-fashionable presenter, and godawful chart rundown saved only by Bowie's Fashion crashing in at no. 20, duly celebrated by a fine bit of dancing and jigging about by TOTP resident dance-troupe Legs & Co.
I've a feeling Bowie may have found this mildly amusing at the time. Happy Birthday Mr Jones. Beep beep!

David Bowie - The Jean Genie (TOTP)

the David Bowie Story pt...

Morning viewers. Sort of forgot I was doing a 'David Bowie Story' feature here, but I seemed to have abandoned it at the end of the 70s, partly because most already know about what happened Bowie-wise in the 80s, and that famously, not all of it was particulary good.
So anyway back tothe 70s then with this recently recovered rare TOTP pièce, the discovery of which got plenty of news coverage just before Chrissmus. Enjoy, and party like it's 1973..

(note: band performance aside, check out white kid trying to dance like much funkier 'coloured' counterpart at approx. 1:51 in .. hilarious)

The rise and rise of David Jones

The David Bowie Story pt. 3
Almost forgot my ongoing potted history of Bowie, with info mostly gleaned from reading David Buckley's Strange Fascination.
Well we're just about up to the Ziggy Stardust period (1972-74), and so much has been written about it already I won't go into it, other than say I never really took to it much and still don't "get" the whole thing. Mind you, had i been slightly older at the time I may well have "got" it when watching Bowie/Ziggy and friends doing Starman on TOTP. According to Buckley it was a seminal moment (ah the power of telly!) in the rise of Ziggy Stardust, especially the moment in which Bowie/Ziggy points his finger straight into the camera and wiggles it around a bit while singing "you-ou-ou", upon which millions of British teenagers promptly swooned and were won over to the cause. They then dutifully went out and bought loads of glitter, glam clothing, oh and the record, the following Saturday. Here's said clip - watch out for that moment at around 1:37...

Love it or love it not, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars certainly assured Bowie's success, after much faffing about, and left a legacy that would influence so many for many years to come. In fact mention of the TOTP epiphany moment reminded me of the first time I - and many others - saw Tubeway Army, or rather Gary Numan, a Bowie-fan himself doing Are Friends Electric? on the show in 1979... he didn't point his finger, and we didn't faint, but the effect was basically the same.: things would never be quite the same again.

The Human League - The Sound of the Crowd

I Love 1981 pt. 9

Smash Hits called it the sound of revivalist groups in the year 2000 trying to reconstruct the genuine sound of the synthesiser "by banging a hammer on a corrugated roof in time to an assortment of fog-horns, humming kettles and finely tuned cake tins". Not a bad description as it really was like nothing you'd ever heard before.
Phil Oakey's Human League Mark II had already made an attempt to achieve pop success earlier in the year, although thankfully in the meantime he and partner Adrian Wright with local boy and tour musician Ian Burden had met up with producer Martin Rushent and together they came up with what was to be their first real milestone to success, "The Sound of the Crowd".

The ad campaign stated "Hear dance and add your voice" which was the new Human League manifesto in an electro-nutshell. Futuristic sounds which you could actually dance and sing along to this time aided somewhat by the new romantic frilly blouses and men's make-up chic, albeit an ilk to which Sheffield's finest never really belonged.
Backing singers and stylish dancerettes Susanne and Joanne finally did get to add their voice to a Human League recording, and were famously called away from sixth-form classrooms as they had to "do" Top of the Pops at the end of April, 1981.You can imagine TOTP producers' and cameramen's dismay when confronted with a set-up with no guitars, no drummer, but just some reel to reel tape-recorders, two keyboards and some pretty weird looking Northerners to capture on video. It was a draw dropping moment for many and the beginning of Oakey and co.'s much longed for chart success. The 1981 Human adventure was just beginning..... Get in line now!

..with continued thanks to Brian McCloskey for Smash Hits updates..

20th Century TOTP

UK telly viewers may like to know that BBC4 are set to re-broadcast all the Top of the Pops shows in their entirety from April 1976 onwards evry Thursday night starting this week!
Why start at AD 1976? I hear you ask, well that apparently was the month when the Beeb actually decided to keep all the shows (presumably on tape) for archive purposes, supposedly for these 'time capsule' type occasions. Hurrah! Should make interesting viewing if only for spotting the daft dancing and "fashions" of the time as bad news is that the music itself won't be very good for quite a bit. Just as an indication, number one in the UK in April 1976 was Brotherhood of Man's Euro-winner "Save Your Kisses For Me" (no, you don't need to sing it thank you).

If anything the new screenings may spawn a new and better quality crop of youtube uploads from the show, as there are plenty of geeks out there willing to record and upload their fave TOTP moments througout the years (cough).
Speaking of which, we came across this rather good youtube channel which is doing just that. The aptly named memorylane1980s channel features loads of good stuff from said decade for your coffee-break sized viewing pleasure. Here's Sheffield band and 80's TOTP regulars The Human League doing one of their best in their 'democratic' line-up, with Phil Oakey dressed in what can only be described as a 'girl's blouse'.
Howzabout that then guys n gals?

I Love 1980 - 26

Spandau Ballet - To Cut a Long Story Short
And yes it was 30 years ago this week, about, that five grown men in kilts, tablecloths and floppy fringes made their way onto Top of the Pops to perform their first single. Emerging from The Blitz scene which had been bubbling in London's underground clubs and things during the past year or so, this was the first hit single of the genre generally known as New Romantic, whatever that means, meant or was meant to mean. Some may argue the re- vamped Ultravox preceded and indeed inspired everyone else and Bowie's Scary Monsters album simultaneously drew from and fuelled the movement both in fashion, attitude, ....oh and the music, although Spandau Ballet are generally considered to be the first of their kind to hit the big time with several others to follow, including Brummy rivals Duran Duran who were still sweating it out in frilly blouses on the Midlands club circuit.

Sad in a way that the Spans soon abandoned the dish-cloth style and bold, rhythmic, electro-based music which first brought them onto the scene, preferring a more MOR "soul boy" approach within a couple of years with True and all that, suited though it was to the upcoming wine bar culture (itself the logical consequence of the Blitz scene?).
We immediately loved 'em just as they were, bringing in something new and exciting, and - as far as I was concerned more importantly than the kilts - vaguely electro (even tho the driving synth line had been mixed down vis à vis the original demo versh). It was foppish but laddish at the same time, a pint of lager with lipstick on the rim, epic poetry for the dancefloor ....listen to the sound of the Spandau Ballet..

To Cut a Long Story Short - chart stats
Spandau Ballet's first mention in Smash Hits (p.15)

I Love 1980 - 16

Joy Division - Love Will Tear Us Apart

I seem to remember there being some kind of strike at the BBC involving TOTP and even, perhaps, daytime radio around this time in 1980, which meant basically that the charts went a bit haywire and records started appearing that wouldn't normally have done so as considered 'unsuitable' for TOTP even in these "new-wave" times.
Joy Division's seminal Love Will Tear Us Apart was a case in point. Fuelled by singer Ian Curtis' recent suicide (news which hardly made it beyond John Peel's 10 pm show) the single was riding high in the indie charts in May and June and manged to break into the regular TOTP-less Top 40 at the beginning of July and had made it's way up to no. 13 by the end of the month.

So much has already been said about the song / band / singer already so not much more to add, except to say that it opened the doors to the band's music to so many new admirers including myself. I didn't buy the single preferring the tape recording off the radio done on my new (and first) radio cassette recorder bought with my strawberry picking money (ironically the original was recorded in Strawberry Studios).
It would also seem to have been the band's attempt to write a 'proper' pop song with a catchy tunes, title in the chorus and everything. Fitting then that it did become their first chart hit, reaching the top 20 aagin on re-release in 1983 and 1995.

The song's beauty and power are universally undoubted with Curtis' dark and detached vocal creating a melancholy sing-along which would inspire angstful youths to gaze meaningfully at their shoes and to try and attempt similar music for years to come. LWTUSA has been covered by a wide range of artists, the first possibly being a brave but much derided version by white-soul boy Paul Young on his 1983 album No Parlez, a version which I've always quite liked. Arcade Fire, Simple Minds, Nouvelle Vague, New Order and Hawksley Workman (look it up) are among the many others to have attempted cover versions, although inevitably none of them compare to the turbulent and unsettling beauty (like that?) of the original by Ian Curtis, Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook and Stephen Morris.


Joy Division: they never wanted to go on Top of the Pops anyway
















Love Will Tear Us Apart : chart stats
Get Love Will Tear Us Apart here or cheaper here

Joy Division - Love Will Tear Us Apart

I love 1980 - 11

The Human League - Rock n Roll / Holiday '80

Going back to that classic TOTP show in May I can't really begin to describe how I felt at the end of it. All I know is that by the end I still had both Messages and The Human League's fab version of Gary Glitter's Rock n Roll ringing in my head...I mean how brilliant were the League at this time?
The song was only 'bubbling under' that week and was typically used as opening number to the show... but it just blew this impressionable 16 year old away.
Visually they were someting just out of this world...Just four blokes some synths, a tape recorder plus a singer with 'funny hair' and the backing singer with a blue glittery tie..magic! Even Gary Numan had never been this good with the full on electronic stuff . .he still used drums and guitars and didn't see and to be having as much fun! But Phil Oakey and the lads were something else... A proper electronic rock band!
Naturally I went out an bought the single (b7w Being Boiled / Dancevision - not the double 7", sadly) and played it to death. I would confound my friends at parties that summer with..a brand new sound, which of course only i seemed to dig.
The single never made the top 40 however (not even thanks to my contribution) and despite a relatively successful and critically accalimed album Travelogue, the band would split within the year.
Philip & Adrian (slides and occasional synthesisers) would be back a year later though and quite a different League. The Human adventure was just beginning....

It's Thursday night and it's Top of the Pops..

..and it's 8th May 1980. And my life will be changed. Forever.

No, not by Mystic Merlin (?), Johnny Logan, or Peter Powell's jumpsuit, or even by Dexy's Midnight Runners at number 1 .. but by Sheffield electronic band The Human League opening the show with their fantastic rendition of Rock n Roll (even though it never made the Top 40 but I knew that one day all music would be made this way) - and by Liverpool band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark performing the new version of Messages.
My jaw dropped and I never looked back.

full show playlist here

I Love 1980 - 10

Jonah Lewie - You'll Always Find Me In The Kitchen At Parties

Definitely reminds me of when I was revising for my O levels..a great bit of synth driven fun by Jonah Lewie who sort of specialised in 'novelty' records, this being his most successful. Witty lyrics, good tune and loved the dead pan faux-americano backing vocals too (kitchen at pardieeees..)..and I could relate to it!

chart stats: here

wiki page: here

alternative video: here

I Love 1980 - 5

The Cure - A Forest

Well as I've done a Siouxsie posting for 1980, better do a Cure one too. Never really took much notice of this lot until 1981 or even 1982 when the angst-factor really began to kick in but thankyou to Benge for reminding me that this track is actually from April 1980.
Not much to write about it so I'll just post the TOTP performance this time (yes you will see Paul McCartney for a split second at the start) .. listen again and again and again and again and again...