[Poddy77]

Rio Duran Duran, total 80's excess

[dead_wing]

Hi all my first post since joining today, good to be here.

Like many here, TOTP was a hugely important part of my growing up. When these 1978 shows were first screened I was just 6. Every time I hear this stuff the memories come flooding back... its funny but I can remember being at my Grandma's house watching the episode with Kate Bush Wuthering Heights and Sweet singing Love is like Oxygen as if it were yesterday.

Unfortunately I've missed most of these reruns as I now live in New Zealand and had got out of the habit of browsing the BBC iplayer website until recently, so I have quickly got myself a UK proxy so I don't miss out in future.... and I've grabbed all the full episodes from 1977 that I could from Youtube

[Robbie01]

Welcome dead_wing!

Unfortunately there's no Top Of The Pops this week, once a month BBC Four screens 'The Sky At Night' in place of TOTP, which is a bit annoying. On the other hand it does give you more time to catch up with some of those 1977 episodes!

[dead_wing]

Thanks Robbie, I had wondered why I couldn't see an episode listed for this week.... yes heaps of time, especially since I've just had sinus surgery (ouch) and will be off work for the next week or so .... still, its enabled me to find out all about the TOTP reruns. All very exciting!!!

[UrsulaU]

Originally Posted by dead_wing

Hi all my first post since joining today, good to be here.

Like many here, TOTP was a hugely important part of my growing up. When these 1978 shows were first screened I was just 6. Every time I hear this stuff the memories come flooding back... :

Hi Deadwing - Yeah I was just abit older than you (8) in 1978 and was just getting into music regularly back then!

The late 70s was definitely a great time for great bands/artists - and I think we are really lucky to be part of it growing up - even though we were only small!

[starry]

Originally Posted by ramraider1

Agree with your 'Embarrassment' opinion. One of Madness' best songs.

I also like Will you ?

But regarding Baker Street - although I did not particularly like the single , the rest of the 'City to City' album is really good and I bought it. Great track called 'Home and Dry' on it.

For me his best songs are Baker Street, Night Owl, Get it Right Next Time and Whatever's Written in Your Heart.

[dead_wing]

Originally Posted by UrsulaU

Hi Deadwing - Yeah I was just abit older than you (8) in 1978 and was just getting into music regularly back then!

The late 70s was definitely a great time for great bands/artists - and I think we are really lucky to be part of it growing up - even though we were only small!

Hi Ursula, yeah I couldn't agree more... for me the whole era from 1978-81 was great, 82-84 still quite good, but by the late 80s, ... well I actually feel sorry for younger people that they didn't get to experience it, not to be patronising or anything of course

[dead_wing]

I've often wondered the only way it could have been better is to have been a teenager back then... on the other hand maybe some of the magic from this music comes from being at such a formative age when it came out...

[Servalan]

Originally Posted by dead_wing

I've often wondered the only way it could have been better is to have been a teenager back then... on the other hand maybe some of the magic from this music comes from being at such a formative age when it came out...

I think it's fair to say that everybody will have songs and/or artists that help define their formative years - and I wouldn't want to take that away from them.

However ...

I was in my teens in 1978 and, as many on here have already testified, it was a genuinely exciting time - not just because of certain songs or artists, but also because of the diversity and creativity on display. Disco, punk/new wave, the rise of electronic music, reggae, heavy rock, plus 2Tone and hip hop just around the corner. I don't think any other era quite has as much musical activity - activity the music industry struggled to keep up with, which made it harder for them to mould and manufacture acts. Artists weren't afraid to challenge their record companies' authority and, for the most part, were proved to be right.

Not to dismiss other eras - but I count myself fortunate to have been in the middle of that musical maelstrom at the time. The fact that so many of the artists from that era were able to sustain meaningful careers and/or leave legacies speaks volumes - a stark contrast to today's singles chart. And I wish I didn't have to say that ...

[SgtRock]

Originally Posted by Servalan

I think it's fair to say that everybody will have songs and/or artists that help define their formative years - and I wouldn't want to take that away from them.

However ...

I was in my teens in 1978 and, as many on here have already testified, it was a genuinely exciting time - not just because of certain songs or artists, but also because of the diversity and creativity on display. Disco, punk/new wave, the rise of electronic music, reggae, heavy rock, plus 2Tone and hip hop just around the corner. I don't think any other era quite has as much musical activity - activity the music industry struggled to keep up with, which made it harder for them to mould and manufacture acts. Artists weren't afraid to challenge their record companies' authority and, for the most part, were proved to be right.

Not to dismiss other eras - but I count myself fortunate to have been in the middle of that musical maelstrom at the time. The fact that so many of the artists from that era were able to sustain meaningful careers and/or leave legacies speaks volumes - a stark contrast to today's singles chart. And I wish I didn't have to say that ...

I turned 13 late in 1978 - although I was avidly following and taping the charts in 78, it wasn't until the following year that I started buying albums on a regular basis. I can't think of any period of music that I would rather have grown up in than the glory days of 1978-84!

[Zeus555]

Originally Posted by highlander1969

Some great stats there Zeus. I'm also a big fan of Sweet.
It's sad but nice to see their final TOTP's performance and a Top 10 hit with 'Love Is Like Oxygen'. It's my fave Sweet single along with 'Fox(y) On The Run'!
I heard somewhere that Fox On The Run was not only No.1 in Australia but the biggest seller of 1975 down under!

Sweet's No.1 Hits in Germany were:,

1) Co-Co - 8 Weeks
2) Little Willy - 1 Week
3) Wig-Wam Bam - 8 Weeks
4) Blockbuster - 4 Weeks
5) Hell Raiser - 2 Weeks
6) Ballroom Blitz: - 1 Week
7) Teenage Rampage - 7 Weeks
8) Fox On The Run - 6 Weeks

And they also had German Top 10 Hits, that were not
Top 10 in the UK. (UK Peak in Brackets).

Funny Funny - No.5 (1971) (No.13)
Poppa Joe - No.3 (1972) (No.11)
Turn It Down - No.4 (1974) (No.41)
Action - No.2 (1975) (No.15)
The Lies In Your Eyes - No.5 (1976) (No.35)
Fever Of Love - No.9 (1977) (Did not Chart in UK)

We liked 'Love Is Like Oxygen', (1978), slightly more than
Germany. It reached No.9 here, & No.10 in Germany.

'Fox On The Run' was Australia's Best Seller of 1975. It
was No.1 for 6 Weeks.

[Nick G]

The bottom line for Sweet will forever be 'Blockbuster', one of the great glam singles and a wonderful tonic after two of the worst number ones of all time.

[dead_wing]

Another thing I've enjoyed as a result of the repeats is revisting the weekly charts beyond the top 30 that TOTP featured. I thought I knew the music of this era pretty well already in relation to the charts, but looking beyond the top 30 (down to 40 and lower), there are so many that didn't "quite" make it, both bands I've never heard of and songs that I know well but thought "no WAY was that a single!"

[Torch81]

Originally Posted by Zeus555

Sweet's No.1 Hits in Germany were:,

1) Co-Co - 8 Weeks
2) Little Willy - 1 Week
3) Wig-Wam Bam - 8 Weeks
4) Blockbuster - 4 Weeks
5) Hell Raiser - 2 Weeks
6) Ballroom Blitz: - 1 Week
7) Teenage Rampage - 7 Weeks
8) Fox On The Run - 6 Weeks

And they also had German Top 10 Hits, that were not
Top 10 in the UK. (UK Peak in Brackets).

Funny Funny - No.5 (1971) (No.13)
Poppa Joe - No.3 (1972) (No.11)
Turn It Down - No.4 (1974) (No.41)
Action - No.2 (1975) (No.15)
The Lies In Your Eyes - No.5 (1976) (No.35)
Fever Of Love - No.9 (1977) (Did not Chart in UK)

We liked 'Love Is Like Oxygen', (1978), slightly more than
Germany. It reached No.9 here, & No.10 in Germany.

'Fox On The Run' was Australia's Best Seller of 1975. It
was No.1 for 6 Weeks.

Fascinating stats, thank you very much for that! Ballroom Blitz only 1 week at No. 1 in Germany?? Shocked, was on their best songs surely!

Out of interest and in case you know, how did Sweet's 'contemporaries' fair in markets like Germany? Slade, Bolan, Quatro, Glitter for example? Were they as big? (I believe the answers "no" in terms of the States and that Sweet out performed them all over there, but I've no knowledge about Europe). Would be fascinated to know.

[mal2pool]

Originally Posted by Servalan

I think it's fair to say that everybody will have songs and/or artists that help define their formative years - and I wouldn't want to take that away from them.

However ...

I was in my teens in 1978 and, as many on here have already testified, it was a genuinely exciting time - not just because of certain songs or artists, but also because of the diversity and creativity on display. Disco, punk/new wave, the rise of electronic music, reggae, heavy rock, plus 2Tone and hip hop just around the corner. I don't think any other era quite has as much musical activity - activity the music industry struggled to keep up with, which made it harder for them to mould and manufacture acts. Artists weren't afraid to challenge their record companies' authority and, for the most part, were proved to be right.

Not to dismiss other eras - but I count myself fortunate to have been in the middle of that musical maelstrom at the time. The fact that so many of the artists from that era were able to sustain meaningful careers and/or leave legacies speaks volumes - a stark contrast to today's singles chart. And I wish I didn't have to say that ...

Dont you think it all happened too quick. There was a new music style around the corner . Maybe if it was spread out a bit. Punk really woke people up but it seemed to die out, then new wave didnt last much longer, then new romantics. Reggae didnt last much unless you count UB40 (great band). Two Tone only lasted a couple of years. So many styles in one short space.

[Servalan]

Originally Posted by mal2pool

Dont you think it all happened too quick. There was a new music style around the corner . Maybe if it was spread out a bit. Punk really woke people up but it seemed to die out, then new wave didnt last much longer, then new romantics. Reggae didnt last much unless you count UB40 (great band). Two Tone only lasted a couple of years. So many styles in one short space.

It was exciting because all those styles bounced off one another. Punk didn't die out - it evolved. Yes, there may have been groups who fizzled out after a year or so, but many others didn't. Similarly, the new romantics evolved - by 1983, when Spandau Ballet and Duran Duran were scoring number one singles, the original scene had been forgotten. Similarly, Depeche Mode, who came up through that scene, were on their way to becoming an international success. And 2Tone also grew, with some groups inevitably fading away, but Madness growing in confidence and the Specials splintering into the Special AKA and Funboy Three.

As for reggae - it never died. Bob Marley sold records by the bucketload after his death and Aswad scored a number one.

Most importantly, those genres that grew and developed pretty much all felt organic and genuine - they weren't constructed by some cynical record company executive with eyes only for their balance sheet.

[Zeus555]

Originally Posted by Torch81

Fascinating stats, thank you very much for that! Ballroom Blitz only 1 week at No. 1 in Germany?? Shocked, was on their best songs surely!

Out of interest and in case you know, how did Sweet's 'contemporaries' fair in markets like Germany? Slade, Bolan, Quatro, Glitter for example? Were they as big? (I believe the answers "no" in terms of the States and that Sweet out performed them all over there, but I've no knowledge about Europe). Would be fascinated to know.

As this is a Top Of The Pops Thread, please read what
I've said in the German Chart Site Thread, that I've just
created, & save the Link in it to your 'Favourites'.

(The Thread is in the Music Forum)

[chemical2009b]

If DLT is still not cleared for months at least, this means BBC Four would have less episodes to show than the number of weeks remaining on the calendar. They could rest it during the Proms to avoid the need to move it to Wednesdays.

[Zimbo78]

Originally Posted by doom&gloom

I don't think there are many songs improved by saxophones, there's a lot more that would be better without them.

Careless Whisper is another good one.

Us and Them by Pink Floyd is an exceptional song. Most Madness songs are excellent too, check out the sax in Yesterdays Men.

[Eraserhead]

Originally Posted by SgtRock

I turned 13 late in 1978 - although I was avidly following and taping the charts in 78, it wasn't until the following year that I started buying albums on a regular basis. I can't think of any period of music that I would rather have grown up in than the glory days of 1978-84!

I agree that for me as well it was a fantastic period to be just in that age where you're discovering pop music.

However, my mum turned 18 right at the birth of rock and roll in the mid 50s and that must also have been an incredibly exciting time (as I have repeatedly been told!) She got to witness not only that but the explosion of rock and pop music in the Sixties (although she was in her mid-20s by then) and it must have been amazing to live through the beat groups of the early 60s to the follk and hippy movements to r'n'b and heavy rock to psychedelia to prog rock at the end of the decade.

Even so I do still feel privileged to have lived through disco, punk, new wave, electronica etc. during an incredibly fertile and diverse period of pop music history.

And I do feel sorry for kids now who over the last decade have had little to get genuinely excited about - X Factor songs, modern r'n'b, boy bands and girl bands, indie groups endlessly rehashing the past (folk-rock, post-punk etc.). The biggest star of recent times is a woman who sings mildly entertaining heartbreak ballads. Depressing.

[faversham saint]

Originally Posted by Eraserhead

I agree that for me as well it was a fantastic period to be just in that age where you're discovering pop music.

However, my mum turned 18 right at the birth of rock and roll in the mid 50s and that must also have been an incredibly exciting time (as I have repeatedly been told!) She got to witness not only that but the explosion of rock and pop music in the Sixties (although she was in her mid-20s by then) and it must have been amazing to live through the beat groups of the early 60s to the follk and hippy movements to r'n'b and heavy rock to psychedelia to prog rock at the end of the decade.

Even so I do still feel privileged to have lived through disco, punk, new wave, electronica etc. during an incredibly fertile and diverse period of pop music history.

BIB - looking at it objectively, anyone who was not around to experience the 1960s or the early 1970s first-hand is not ideally placed to pronounce with authority that a later period they themselves lived through was the best for music (or indeed TOTP because the BBC have destroyed the evidence ).

In 1985 Channel 4 screened the surviving footage from 'Ready Steady Go!' which featured studio performances (some live) by inter alia the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Beach Boys, Lulu, Dusty Springfield and Motown acts like the Supremes and Martha & The Vandellas etc. and it looked very fresh and exciting, even though it was in black and white. I suspect people who were in their teens and early twenties during the sixties beat boom might look down their noses at TOTP 1978.

[Frood]

Originally Posted by Eraserhead

I agree that for me as well it was a fantastic period to be just in that age where you're discovering pop music.

However, my mum turned 18 right at the birth of rock and roll in the mid 50s and that must also have been an incredibly exciting time (as I have repeatedly been told!) She got to witness not only that but the explosion of rock and pop music in the Sixties (although she was in her mid-20s by then) and it must have been amazing to live through the beat groups of the early 60s to the follk and hippy movements to r'n'b and heavy rock to psychedelia to prog rock at the end of the decade.

Even so I do still feel privileged to have lived through disco, punk, new wave, electronica etc. during an incredibly fertile and diverse period of pop music history.

And I do feel sorry for kids now who over the last decade have had little to get genuinely excited about - X Factor songs, modern r'n'b, boy bands and girl bands, indie groups endlessly rehashing the past (folk-rock, post-punk etc.). The biggest star of recent times is a woman who sings mildly entertaining heartbreak ballads. Depressing.

I think the best periods were from 1966-70 and 1978-81.

I was too young to really appreciate the former but perfect age for the latter.

The first period had such a fine range from pop like The Kinks and The Small Faces to proper rock from The Rolling Stones and The Who. There was the 'experimental' groups with Pink Floyd to the fore. From the US the West Coast sound was at its peak and the more folk style sound, led by Dylan and including The Mamas and the Papas, stood with it. Sly and the Family Stone, Marvin Gaye, Joan Baez and Janis Joplin reflected the political momentums of the time whilst The Doors provided something altogether darker and heavier. This was all crowned by the marvellous Soul music.

Oh,and the UK had a thriving Blues and (proper) Rhythm and Blues scene.

The late 70s had punk which allowed the largely superior new wave to come in without upsetting the oldies. Everything from The Jam to Ian Dury and the serious beginnings of undertanding reggae, in part through the "Two Tone" Bands made this a far more interesting and imaginative time than the mid 90s with lame "up their own arse" so called 'Britpop' and The Spice Girls. The US was generally quieter but the often overlooked musicality of Disco had enough worthy moments.

From 81 the "New Romantic" stuff came in and the fashions started to become more important than the music (satirically summed up beautifully by the Not the Nine O'Clock News team with "Nice Video, Shame About the Song"). culminating in the awful, cookie cutter, marketed stuff of SAW

[faversham saint]

Originally Posted by Frood

The late 70s had punk which allowed the largely superior new wave to come in without upsetting the oldies. Everything from The Jam to Ian Dury and the serious beginnings of undertanding reggae, in part through the "Two Tone" Bands made this a far more interesting and imaginative time than the mid 90s with lame "up their own arse" so called 'Britpop' and The Spice Girls

BIB - I prefer the Beatles unrecycled

[Frood]

Originally Posted by faversham saint

BIB - I prefer the Beatles unrecycled

They were up their own arses as well!

[starry]

Originally Posted by Frood

The first period had such a fine range from pop like The Kinks
From 81 the "New Romantic" stuff came in and the fashions started to become more important than the music (satirically summed up beautifully by the Not the Nine O'Clock News team with "Nice Video, Shame About the Song"). culminating in the awful, cookie cutter, marketed stuff of SAW

To equate New Romantics with SAW I think isn't really that accurate. Better to equate new romantics as a branch off from new wave. New Romantics did have decent musicians and not soap opera stars made into singers.

Originally Posted by faversham saint

BIB - looking at it objectively, anyone who was not around to experience the 1960s or the early 1970s first-hand is not ideally placed to pronounce with authority that a later period they themselves lived through was the best for music

Except that there is more music of the past readily available to people than ever before, so it is probably easier (for those with the time and inclination) to look through earlier music periods in detail.