Monday 6 June 2011

The Alternative TOTP Canon #11: Orbital - Chime

Thing is, Phil and Paul Hartnoll didn't usually have to do a lot live to get this track going, and with the equipment meaning the dancer friend of someone from FFRR not being able to move from one corner of the set. Paul: "We wanted to play live but Top Of The Pops insisted that we mime. However, when they provided us with flashy keyboard stands we sent them away and got trestle tables from the canteen. In our minds, flashy keyboard stands just wasn't us. We were used to performing on tables at the backs of pubs and we just had to set things up the way we knew... She looked bored, we looked embarrassed and Top Of The Pops said 'We'll never have them back again.' As it happens, they did, but only once the staff had been replaced by people who'd forgotten they would never have us back again!"

4 comments:

Noax said...

Lovely. Of course, things only got sillier in the Franklin/Dortie/Vlugtie van der Vlugt (or whatever her name was) era when they all had to sing/play live whether they liked it or not. Ironic really that Orbital would only have had to wait about a year to get their wish!

The daftest one I remember was Bizarre Inc doing 'Such a feeling' while standing on boxes or TVs (can't remember which) but I loved all the early 90s stuff regardless. 'Evapor8' by Altern8 is particularly awesome.

Noax said...

'Early 90s *rave* stuff' that should have read. I don't like ALL early 90s stuff as that'd include Michael Bolton, which would be hideous.

wilberforce said...

michael bolton ha ha ha! i know it's unlikely, but with his absurd über-mullet i am chuckling at the thought he may have been a showaddywaddy fan in his youth...

altern 8 were (unintentionally?) hilarious on TOTP - a couple of geezers wearing facemasks with an "A" painted on them and parkas (i've now found out they were actually chemical warfare suits), plus of course the obligatory scantily-clad female gyrating away to one side - one of them later stood (perhaps not surprisingly unsuccessfully) as an MP...

Noax said...

I'm pretty sure that Altern8 were always intentionally hilarious as I remember their very silly interviews with the music mags of the time.

Certainly they were the only artist to have featured a schoolgirl ('MC Crazy Claire' IIRC!) and PP Arnold as guest vocalists on consecutive hits anyway!