It's from a time many, many years ago when I free-styled a version of the song, with that as the main theme. Asda should definitely look it using it.

In much the same way as some Bookies chain should have a character called 'Bet It Lee' and use the Beatles track with switched lyrics. And a female version called 'Back Betty'.

Yes quite...

BIB - but that's precisely the problem: which acts? Which acts came to the fore (i.e. for the first time) during that period that either still continue today or have any lasting legacy? Where is the equivalent of David Bowie, Prince, Kate Bush or Stevie Wonder (for instance) from that era?

The peak of SAW/PWL coincided with the music industry starting to become obsessed with profit above everything else. The 90s were probably the last decade in which innovation was in any way championed in the mainstream and post-2000, it has become harder for new artists offering anything different or original to be heard, because of the Cowell-fuelled obsession with short-term profit and a growing aversion to risk-taking.

Exactly!

'they're a lament for a lack of diversity and risk-taking'

There is still diversity out there, but we don't get to hear it now.

Back in the day, Radio One & TOTP were about it, and they played pretty much everything, as a consequence you got a lot more genres hitting the charts and we were exposed to many different types of music.

Now, everything is delivered through dedicated channels. Classic Rock, dance, indie, 80's, RnB, Grime etc. All have their own tv channels and radio stations. There is little or no crossover.

Again, what's that got to do with SAW or Cowell??

But acts that came to the fore during the SAW period included Prince himself, Madonna, Kylie, Springsteen's career really took off in the UK (he had his most successful singles period), Wonder had his only solo UK Number 1. Not sure that Kate Bush is a very good example on your list, she's hardly been prolific over the years.

Stock, Aitken and Waterman's peak period i would say was between 1987 and 1990, and with the exception of Kylie, who is a SAW act anyway, all those others you mentioned came to the fore way before, and with Stevie you may actually be going back to the early sixties! Not everything SAW did was truly bad, and the odd song like Princess' "Say I'm Your Number One" may even have been inspiring in its own way. However, once their sound became more or less formulaic and fixed, when they had found what worked best in terms of success, i really do believe their influence on pop in general, had a much more negative impact, than positive. There have been times at the end of the eighties, and into the nineties, where other sounds have had a look in, of course, like grunge and Brit Pop, but the possibilities inspired by SAW, have never faded, and into the new Millenium, and Pop Idol, and the era of Cowell, it is now possible to even make a packet by eliminating risk altogether, because the public now choose their own pop stars, before they even make a record. They have already been given the public's seal of approval, so to speak, and with all the publicity surrounding the programme, they really can't fail, initially. Of course, many of these acts careers have the potential to be short lived over the longer period, but Cowell and Co. have already lined their pockets by the time that happens. Some of those talent show winners, are reasonably talented, and are arguably better singers than the average pop stars of today. However, many do also lack an identity of their own. What Cowell offers them though is the same safe and sterile songs and production. I still think Will Young had a good voice, even though he doesn't sing in the way he did, when i originally liked him. He's another who has been made over, and not for the better, but his success has lasted became his talent still manages to shine through a little, despite it all.

I feel I'm banging my head against a brick wall here! One last try. Whatever you think of SAW and Cowell, their output in the history of pop has been absolutely tiny and it is ridiculous to blame them in anyway whatsoever for the current state of pop music. Even at their peak there was still more than enough room for other artists to come to the fore. What SAW did in the 80s was only a replica of what people like Berry Gordy and Phil Spector had already done in the 60s.

Neatly sidestepping the above arguments and returning to the subject of TOTP 1982...

Can't say that I'm looking forward to tonight's episode that much. Out of 10 songs, four I'm already thoroughly fed up with, two more that I don't particularly want to see, and another couple that have already been on multiple times. In fact, just wake me up when The Associates come on.

'Countdown Capers'

Top of the Pops 4th March 1982
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...-pops-04031982

Our head Zoo-keeper for this episode's enthralment is David 'How many more times-don't call me Kid' Jensen, who's immediately scuppered again by the Caption crew but valiantly leads us quickly and efficiently into Item 1 on the agenda.

Even more excitingly-it's LIVE!

(2) TONI BASIL – Mickey
The cheerleader outfit's bound to be a bit mucky after so many Mickey matinees, so Toni rightly puts it in the wash at BBC TV Centre, hopefully not together with the bananas in cardigans worn by the Jets as they don't look 'colour fast'.

Toni's substitute is a confectionery-inspired outfit based upon an Everton mint, but you'd struggle to say BAH! HUMBUG! to this catchiest of ditties & one of my guiltiest pleasures of the 1980's which may land me on Ursula's naughty step.

Chinn and/or Chapman had 'the Knack' of producing some annoyingly catchy & 'Racey' songs, this rampant piece of shouty power pop being no exception, and it's a delight from beginning to end.

As others have mentioned, the version used on the Pops did the track no favours & sounded more Dicky than Mickey, but I like Toni Basil's limitless energy and I always have a sly tap of the foot or singalong whenever it comes on, usually embrassingly in a traffic queue whilst gesticulating to other road users using hand signals you won't see in the Highway Code.

Her choreographic talent's not in doubt, but I think a great shame she didn't have a hit in the UK after “Mickey”, as some subsequent releases from her album “Word of Mouth” were more pop-rock orientated, with more than a hint of Benatar about them & should've had recognition in their own right. Examples below on the clickety's...

B-Side of Mickey “Hanging Around”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8yusuvDfO4

“Nobody”
https://youtu.be/iht4_NlLv-8?t=4

“Thief on the Loose”
https://youtu.be/XaJ8FkKTJh0?t=57

I seem to remember around this time Toni Basil had a TV special on BBC2 featuring her routines & inspirations, which I remember really enjoying, in some part due to being a 13-Year old teenager & finding Toni Basil, ahem, rather 'fetching' (cough)....

Balloon mayhem surrounds Toni with hand-jive evident in the crowd, slightly adjusted to keep Bob Holness on his toes & on this occasion Fairbrass lucked out, as permission for one-sided pushing with the artist has been revoked by Herr Hurll.

(35) GARY NUMAN – Music For Chameleons
A difficult act to follow after such an uptempo start, Gary struggles to regain the attention of the audience as they've got too giddy with the Mickey hand-jive. The scamps now seem more interested in popping balloons at inopportune moments than listening to the moody musings of a synth maestro, but their behaviour surprisingly seems to raise a titter with the normally po-faced Numanoid who soldiers on like a colour-fast Chameleon but with head attire that says "You Don't Want to do it like that".

The track itself involves a brooding intro, which gives way to a bit of mumbling here & there, and we're riding high with Gary to 10,000 feet before being brought straight back to Earth at an alarming rate with Gary's usual semi-incomprehensible vocals (subtitles essential), running out of fuel long before we get to the runway which is what happens when you top up a Cessna with only a tenner's worth.

Thankfully no harm done (apart from to the Cessna).
https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=166739

I like this Numan track due to it's unique backbeat & the album's half decent, but I think he'd lost his edge by this point & to a certain extent he was coasting & dining out on past glories.

On a more positive note the Chameleons were the lucky recipients of Karma the following Year and would 'come and go' Club Class with Culture Club & British Airways, which had a much better flight safety record.

As a footnote, it's believed the 'Music for Chameleons' label posed little competition to EMI's 'Music for Pleasure', as flawed market research suggested Chameleons' main leisure activity was listening to Gary Numan records, when of course their music of choice is Thin Lizard (sorry, couldn't resist)

(14) MADNESS – Cardiac Arrest (video)
I like tracks which tell a story & examine the minutae of everyday living (both good and bad). Most of Springsteen's output & ABBA's "Day Before You Came" being examples of story-telling done in a masterful way.

This track by Madness I feel is a bit of an anomaly in their output, as it seems to fall between the two stools of trying to be both social comment & a bit of a lark, which they'd become renowned for by this time.

Giving out health advice & a sly dig at the Reginald Iolanthe Perrin's of Britain might have looked good on paper, however it was perhaps a bit close to home to be truly a massive hit but still a track I like. Madness have a fabulous & mainly high quality back catalogue, their box set "The Business" is, erm, The Business.

(39) GOOMBAY DANCE BAND – Seven Tears
We cut back to the studio, where David announces a fiery first. Who could it be?

It's Lennie Bennett and the Flam-bayed Dance Band, the Seven Tears in the title will be the floor managers' if he's not poised with the CO2 Extinguisher when Lennie's curling lotion catches fire.

A risky strategy allowing naked flames on set, but as an extra precaution the studio audience have thoughtfully been issued with souvenir cut-down Goombay Dance Band fire blankets should the incidendiary Lennie and his pals go up like a leaky bunsen burner.

The girl wearing the Quality Street dress at the back (Caramel Swirl or Toffee Finger I think) is flame-retardant due to her attire, but she's been issued with a Goombay Fire Blanket too as a precaution, due to being a member of Zoo & therefore indispensible.

Nervous looks abound throughout the performance, with a cursory check on the location of the exits by members of the studio audience should they become nauseous from overexposure to the musical effects of the Goombay Dance Band.

A relief when it's finished really, although I don't find the track as offensive as some fellow forumites. NEXT!

The Camp is Ramped up to 11 with our next turn...

(40) IMAGINATION – Just An Illusion
The dressing up cupboard is always fully utilised when it comes to Imagination.
Who could possibly not be moved by the sight of Errol's gold hot pants complete with teasing garter on his left peg for the performance of "In & Out of Love".

Form an orderly queue lay-deez!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8-V33l0QIA

This time Errol's got a massive Leopard-print squid draped seductively round his neck, which was apparently all the rage in the peaceful village where the lion doesn't sleep tonight, but a bit much for early 80's Wood Lane W12 8QT.

Errol doesn't seemed peturbed however & carries on playing the drums like a true professional or BA Robertson. Errol's in complete control of drums and the squid, just as long as Leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee John doesn't upset Errol's neck squid by wearing a Samurai mask on the back of his......Oh, bugger!

Leeeee is having the time of his life prancing round like a giddy goat & is quite convincing wearing the Samurai mask backwards, like a pre-cursor to the Young Person fashion of today by adorning baseball caps in reverse polarity.

I like his backwards-forwards dancing too, he 'owned the stage', but the Imagination 'Air Piano' was I felt a step too far & he was fooling no-one with his illusions by this point.

Top marks though for my highlight of Leeeee's unsuccessful illusions, pretending to sit down on an 'Air stool'. I predict in future Weeks, both Air Piano & Air Stool will be a mainstay in the Imagination book of camp-ology which is not available in the shops.
Leeee finishes the routine with a few kicks of an Imagination 'Air Football' on stage, the squid is disturbed (but not disturbed if you catch my drift)....And THAT'S magic!

Great performance, great track & a deserved monster hit, just the usual Zoo/cheerleader yelping & shouting requires turning down a bit to further enhance.

Shame we missed out on The Cars "Shake it Up" on the JK segment, a track I really liked with the fabulous misheard lyrics "Don't let nobody pick your bum", which sounds like decent advice to me.

The Cars "Shake It Up"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eq-yoorI7lo

(26) THE JETS – Love Makes The World Go Round
Bereft of their yellow Soyuz Space Station-bothering cardigans currently infiltrating Toni Basil's cheerleader costume (see Item 1), Billy, Nick & Dot Cotton have to make do with red jumpers with a capital J to ram home the message for this well overdue third bite at the cherry, as it must be at least a fortnight since we've seen the blighters (or the next day with some repeats).

As Highlander Ian pointed out, the track had one of the weirdest chart runs imaginable but according to the letter of 'the law', the track qualified for TOTP inclusion so we'll have to lump it. First footage of Little Miss Show-off desperate for the limelight, but random twirling & jazz hands ain't the hucklebuck chuck & you don't know how to do it so you're outta luck.

Fairbrass gets stuck in at the back with 'Toffee Finger' but the less said about that the better.

A dodgy looking practitioner of the dark arts from Mexico, complete with shrunken death mask pendant & who likely in his spare time ties damsels to railway tracks in Black & White, leans on David's broad shoulders whilst David fires up the (Betamax, VHS or V2000?) 'Video Player' (whatever that is) as we move into...

(30) ABBA – Head Over Heels (video)
Agnetha easily got the best deal in this footage, having the comfort of the studio whilst Frida was sent outside to a snowy wasteland which looked like Stoke-on-Trent. The storyline seems like a homage to Norman Wisdom as Frida teeters & slides in a pair of high heeled boots totally unsuitable for the inclement weather conditions.

It's a matter of conjecture whether Frida was calling for Mr. Grimsdale whilst chasing a milk float on roller skates during filming, but thankfully the cuts to the studio footage would suggest Frida got over any potential shock by wearing an Emergency Survival Blanket in coat form to warm up a bit, prior to forcing hen-pecked Bjorn down the mall to give his plastic a good pasting.

The track is good, catchy fodder as you'd expect & I like the darker tones of "The Visitors" album (one of their final masterpieces mentioned earlier was yet to come, but not on TOTP unfortunately), but you could play me virtually any ABBA track & I'd be happy.

(13) ADAM & THE ANTS – Deutscher Girls
A shameless cash-in but I like this track & I find it infinitely more preferable than "Young Parisians", but these two tracks I think were like music hall novelty knock-offs, completely unrepresentative of an innovative and unique band such as Adam & the Ants.

No studio performance, so it's left up to Zoo & Co. to step up to das podium strasse for a 'yeee-haw' by numbers sans gunslinging.

If Allo Allo had relocated to Germany this would be what Cafe Rene would've looked like & Herr Hurll must have been happy with the cut of the girls' Lederhosen, but what a snarling beelsebub set with Victorian drying canopy & what looked like grapes hanging from it had to do with a celebration of the Fraulein of the species is beyond my comprehension.

A young trainspotter standing behind David waves a red flag & stops the 7.45 from Euston from proceeding, the announcement to passengers is they may be late arriving at their destination, but to compensate they're just in time for David's 'Hit Sound Countdown'.

This unreported Weekly delay was one of the reasons British Rail was subject to privatisation some Years later.

(15) ABC – Poison Arrow
Bacofoil-suited barmy excess, but when the music is this sublime anything is forgiven.

A true classic and wholly representative of the Year along with Rio, The Lexicon album is a stunning piece of work where all the ingredients came together to present perfection in pop, this offering & the subsequent singles being equally as good.
Martin Fry used to live not far from my old address in Stockport, but unsurprisingly I never bumped into him either wearing his trademark gold lame suit or in civvies.
I thought he looked every inch the star, but needed a bit of gesticulating practice as his performance was a bit lacklustre in the "You did, You did" sections.

Needs to come out on the road to practice his gesticulations & have a bit more 'attack', like Phil Lynott when returning unwanted reel-to-reel equipment to Dixons from a previous episode.

"Who cut me up? YOU DID, YOU DID" (in your bloody Audi!) etc.

Less "Poison Arrow" & more toy dart with safety rubber on the end, but excellent all the same.

We return to David who's having his thunder well & truly stolen by the return of Little Miss Show-off, who's beside herself with over-exaggerated facial movements, as this is now officially the big time baby & she wastes no time milking it for all it's worth.

The Kid's wise to it though & cuts her off quick smart with the re-commencement of the 'Hit Sound Countdown', but he ain't so lucky afterwards....

(1) TIGHT FIT – The Lion Sleeps Tonight
Giving it the full Wimo-weh this Wimo-week, we have a packed auditorium containing the full monty of employees, audience, 57 varieties of Zoo, drummers, untethered animals and even harder to believe on TOTP, a band! It just needed Errol's neck squid to crawl alien-like across the floor and the show would've been a '10 from Len'.

Good to see Renton the spaced-out lion staying off the junk, choosing life and integrating so well into his natural environment, but as we know from the Scooby Doo unmasking in a previous episode he's just the caretaker annoyed with meddling kids.

The Gorilla I'm not sure about as he's slightly more convincing, and gets into character a bit too much by playfully slapping Renton the spaced-out lion when he's trying to have a kip as the song would suggest. Renton repels the advance with great skill, dexterity & probably a swift wimoweh to the goolies.

Tight Fit take animal welfare very seriously, but are fully employed wimo-wehing so there's no wimo-weh they can act to prevent such errant primate behaviour, but we arrive at 'the Clap' with dignity almost intact.

Little lion hand puppet very cute, especially when attached to the future Mrs. Waterman. Such fun.

David packs the episode off quickly, as he can wisely sense the show being hijacked by Little Miss Show-off who's in full gurning mode again.

We're left with Robert Palmer touretting his way through the credits whilst Little Miss Show-Off hijacks the space occupied by Caramel Swirl & Toffee Finger, continuing her limelight-seeking activities with even more exaggerated facial movement & Kate Bush-y like pirouetting. It's with some relief another episode is in the can.

A surprisingly entertaining and higher scoring than it probably deserved 7/10.

A class review as ever Andy!

That's a nice thing to say Glorious 12th.

Andy, that was a masterpiece! Was giggling over Leee John and the extras to his name, and I am off to see ABC next week

I'm pre-rating tonight's as one I'm quite looking forward to. There's 5 acts/songs I quite like and only 3 I don't. I expect of the five I like they'll be at least a couple of repeat performances though. Of course, The Associates are going to be the total highlight. We'll give you a shout when they come on Sgt.
Looks like just one edit from the early and as that's an act I've never even heard of, I can't imagine I'll be bothered about that.

Bit OT - but here's weird! I was in a branch of Boots earlier and there was music playing over their system. The song? 'Children Of The Damned' by Iron Maiden. Not one of their singles which may or may not have been on some 'hits' type album but a track off their 'Number Of The Beast' album, so maybe they were playing that record in full. I loved it, (of course), but at the same time it really was quite a bizarre experience. I can only assume the store manager is a big metal fan.

The point several of us are making (I think - please step in if I've got it wrong, Jedikiah!) is that SAW marked a point where the music industry saw a different profit model that required very few musicians, where acts who couldn't actually sing could be made to appear as if they could, where those acts had no artistic input at all and if there was no more than a couple of hit singles generated by those acts, then it didn't matter, because there'd be another one along in a minute.

That is precisely what Cowell took from SAW, first with his own efforts in the 90s (step forward Robson & Jerome), then via Pop Idol and TXF, in the case of the latter with added 'narrative' value.

The major labels watched this happen, saw the money streaming in, and so gradually turned to that model of short termism. Which is why any modern equivalent of Bowie, Prince or Bush has to struggle to be heard now. Or get extremely lucky.

Which major British artists came to the fore in 1987-1990 and then sustained careers? With the exception of Blur, I can't think of any. As Jedikiah says, we're not talking about Prince, Madonna or anyone else who broke through before that period. The point is that major labels became complacent post-Band Aid/Live Aid, and stopped trying … so SAW had a perfect moment to establish themselves and their profit model.

The 90s saw grunge, hip hop, Britpop and dance all make an impact - but as soon as the Spice Girls came along, courtesy of Cowell's chum Simon Fuller, the music industry quickly lost interest in long term talent investment. Whether or not Kate Bush has been prolific since the 90s isn't the point: it's the fact that EMI were prepared to have her on their books for two years before she released anything, then gave her an advance to do with what she wanted - purely because they believed in her talent as a long term investment. They were right - but that kind of thing is unimaginable now.

And sorry, but Motown isn't in any way equivalent to SAW - much as Pete Waterman might like it to be! Berry Gordy encouraged major performing and songwriting talent and he had rafts of people supporting his endeavours. It wasn't just about three middle-aged men, a Linn drum machine and some session vocalists who provided guide tracks for novices to sing along to (and sometimes those guide tracks would form part of the released material). There was also a huge diversity of material generated by Motown artists - from love songs to social commentary - that SAW can't even begin to match and the productions didn't all have the same sound (which, with a handful of exceptions, SAW's did).

In a bid for some light relief …

https://twitter.com/ianberriman/stat...src=email&s=11

I'm not sure I can let the comparison between LMSO and Kate Bush go unchallenged, though! But she is getting more and more OTT and poor Craig Fairbrass is being pushed into the shadows …

Latterly caught up with this episode - some genuine horrors in there, but all overshadowed by two of the tunes of the year for me - 'Just An Illusion' and 'Poison Arrow' …

Could anyone help me out with a technical question? Occasionally people say that a particular episode of Top of the Pops may not be able to be broadcast due to mute links, but often the same episode is available on YouTube and elsewhere without mute links. I'm wondering how this is possible. Surely if it's elsewhere with the links, the BBC copy must be okay?

Presumably the copies without the mute links were made on VHS by private individuals from the original broadcast, whereas the reason for the BBC having a version with mute links is that they didn't record it properly themselves on the night of the live broadcast.

The private VHS copy may not be of broadcast quality, so if there are other issues with the BBC's live copy (as there were with the episode in May 81), then the episode won't be shown.

Fortunately, it looks like the Bates episode with mute links (September I think) will be shown, as someone has submitted a copy of the episode with the audio intact, and the BBC have accepted it (this is taken from the Popscene forum).

Yes Servalan, you have made the point very well! Aside from the obvious lack of real musicians, SAW, found a ready made audience with regards to Kylie and Jason, through their success in the soap, 'Neighbours', in the same way as Simon Cowell, later felt inspired to try his luck with the actors Robson and Jerome, and their success with 'Soldier, Soldier'. After the use of popular actors, it was time to turn the spotlight on the talent show format, and giving the contestants, many of whom had literally become celebrities themselves in their own right, the opportunities to sing the songs. It certainly saved in promotion, and especially like i remarked earlier, they were cherry picked favourites of the audience already. It was hard to see initially how they could fail. Longterm, of course had the potential to be a very different story.

Since they're putting the full version of tonight's edition on at a stupid time I'll be watching the copy I have already have of it when I get home from work tonight. I can't remember off-hand who appears on it, and I'm trying not to spoiler myself. Looking forward to some Simon Bates' time checks!

It'll quite literally be a bobby dazzler! I'm liking the Lexicon of Love 2 & there's a good interview with the Fry in this Month's Classic Pop magazine which is worth a shuftee.


The words 'poor' and Fairbrass don't normally go together, but I'm almost wishing he gets a bigger slice of the action compared to Little Miss Show-off. I say almost

Perhaps the comparison isn't too kind to Kate, so maybe as the editing timeout has expired, Kate after drinking a bathful of Diamond White might be more appropriate

The twitter link is hilarious & I'm glad it's not just me who forensically examines the Pops for faux-pas. Something's obviously tickling LMSO's fancy!

Could be Renton the spaced-out lion's supplying her with an ounce or two as he's got form

Andy,I absolutely LOVE reading your reviews mate!! Excellent

Well - just an hour to go before the long awaited Associates appearance on tonight's TOTP!! - One band we can all safely agree will be great viewing!!
- Just a shame Billy McKenzie isn't around to see we still all think fondly of him & his great songs! RIP Billy xx

Brilliant! I love that. I've never noticed her as normally read here during the DJ links, but I'll look out for her now.

Yes, i can't help but agree with you there. Oasis' first album, 'Definitely Maybe', was perhaps their least Beatles inspired, and has a more abrasive post punk edge. Lennon can still be heard in places, for sure, but the group really don't especially sound like a tribute act to all things Lennon, The Beatles, and the sixties, like they would later become. I feel very much like Ursula, ultimately, in that they don't appeal to me much. However, their more raw rock 'n' roll sound appears more authentic to me, than their ballads, and when they attempt to get more deep and philosophical on tracks like ''Who Feels Love'', they sound like they are ridiculously parodying Lennon to a hero worshipping degree, although they themselves have never struck me as being sophisticated enough to think in such deep terms. Liam's voice grates too much for me, anyway.