TOTP on BBC4

[dalliance]

TOTP on BBC4

This era that TOTP is covering at the moment is fairly distinct for one thing worthy of conversation, big one hit wonder hits by proxy.

A number of these acts we have been discussing make the top 10 not because they actually specifically released music or were aggressively marketed or promoted here, rather because they have been heard by British package holidaymakers abroad and gained a commercial groundswell via word of mouth on their return.

Demis and Nana happened this way, so did Baccara of course. The whole holiday record brought home scene was led of course by 'Viva Espana' by the er, Swedish woman.

[MsD]

TOTP on BBC4

atlanticjaxx wrote:

holding a spunky penis substitute.

Call me oldfashioned, but when I want an ice-cream, I want an ice-cream.

When you have eat a jammy dodger, is it a substitute for ... well, you know? No, it's a delicious jammy dodger.

[Jah Womble]

TOTP on BBC4

(MsD - please don't credit me with that quote!!)

She appeared on an LP cover in her dungarees holding a spunky penis substitute.

And she sung this, this and this.

She was 'good', yes - but never 'cool'. There's a difference.

And, what MsD said about that LP cover. This was 1974. People weren't quite as fixated with phallic symbols as they are now.

[Benjm]

TOTP on BBC4

The pick of Ruby Flipper's costumes this time around has to be the leopard suit with flared hind legs. That guy definitely gets the short straw when they dole out the outfits - he was a Tom & Jerry housekeeper the other week.

[G-Man]

TOTP on BBC4

Jah Womble wrote:

And, what MsD said about that LP cover. This was 1974. People weren't quite as fixated with phallic symbols as they are now.

That's why that cover is so unusual. I had that LP for a long time before I realised that there was a joke.

Anyway, cool is relative. It would not shock me if someone here found this cover cool (well, you have to be cool to pull that one off):

[Come along, Min]

TOTP on BBC4

If anyone here was saying that Minnie Riperton LP cover didn't have a representation of a substitute for a spunky penis on it. I would suggest they listen to some of her music. She was into it, no shame in her game.

Her Lion LP cover's sexually suggestive too, She's sat there touching, stroking? her big furry cat, legs slightly apart.. see?

..And far as people from 1974 not being fixated in phallic symbols...I was born in 1974, so I know of at least one (and I'm not talking about Minnie Riperton).

In my world, Riperton's definitely cool.

[MsD]

TOTP on BBC4

Apparently the original title for Minnie's hit single was Tossing You Off is Easy, but the record company had cold feet.

[Wyatt Earp]

TOTP on BBC4

dalliance wrote:

The whole holiday record brought home scene was led of course by 'Viva Espana' by the er, Swedish woman.

Why did I think she was Maltese? Am I thinking of something else?

[historyman]

TOTP on BBC4

laverte wrote:

Not cool either, but Howard actually looks relatively un-ridiculous.

Surely this must settle the 'dungarees on men argument' once and for all?

[Jah Womble]

TOTP on BBC4

Apparently the original title for Minnie's hit single was Tossing You Off is Easy, but the record company had cold feet.

Well, quite.

What would ever have been the point of dressing up Minnie Riperton to be sexy? Syreeta, perhaps - Labelle, definitely.

It just wasn't her market.

(And if, somehow, that was what her management were trying to do - well, they made a monstrously bad job of it...)

[MsD]

TOTP on BBC4

I wasn't really dismissing atlanticjaxx's point because I barely know any MR tracks apart from Loving You. From seeing her do that, she seemed "sweet and homely" rather than foxy or vampy but maybe it wasn't representative. I know some singers of that era - well, Millie Jackson - most definitely did go there with some very explicit material, and Patti Labelle was very sexy.

But yes, Minnie didn't seem the type.

[Come along, Min]

TOTP on BBC4

Jah Womble wrote:

What would ever have been the point of dressing up Minnie Riperton to be sexy? Syreeta, perhaps - Labelle, definitely.

It just wasn't her market.

(And if, somehow, that was what her management were trying to do - well, they made a monstrously bad job of it...)

I don't think she failed in any attempt at dressing her up to be sexy, some of her best songs were a blatant and in my opinion brilliant attempt at being "sexy". In fact, inherently sexy.

She or her record company made the choice to put her on the Perfect Angel LP cover with a spunky penis substitute, or on Adventure In Paradise.. stroking that.. big cat, or even on Stay in Love.. spreading her legs akimbo on the sofa..

Its not really the stuff of the UK pop charts I'll give you that. But she managed a successful career during one of the best and most competitive periods for American Soul/Funk/R&B, and it worked for a while.

If you only know her from Lovin' You, you might have the opinion about her that you do, but there is more to Riperton than that, indeed there is more to her than just attempting to tap into the sexy soul market, but she definitely did

Inside My Love

You can see inside me, will you come inside me
Do you wanna ride, inside my love
You can see inside me, will you come inside me
Do you wanna ride, inside my love

...Hardly St Winifred's School Choir is it? a giant of a tune as well.

[Jah Womble]

TOTP on BBC4

Perhaps her albums hid one or two steamy moments, but her overall image was not really a 'sexy' one. In the mid-seventies, execs and management would've been all too aware of what they could and couldn't get away with: the charts might be full of thinly-disguised pornography now but they really weren't back then. (Edit: The Ohio Players, for example, got their label [Mercury] into a fair bit of hot water for adorning their record sleeves with half-naked women around that time.)

If you're going to try and sell a girl holding an ice cream as a sexual metaphor (which I'll concede, you might) - then you don't really dress her in dungarees. Not even in 1975. (Ice cream + dungarees + 'Perfect Angel' title = 'daft kid' every day of the week.)

Maybe I'm wrong, but if I were to hazard a guess about 'Adventures in Paradise', I'd say they were aiming at a 'faux-sophisticated' look, as opposed to some clumsy 'lion = pussy' angle.

[MsD]

TOTP on BBC4

I suspect if you called him "pussy" he'd rip your head off.

[Gangster Octopus]

TOTP on BBC4

dalliance wrote:

We fortunately have missed with the current run the likes of Laurel & Hardy

You dissing Stan'n'Ollie? Outside. Now.

[ale]

TOTP on BBC4

These re runs are genuinely perplexing ...once announced I was genuinely excited as would have classed myself as an avid watcher from 1973 to around 1982...and yea recognise Real Thing Wurzels Demis BofMan Abba and even that god awful JJ Barrie...less obviously the likes of Liverpool Express Sailor & Alex Harvey..

but great chunks have taken me aback...the likes of Mud Showaddywaddy & BCR have all performed songs I simply couldnt remember either then or with the memory prompt...and then theres all those songs that start the programme which are obviously not current hits but expected to be...yet hardly any one of them ever were...

can only conclude I didnt really watch every single episode in the 9 year time frame detailed above or have blanked most of them from memory...

still compulsive viewing though...

[David Agnew]

TOTP on BBC4

Boston Tea Party is one hell of a grower.

dalliance wrote:

I don't think TOTP in 76 reflected what young people listened to, either the music I've described, or the "hairy" crowd who were catered to by the OGWT.

The charts back then were much more reflective of broader listening tastes than they are now though, avenues into other more challenging musical cultures for kids were fairly restricted to the likes of John Peel.

We think of this period as the lull between prog and punk but neither of genres were hugely commercially successful. I think we are all viewing these TOTPs as a quirky novelty show about to get blown away by punk and new wave, but as TOTP is essentially a reactive programme that plays stuff based upon it having achieved a certain commercial mass first then I reckon we will be disappointed.

Only at this point, it really wasn't. In the pop video and on era, the Top of the Pops criteria was easy enough. They played the number one (unless it was banned) and the highest placed records in the charts that were new entries, or had gone up, and weren't on last weeks show. Record Mirror used to list the top 100, with icons showing who was going to be on TOTP. It was rare that a record outside the top 30 got on TOTP after videos became commonplace, and until Ric Blaxill introduced the notion of previewing unreleased tracks in 1995 (so they could beat The Chart Show to video exclusives), they only had one track in about fifteen years on the show, which wasn't in the top 40 (Northside's "Take 5", at 41 the week it was shown).

However, in 1976, it was a whole load different. With so many acts from abroad (from Europe, as well as the US), and a lot of one hit wonders perhaps being unprepared for their success (as well as the charts being announced the day before TOTP was recorded) seriously limited who they could show. This week, we have The Real Thing (1), Candi Staton (2), Elton John & Kiki Dee (9), SAHB (16), Champs Boys (41 - the one with Ruby Flipper in the Blue Peter garden, with most of them dressesd as generic dancers, with one sterotypical Arab Prince) and Billy Ocean (50) with Dorothy Moore (13) being half-played at the end. 5000 Volts' Doctor Kiss Kiss (with the most staggeringly unerotic baking band blowing into a pipe and trying to look sexy while Tina Charles is singing "Doctor Kiss Kiss") isn't even in the Top 50, and wouldn't make it for a another fortnight.

And this week's line up seems quite chart-friendly. There have been weeks where 2/3 tracks have been outside the Top 50 when on the show, and wouldn't make it even with TOTP's backing.

[Come along, Min]

TOTP on BBC4

Usual mix of the good bad and the weird tonight.

Kiki Dee in pink dungarees.

[Come along, Min]

TOTP on BBC4

@David Agnew

[laverte]

TOTP on BBC4

I was afraid that Sutherland Brothers song was never going to end. I was on the verge of calling British Rail to complain.

Tony Blackburn gives me the creeps. Alex Harvey gives me the shivers. That fellow from 5000 Volts with the mouth instrument made me feel a little sick. An unsettling week.

The interval between Philly soul and disco seems to have been quite fertile for black British music: The Real Thing, Billy Ocean, Hot Chocolate…. I had no idea that Ocean was around in the mid-70s. What an unusual career he had.

Young hearts run free used to be my karaoke song. I wish I'd performed it dressed in beads and blue jeans. The performance was bland, but I dig Candi Staton anyway.

The Ruby Flipper routine reminded me of the film Together, maybe mixed with a bit of The Idiots. And Tommy Seebach.

[N est ŕ?]

TOTP on BBC4

I was wondering how Tony Blackburn would respond to Diddy David Hamilton's 'personal library' zing from last week. Could he deliver? Yes he could- introducing Boston Tea Party, "that's 200 years ago-almost as old as David Hamilton!" Ha! Burn!

[Mumpo]

TOTP on BBC4

David Agnew wrote:

It was rare that a record outside the top 30 got on TOTP after videos became commonplace, and until Ric Blaxill introduced the notion of previewing unreleased tracks in 1995 (so they could beat The Chart Show to video exclusives), they only had one track in about fifteen years on the show, which wasn't in the top 40 (Northside's "Take 5", at 41 the week it was shown)

I can remember Mick Jagger's performance of his solo single Let's Work in the TOTP studio in the late 80's - it was an elaborate event involving a troupe of performance school kids and several stages that evidently took some rehearsing; and so, when the song limped into the charts outside the top 40, pulling the whole extravagant affair was not an option.

[N.B. That's all off the top of my head]

[Mumpo]

TOTP on BBC4

Also, don't know if it's been mentioned on this thread, but aparrently there are eight TOTP shows from the latter half of 1976 missing from the archive, which is why these BBC4 repeats have an occcasional week off.

[dalliance]

TOTP on BBC4

However, in 1976, it was a whole load different. With so many acts from abroad (from Europe, as well as the US), and a lot of one hit wonders perhaps being unprepared for their success (as well as the charts being announced the day before TOTP was recorded) seriously limited who they could show. This week, we have The Real Thing (1), Candi Staton (2), Elton John & Kiki Dee (9), SAHB (16), Champs Boys (41 - the one with Ruby Flipper in the Blue Peter garden, with most of them dressesd as generic dancers, with one sterotypical Arab Prince) and Billy Ocean (50) with Dorothy Moore (13) being half-played at the end. 5000 Volts' Doctor Kiss Kiss (with the most staggeringly unerotic baking band blowing into a pipe and trying to look sexy while Tina Charles is singing "Doctor Kiss Kiss") isn't even in the Top 50, and wouldn't make it for a another fortnight.

Fair enough. I think what you have described above is perhaps masked from most people due to the way they dump the whole Top 30 on you right at the beginning at a rate of knots way in excess of anyone's ability to remember much from it.

It's easy to assume everything that comes after it is from that same Top 30, the DJs are not always specific about chart numbers during their links and they are not that explicit in saying this is a new release bubbling under the charts.

[David Agnew]

TOTP on BBC4

Mumpo wrote:

David Agnew wrote:

It was rare that a record outside the top 30 got on TOTP after videos became commonplace, and until Ric Blaxill introduced the notion of previewing unreleased tracks in 1995 (so they could beat The Chart Show to video exclusives), they only had one track in about fifteen years on the show, which wasn't in the top 40 (Northside's "Take 5", at 41 the week it was shown)

I can remember Mick Jagger's performance of his solo single Let's Work in the TOTP studio in the late 80's - it was an elaborate event involving a troupe of performance school kids and several stages that evidently took some rehearsing; and so, when the song limped into the charts outside the top 40, pulling the whole extravagant affair was not an option.

[N.B. That's all off the top of my head]

Let's Work limped it's way to number 31 off the back of that performance (it may even have gone down as a result, in what TOTP knowalls may call the New Order or Kirsty MacColl effect). Making it Jagger's biggest solo hit at the time, after Memo From Turner and Just Another Night (me, neither) both scraped themselves up to the dizzy heights of number 32.

N.B. Only the bit about Let's Work was off the top of my head, the rest I used Chart Stats for.