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    The episode 22.11.90 was the same date Thatcher resigned.

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      Originally posted by Satchmo Distel View Post
      The episode 22.11.90 was the same date Thatcher resigned.
      My first thought when I saw that date. Remember it well. I crashed my car that day, so it was "win some, lose some".

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        i recorded a whole load of these and have started watching them back. i'm weeks behind so will also be trailing the zeitgeist, but it's 5:44pm, Diane, and i feel like talking into a machine anyway.

        i remember being annoyed at the time when 'Bruno' Brookes described Wash your face in my sink as "the novelty record of the summer". Rewatching the episode has annoyed me all over again. Not only has he mistaken lightness of tone and, i think, moments of real wit for "novelty", but there's a flipping ninja turtles record in the chart and we are days away from the release of Itsy bitsy, which he has been promoting on his radio show (admittedly giving us a respite from painful banter with Liz Kershaw). Hard to accept that Trevor is only 30 years old at this point, and heading home to beat up Anthea Turner.

        On a happier note, i loved everything about Caron Wheeler's performance of Livin in the light, from the live vocal to the look and the routine, and of course the song itself, with its poised lyric that hasn't dated at all. Post Soul II Soul, Black British music was enjoying an exciting, fertile stretch that has never been properly appreciated. And on that note, why didn't Monie Love become a star in her home land? She had everything. Queen Latifah saw it.

        Football was having a moment in 1990, wasn't it? Maybe that Pop Will Eat Itself world cup song would have sounded better in a club. The frontmen looked completely lost. My sense is that indie rock needed football more than the other way around – which brings me to Groovy train. i'd forgotten it was a "woman, i don't approve of you" song. The lyrics are, frankly, not good, but whatever is represented by the groovy train that the lassie has gotten onto sounds a lot more appealing than the oddly bitter attitude of these unfunky blokes in their dadwear, who are able to project a set of values onto her just from the way she styles herself and flicks her hair. Disdain for anyone who tries to better themselves is a bit of a feature of the era isn't it? Yuppies were shit, but too many of us struggled to understand that aspiration in itself was not the cause of the problem.

        From the summer onwards, you get a keen sense that, for the Madchester / baggy / indie-dance scene, the next Happy Mondays album (or international football tournament) couldn't come quickly enough.

        Another thing i haven't gotten over is the outcome of Dee-Lite v the Dave Geezer Band: a travesty almost on a par with the Night of Seville. No words can describe how much i dislike The joker. It has even managed to acquire a Trumpy undertone, with its self-mythologising braggadocio ("some people call me the least racist person") and idle misogyny, and the lilywhite audience in the video doesn't help. The whole thing seems to be generated from Dave's discovery that he could make a wolf-whistle with his guitar. Wip fucking woo. i'm quite sure neither he nor his fans will be showing anyone a good time. i seriously prefer Stiltskin, and Babylon Zoo.

        It's remarkable how the acts responsible for the two big, enduring dance tracks of the year, Killer and Groove is in the heart, couldn't produce a follow-up worth a damn (fine cup of Joe).

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          I'm not entirely sure that The Farm weren't an elaborate hoax. They had a reputation as sharp witted arbiters of taste and cool, largely based upon their '80s fanzine, that bore no relation to the pedestrian and unstylish reality that presented itself when they broke into the mainstream.

          The football casual obsession with clothes was (and still is) largely played out within a very safe and conservative template. Your mates might not have been as impressed as you hoped by your trainers and anorak but strangers were unlikely to attack you in the street for wearing them.

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            I mentioned on the very first page of this thread that I had about a hundred episodes of this. It's about 720, now.

            I think 1990 was about the point that I really started *give up* on pop. I mean, my interest had been diminishing for years (probably mostly by what felt like a relentless slew of Stock, Aitken & Waterman), but I really severed those links by about the end of that year.

            I looked at these bands and just kind of thought, "Wait, what?", and skewed heavily towards 'indie' and American post-punk (SST records, that sort of thing). I should have smartened myself up. I was a proper scruff for a few years.

            But I stuck with TOTP until about 1998, out of habit. I drifted away from it as I got older. By my mid-20s, I was out. And I wouldn't be in if they brought it back, because it wouldn't be for me. It should be for people my age to not understand.
            ​​​​​​
            And in any case, I've got 720 old episodes to wade through.

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              That's only ten weeks worth, if you watch 9 to 5 with a half hour for lunch.

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                Gotta factor in the six months recuperation time from the subesquent Simon Bates hallucinations, too.

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                  I know some of them were initially left-wing activists, but I have to say that I don't recall The Farm as ever having been 'sharp-witted arbiters of taste and cool'. I guess it was a Liverpool thing.

                  During their six months or so in the baggy limelight, I can remember Peel saying how much he was enjoying seeing Peter Hooton's wan features gawping at him from the front cover of Smash Hits and the like.

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                    Two testing episodes this week. The Campbell fronted first instalment was something of a rollercoaster ride, featuring Being Boring and Wicked Game but with Timmy Mallett's Bombalurina only the third worst ordeal of the remainder. Kinky Boots is just unspeakable and, despite being fashioned from a number of excellent stand alone singles, the Megabass megamix was reductive and pointless. I quite like Ice, Ice Baby, despite the absurdity of Vanilla Ice.

                    The second show was just poor, with Saviour's Day and Altogether Now ramping up the Christmas factor. The direction of Saviour's Day proved that when filming a flautist, it is best to focus upon the finger work rather than the blowing. Without being appreciably better than in the appearance slated upthread, The Farm were still vying for the episode highlight title until Betty Boo's entertaining 24 Hours video appeared on the run out. Time confirms Justify My Love to be less compelling than the unadorned Public Enemy rhythm track that it is built upon. Impressive floor shagging from Vanilla Ice and crew in the studio.

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                      I wonder if 'Vogue' was Madonna's last very good single until 'Ray Of Light', a gap of 8 years (meaning the latter was really a comeback)? I can't recall the melodies of any of her singles post-2000 except 'Hung Up', which is essentially an Abba tune (although I'd stopped paying attention so it might be an unfair measure).
                      Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 18-04-2021, 13:20.

                      Comment


                        Originally posted by Satchmo Distel View Post
                        I wonder if 'Vogue' was Madonna's last very good single until 'Ray Of Light', a gap of 8 years (meaning the latter was really a comeback)? .
                        She still had plenty of US and UK top ten singles between Vogue and Ray of Light (and of course Frozen came just before Ray of Light and signalled that William Orbit direction of the upcoming album) - I wouldn't comment too much on the quality of the hits in those years but she certainly wasn't in the wilderness commercially.

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                          Originally posted by Benjm View Post
                          Two testing episodes this week...... Impressive floor shagging from Vanilla Ice and crew in the studio.
                          I did the last four in one go and did a lot of fast forwarding...Vanilla Ice is a dick but his live vocal appearance was probably the stand out performance of the ones I actually watched.

                          Cubik by 808 State was one of the least likely top 10 singles even by the standards of that era, but there wasn't a lot they could do with it performance wise. In a parallel universe Legs and Co didn't get the boot in the early 80s and hung around long enough to have to interpret that hit - and/or with the BBC Orchestra re-recording it due to Musicians Union rules.

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                            Ha I did enjoy the total shambles that was that 808 State performance, I'll always take that over the random dancing girls in hotpants so beloved of TOTP producers

                            Originally posted by Benjm View Post
                            despite being fashioned from a number of excellent stand alone singles, the Megabass megamix was reductive and pointless.
                            Nice that one of the records in the megamix is the Technotronic megamix - classic megamix mise en abyme right there

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                              Originally posted by Fussbudget View Post
                              Nice that one of the records in the megamix is the Technotronic megamix - classic megamix mise en abyme right there
                              Good lord, they really have gone down the (Jive) Bunny hole there.

                              To this day, the creators have kept the megamix equivalent of a sourdough starter fermenting away in their basement, occasionally adding a bar or two of new music to sustain it.

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                                Originally posted by Walt Flanagans Dog View Post
                                She still had plenty of US and UK top ten singles between Vogue and Ray of Light (and of course Frozen came just before Ray of Light and signalled that William Orbit direction of the upcoming album) - I wouldn't comment too much on the quality of the hits in those years but she certainly wasn't in the wilderness commercially.
                                Satchmo's obviously commenting on the artistic merit of Madonna's output in that time, and I'd by-and-large agree with him - although I did quite like Justify My Love and found myself half-singing tunes like Deeper and Deeper during the early nineties.

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                                  I had a look at the discography and the pickings are pretty slim compared to the period covered by The Immaculate Collection, but then her run through the '80s was exceptional.

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                                    I like Justify My Love. I also enjoyed the episode having to show a video cobbled together from clips from Lucky Star, Vogue and Cherish as the original video got banned (there was a right fuss about that at the time wasn't there?) But, yeah, then it's pretty thin stuff by her wider standards through to Ray of Light. The Sex-n-Evita era, really.

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                                      It was sometime during that period that I bought a copy of Vanity Fair with a Madonna cover from John Menzies in Walsall and the till worker put it into a plain paper bag, making sure that the rest of the queue saw what she was doing.

                                      I felt like taking it out and going along the line to show everyone Dominick Dunne's latest 10,000 word expose of a minor Kennedy's law troubles but made for the exit instead.

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                                        https://www.theguardian.com/music/20...pops-nostalgia

                                        In the comments:

                                        JohnBarnesOnToast
                                        12 hours ago
                                        1


                                        With any discussion of TOTP I am compelled to point people in the direction of Chart Music podcast.
                                        It’s a forensic and unfiltered dissection of individual episodes of TOTP which digresses into all aspects of popular and political culture of the times.

                                        It took a few episodes to find its feet but is now a thing of wonder, especially when the right balance of pundits are aboard.

                                        Contains very strong language.

                                        StandAtlantic
                                        16 hours ago



                                        I’m guessing most people reading the comments are big fans of the show. I can highly recommend the podcast Chart Music which has a number of former Melody Maker writers dissecting a random episode. Of all the podcasts I’ve listened to over the last 15 years I can honestly say it’s consistently the funniest. Check it out!


                                        Last edited by Sporting; 01-05-2021, 08:29.

                                        Comment


                                          If I had to create a mental image of Trisha's nan, she'd look very much like Dimples D.

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                                            Another odd mix in the last couple of episodes. You could look at it and think pop had ate itself, with the presence of Unchained Melody, the Quo waltz, Jive Bunny, the Grease Megamix and Crazy (Cline), but on the other hand there are some absolute pop behemoths - Wicked Game, Ice Ice Baby and Crazy (Seal) which we probably wouldn't have expected at the time would still be radio regulars 30 years later.

                                            And on Ice Ice Baby, what was going on with the presenters getting their head round the situation? Mayo went for "it's Ice Ice Baby, with VANILLA ICE" while. Brookes went for "they are still number one, here they are, Vanilla Ice"

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                                              Is there a suggestion here that Van Winkelen’s entourage shared his stage name as a whole?

                                              Quick, fire up that other thread from a couple of weeks back!

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                                                I varied the old music telly diet yesterday and watched Guy Garvey: From The Archives on Sky Arts. I'd noticed it in the listings before but never checked it out, due to a perhaps unfair preconception that GG's broadcasting sidelines might be as soporific as his own music. Anyway, it turned out to be great. It's basically just a clips show that casts the net wider than usual to round up footage from late night, regional and less well remembered shows (The Other Side of Midnight, Night Network, Wired, etc). This episode focussed on 1988, pretty much the nostalgia bullseye for me, and featured Happy Mondays, The Wedding Present, The Fall, Public Enemy, Run DMC and assorted other goodies. Garvey supplied an enthusiastic enough to be engaging voiceover.

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                                                  Yes, it's a TV highlight of the week for me. Elbow are Satan's cock sucking songwriters extraordinaire, but Garvey is a good broadcaster with a generational taste in music that will appeal to many others of a similar age.

                                                  I loved the interview with Dave Gedge on the big leather armchair, full of arrogance not to far removed from Noel Gallagher's schtick a decade later. I vaguely recall the Public Enemy clip, but hadn't seen it in a very long time.

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                                                    I've been watching it since it started, I've got three episodes taped and waiting to be watched. Very entertaining.

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