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Top Of The Pops 1983 - BBC4


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Old 02-01-2017, 07:30
Kid B
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The recent Glasto was the first time I've seen New Order acquit themselves well live. A notoriously awful live band up until recently.
I also saw this and thought the version of Love Will Tear Us Apart was very well done.
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Old 02-01-2017, 11:01
ramraider1
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Never really liked Too Shy and didn't think it deserved to be a No.1.
I did and I did.
Loved the bass-heavy intro.
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Old 02-01-2017, 11:03
ramraider1
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I like Too Shy up to a point, but would definitely have preferred Sign of the Times by the Belle Stars to have been number one instead.
Bought both of these singles but the Kaj would be my preferred choice.
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Old 02-01-2017, 11:08
ramraider1
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With only seven days until 1983 starts here's my predictions of songs to be shown on Big Hits

Wham - Either Wham Rap,Bad Boys or Club Tropicana
The Police - Every Breath You Take
Culture Club - Karma Chalemon
Siouxsie and the Banshees - Dear Pruduence
Duran Duran - Is There Something I Should Know
Bananarama- Cruel Summer
UB40 - Red Red Wine
The Beat - Can't Get To Losing You
Elton John - Either Passengers,I Kissed The Bride or I'm Still Standing
Bonnie Tyler - Total Eclipse Of The Heart
Paul Young - Wherever I Lay My Hat (That's My Home)
Malcom McLaren - Double Dutch
New Order - Blue Monday
Belle Stars - The Sign Of The Times
Heaven 17 - Temptation
Spandau Ballet - True
The Cure - Lovecats
Howard Jones - New Song
The Smiths - This Charming Man
The Style Council - Long Hot Summer
You could be right Alex. There is some over-rated rubbish in that list though.
Not a single dance track either unless you count 'Blue Monday'.
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Old 02-01-2017, 11:15
ramraider1
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Off the top of my head, my favourite songs of 83 are:

Sign Of The Times - The Belle Stars
Rip It Up - Orange Juice
Let's Dance - David Bowie
First Picture Of You - Lotus Eaters
Long Hot Summer - Style Council
4 out of 5 ain't bad.
The stand out track from 83 for me (if I remember correctly ) was The Crown - Gary Byrd and the GB Experience.
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Old 02-01-2017, 11:20
ramraider1
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As a huge Eurythmics fan, I'm very upset that Sweet Dreams isn't going to appear on the show at all since it was shown three times and Mike Smith or DLT were the presenters on all occasions. The Sweet Dreams album is probably one of my top 5 albums of all time.
That is unfortunate Andy. I reckon there will be a lot of good tracks we don't see in 83 TOTP because of the DLT / Savile/ Mike Smith situations. Pity.
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Old 02-01-2017, 12:42
Westy2
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Bearing in mind it's part of an advert at the moment & I have a memory of a studio appearance on TOTP2, will we get Joe Jackson with Stepping Out officially or not?

If not, that means we've never seen him on the repeats, as his previous 1977 appearances were Yew Treeed.

On the subject of what to call the Mike Smith skipped episodes. I'll go with either 'Smithed' or 'Smitted' !
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Old 02-01-2017, 12:46
Straker
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On the subject of what to call the Mike Smith skipped episodes. I'll go with either 'Smithed' or 'Smitted' !
MikeDropped.
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Old 02-01-2017, 14:22
UrsulaU
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HAPPY NEW YEAR & Happy 1983 - when it starts!

1983 - the last of the great chart years in Popular Music! UnFasten your seatbelts - it's all downhill after this year!

Usually I would agree with you, but the problem is that the presenter on Top of the Pops is only on screen for about 2 or 3 minutes in each show of 35 minutes or whatever it is that week. So we're going to miss about 30 minutes of performances because of those 2 or 3 minutes which seems a bit unreasonable.
Yes - I agree Andy! - The should they/shouldn't they argument still continues on...

The stand out track from 83 for me (if I remember correctly ) was The Crown - Gary Byrd and the GB Experience.
Yes - love that track too Ramraider! Possibly because it sounds like it should've been a hit in the late 70s!
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Old 02-01-2017, 14:34
UrsulaU
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On the subject of what to call the Mike Smith skipped episodes. I'll go with either 'Smithed' or 'Smitted' !
Someone mentioned YewSmithed on the other 1982 page - which gets my vote!
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Old 02-01-2017, 16:48
highlander1969
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August 1983 will be a bit of a washout as only 1 of the 4 editions is eligible to be screened on BBC4.
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Old 02-01-2017, 16:56
highlander1969
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I reckon you're spot on with most of these Alex, however on the basis they're Yewtreed or Smithed (are we adopting this as the official term?) hopefully they can fit in The Story of the Blues, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Oblivious. I'd also like to see (Keep Feeling) Fascination and They Don't Know as we'll only get the videos on BBC4. Alternatively they could just show Tracie singing Give It Some Emotion (won't be on BBC4 either ) for an hour and I'll be in pop heaven
Yep, Tracie's 'Give it Some Emotion' (both performances) is a victim of the August cull!
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Old 02-01-2017, 16:58
highlander1969
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4 out of 5 ain't bad.
The stand out track from 83 for me (if I remember correctly ) was The Crown - Gary Byrd and the GB Experience.
Absolutely adore 'The Crown'. A definite highlight of the year for me. It's a shame we won't see it featured at all on BBC4.
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Old 02-01-2017, 20:38
sheff71
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Someone mentioned YewSmithed on the other 1982 page - which gets my vote!
Yes, it kinda covers all difficulties for now

Judging by the new TOTP shows over the last few weeks with Reggie and Fearne on, we can only hope in the future that one of both 'does a Smithy' and refuses to let their episodes be shown on BBC4 in the future It's not like we'd be losing much...
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Old 02-01-2017, 21:56
SgtRock
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August 1983 will be a bit of a washout as only 1 of the 4 editions is eligible to be screened on BBC4.
Early in the year we get continuous runs of six episodes and seven episodes, but after that it's very disjointed - barely a couple of weeks without losing an episode.
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Old 02-01-2017, 22:16
andyd1302
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On the subject of what to call the Mike Smith skipped episodes. I'll go with either 'Smithed' or 'Smitted' !
How about episodes being 'O-SMITTED'?
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Old 03-01-2017, 11:11
Scott_Whitton
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Bearing in mind it's part of an advert at the moment & I have a memory of a studio appearance on TOTP2, will we get Joe Jackson with Stepping Out officially or not?

If not, that means we've never seen him on the repeats, as his previous 1977 appearances were Yew Treeed.


On the subject of what to call the Mike Smith skipped episodes. I'll go with either 'Smithed' or 'Smitted' !
Just the video I think, the studio appearance is Smithed. Also, we did see It's Different for Girls during the 1980 repeats
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Old 03-01-2017, 11:16
Scott_Whitton
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Are you ready for the first edition of 1983? 6/1/83 hosted by Mike Smith and Tommy Vance.

https://wetransfer.com/downloads/81d...2143831/a443f4
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:11
andyd1302
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Are you ready for the first edition of 1983? 6/1/83 hosted by Mike Smith and Tommy Vance.

https://wetransfer.com/downloads/81d...2143831/a443f4
HELL, YEAH BABY! BRING IT ON!

Sorry Scott, got a little carried away but I'm excited to find out what treats await us!
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:15
Markjuk
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Some info on The Story of 1983:

It's 1983, and Top of the Pops reaches a landmark - its 1,000th edition. A time to celebrate, perhaps, but there are signs that the show is going through something of a mid-life crisis. The aristocracy of British New Pop are in the ascendant - Culture Club, Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet, Wham! - but the rise of the video starts to threaten the show's unique appeal, which is based on getting the top artists into the studio. So producer Michael Hurll tries out new features including the first regular female presenter and the Top Ten Video Countdown. In the year that Margaret Thatcher is re-elected with a landslide majority, the mood in the charts is escapism. But 1983 is also a year of musical reinvention. Alongside the rise of indie bands like New Order, and a memorable first appearance of The Smiths with Morrissey swinging his gladioli, other acts who've inhabited the backwaters for years now fine-tune their image and enter the mainstream in a bid for chart success.
Except we won't be seeing the 1000th edition as it contains Savile and "continued to be vilified by the BBC" Dave Lee Travis.
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:26
LaVieEnRose
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Except we won't be seeing the 1000th edition as it contains Savile and "continued to be vilified by the BBC" Dave Lee Travis.
I suppose DLT is being denied his potential repeat fees because of this. He ought to take that up with the BBC.
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Old 03-01-2017, 15:40
mickmars
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look Ive never agreed with the approach the Beeb have taken to excising parts of TOTP from recorded history, but ultimately Mike Smith was perfectly entitled to withold his permission for his repeats, and Sarah is perfectly entitled to maintain her husbands wishes, you dont stay married for 25 years together by just saying well lets forget about all that to get a bit of money.
I honestly believe that the days of "one artiste" being able to stop repeats are long gone,Britain has had satellite/cable tv for decades and this nonsense is largely dealt with in 2017.

Do Mike Smith/Sarah Greene have the legal right to stop BBC4 showing vintage TOTP episodes,or are the BBC just being pathetic because Smith didn't sign permissions for an earlier ,completely different, agreement ?

that is the real question
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Old 03-01-2017, 17:03
Jedikiah
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4 out of 5 ain't bad.
The stand out track from 83 for me (if I remember correctly ) was The Crown - Gary Byrd and the GB Experience.
4 out of 5 ain't bad?

Which of my selections did you agree or disagree with?

I don't mind ''The Crown'' by Gary Byrd. Another track from 83 i rather like is ''Christian'' by China Crisis. I particularly like the bass playing.
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Old 03-01-2017, 17:13
andyd1302
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I think as far as any repeats of BBC shows are concerned, the argument may well become irrelevant anyway along with the BBC in it's current form in the next decade.

TV consumption is changing on an industrial scale with the advent of streaming & downloads, which are likely only to get bigger in their scope.

The BBC in my view as a whole are trying desperately to hold on to a model which has become largely outdated, outpaced and at times down right bloody annoying with it's rigidity to schedules and a seeming disdain to the Licence payer, who've been treated as cash cows for a couple of decades now with little right to reply apart from the quite pathetic BBC Audience services (now outsourced to Capita Belfast).

Their stance might have worked up to when there were 3, 4 or even 5 channels, viewing figures were in excess of 10 million and internet was dial-up, but the BBC's excuses and fudging no longer cut it in the World of multi-platform entertainment.

Whether complete Pops episodes might appear on BBC Store in the future who knows.

This would of course be behind an additional paywall, but whether the mysterious 'contract' Mike Smith didn't sign just covers repeats on TV I'm unsure, but it's a price I'd be willing to pay to see the acts featured in decent quality (same for the Yewtree two).

If not, I wish the BBC Archive was handed over to an organisation which has more respect for it's contents and not so apologetic for making programmes in the first instance from a different era. Most people get the context and are intelligent enough to make a distinction without throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

The current BBC model seems to be like so many autocratic organisations unfortunately, arrogant and at times offensive to the intelligence of the people they purport to represent.

The original BBC statement posted a Month or so ago said 'the BBC is continuing to respect his (Mike Smith's) wishes' for his episodes not to be shown.

Fair enough you might think with BBC's stance on the matter & 'respecting his decision' following his passing, but curiously this afternoon I was catching up with some previous BBC4 recordings & decided to give Mark Radcliffe's documentary on Indie 'Music for Misfits' a whirl (shown September 2016).

Part way through the 'Alternative 80s' episode was a section dedicated to PWL, considered an 'Indie' label in the 80s.

Given the BBC are 'respecting Mike Smith's decision', I was more than a little surprised to see footage directly taken from a 1987 Top of the Pops episode where Mike Smith introduces Kylie's 'I Should Be So Lucky'.

Given Wham's debut was also featured on 'Big Hits-1982' with Mike Smith jigging away at the start in the background, it does beg the question WHAT THE BLOODY HELL ARE THE BBC PLAYING AT?

If I was a cynic, I might conclude this has diddly squat to do with the Beeb respecting anyone's wishes, but more to do with the absence of Smithy episodes fitting nicely into BBC's scheduling plans for 2017, allowing for Sky At Night & more Proms coverage.
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Old 03-01-2017, 17:40
ramraider1
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4 out of 5 ain't bad?

Which of my selections did you agree or disagree with?

I don't mind ''The Crown'' by Gary Byrd. Another track from 83 i rather like is ''Christian'' by China Crisis. I particularly like the bass playing.
The Lotus Eaters one. I can't remember it to be honest. Maybe when it comes up ( if it comes up ) it might be one of those long forgotten gems I occasionally come across on TOTP. Liked the other 4 you listed.
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