TOTP 2/6/77 (tx 21/6/12): it's time to play the music

TV Cream alerted its world last week to the fact there's a full Late Late Breakfast Show (that's part one of four, follow the sidebar for the others) from October 1986, which turned out to be the third last show before Michael Lush's death brought the series to a sudden close. It's very disjointed for event television, only held together by the veneer of what looks like quite a dangerous Whirly Wheel stunt, proof that modern BBC LE hasn't really dumbed down, full of hubris, overmateyness, weird moments (Cyndi Lauper's not even listed as a guest in the credits, did she just turn up on the offchance?), "the top forty" as a glamorous star prize and jokes that don't make sense. Not to mention Mike Smith's pronunciation of 'slalom' when reading out the address in part two.

Back in '77, speaking of not making sense... "if I could borrow your cheeky bits I'd be very grateful actually, because we do have a rather splendid Top Of The Pops". It's as if he started his comedy stream of consciousness too early and just barrelled on regardless of how it sounded.

Alright, let's at least acknowledge it...



Because there were people wondering whether it was so much as given a photo caption. Don't get excited, it's still banned in the past. It came out on a Friday, which explains its surely premature appearance.

Elkie Brooks – Saved
After the feathered elegance of Pearl's A Singer a spot of honky-tonk ragtime to open, via a spinning crane shot from above, is a jolt, but not as much as when we see a whole mass of people on Elkie's stage. Eight backing vocalists, one with an audible tambourine, and while whoever did her hair and makeup didn't get the message this is Elkie in shoes kicked off good time boogie and let's sing a Leiber & Stoller song mode, something she, well, didn't really do at any other time in her career. Suits her, though, grinning through and with her backing eight an exuberant gospel chorus. Her bassist has risked shades indoors. Her drummer has made the more bravura moves of adopting a droopy handlebar moustache and perm and indicating the point where the key change should have come with a load of rogue cymbal crashes. The audience, conversely, are increasingly less willing to invest their own energy as time passes. Nevertheless, at the end under Noel's simpering ("she's really brought a fresh flavour to the charts recently") you can hear, and Noel is distracted by, everyone cheering and applauding themselves. Unless that's on the record, in which case playing it in as such volume is hubristic beyond means.

The Muppets – Halfway Down The Stairs
Why do we always come here? I really don't know. It's like a kind of torture to have to watch the show. "From Jim Henson's Muppet Show, we've got Jerry Nelson and the story of what goes on halfway down the stairs". Where to start? There's the ungainly tagging of the show title. There's naming Robin's voice/puppeteer even though he's not credited on the song. There's a return to one of Noel's habits, tagging "the story of..." onto a title. And it's not about what goes on there, it's about the state therein. It's glaring that this ATV-produced series has infiltrated the BBC when Rock Follies (number ten this week) won't, but who can resist a sad eyed, AA Milne-quoting piece of softhearted bathos? Well, Noel and his heart of stone can, as he's openly laughing upon our returning to him. "A number written by AA Milne and RAC Services" he ruins it.

The Four Seasons – Rhapsody
"If you listen to this one very closely, the sound of the Four Seasons" - that old identifier again, it gets round the lot of them - you'll realise it's not called Rhapsody, it's called Vaseline". And thus a whole nation's attention is diverted. (Because, well, sometimes it does) Unlike last year Frankie Valli is back with his band but his attentions must still be elsewhere as he's the only one not in a powder blue suit. We know this to be the case, of course, because Valli was on the show three weeks earlier, something also given away by the two girls holding a large 'SEXY ERIC + MOEY' banner in tartan behind the band, as the Rollers were also on that show, and three young women at the front holding large clumps of balloons, presumably straight from disassembling the stage after Joy Sarney had done her business that same week. The pianist has attacked one balloon to his white baby grand, giving him the look of a wedding band member who got lost. Valli's not even on lead vocals, yet they've still stuck him out front and centre without so much as a covering tambourine while the bassist who looks like he failed the 10cc audition takes the lead. Also the stage setup exposes how small Valli is, not quite Graham Parker dimensions but definitely a notable shortage. It's not until the very late entrance of an organ and bass sax, both invisible, that the song takes off and becomes ersatz funk for a bit, which given the orchestrated nature of the rest of the song suggests that wedding band got a bit confused with a late request. The edit out is incredibly jarring, cutting off a coda extra chorus and straight back to Noel without any audience effects.

Van McCoy – The Shuffle
This, in its two Legs & Co versions, has now been edited out of the early version three times. Is it deemed offensive or something? Is it the flute? This is the Sue and Lulu only version shown first off.

Heatwave – Too Hot To Handle
Noel tries to make a link between McCoy, the forthcoming Scaggs (fine so far) and the title of this, again shown via video. Maybe he's not been in a lido and thinks it's like a sauna.

Twiggy – A Woman In Love
"Come over here! Come and look at Twiggy!" Well, by the nature of the director's work we would anyway, but thanks for the invitation to find out "what happenes when a woman falls in love", like she's MOR pop's own Barbara Cartland. Dressed like the lead in a very cheap school theatre production of Robin Hood, Twiggy grips the mike cord with her left hand, stands on a hexagonal stage and tries not to look too nervous and not stray too far from the correct key. An advancement on her last appearance, of sorts.

Boz Scaggs – Lido Shuffle
We find Boz and band, with just the one drummer this time, in the studio pretending to be recording the song, interspersed with clips of the crew and gear arriving and setting up at some enormodome plus Boz making a lot of enigmatic phone calls. Then it turns into a straightforward live video, so we get to see the huge carnation in the pianist's suit jacket lapel.

Jesse Green – Come With Me
Noel riffs on pretending he can't pronounce his name as "your Jess is as good as mine". Since when has the last e in Jesse ever been silent? Come on, Noel, shape up. Jesse Green's third appearance sees him take Billy Paul's wardrobe advice and extend it, a huge ranger's hat offsetting the big scarf, crimson plastic-reflective tabard, lurid red trousers and pencil moustache. He's also performing in front of a Union Flag with lights around the sides. That's meant for next week's silver jubilee, surely. Don't curry favours with us that way, Jesse. Battling parping brass he may be but he's got everyone around the tiny little circular stage he's using swaying from side to side in unison, a kind of collective nervously ungainly bop. Meanwhile in the background someone sets up useless wiring around Hot Chocolate's keyboard and bongos. The bridge features a prominent comb and toilet paper. Wonder who Johnny assigned that job too.

Marvin Gaye – Got To Give It Up
Noel thinks the most notable thing about this record is the party sounds in the background, or as he puts it "all those people making a lot of noise like they're (fake laugh) being very silly indeed". Another reason not to go to his parties if those are his standards. Nobody ever play him Dylan's Rainy Day Women, alright? Legs & Co have a second go at this, shuffling on the spot in swimsuits on a raised stage they seem to have just found somewhere, which the director gives his latest version of added spice to with a light show. Individual members flash in and out of silhouette at disorientating rhythm, which doesn't always hide the lapses in choreography, though given they surely couldn't see each other very well in that lighting and while standing in a line it's forgiveable. Certainly, beyond arm waving and turning round on the spot in instalments it doesn't seem to have much to do with the melody as much as the direction had to flushing out latent epileptics.

Hot Chocolate – So You Win Again
Like a stopped clock Noel, the man who told us 1977 was going to be marvellous for John Christie, gets one right, but he's now so wary of his predictive powers he has to foist it upon the subject themselves, making them seem far too presumptious. "I was speaking to half a dozen people who said Hot Chocolate are bound to have an enormous smash with their new single. In fact the six people were Hot Chocolate. And do you know, they're right." Just after that someone, and we can take a guess who given the logic of being miked up, makes a peculiar squawking noise, accompanied by the sound of something being slapped. Something wrong with that, Noel? Errol has stopped messing about with the mike stand but this leaves him even more rooted to the spot than Twiggy, only the power of his visual simper helping. In fact all the band are quite laissez-faire, the bongo player not seemingly putting the most effort in no matter how often he appears in the forefront of the shot. Afterwards Noel is still reluctant to convey the courage of his convictions as he sits next to a female audience member - "we were just discussing the merits of that number, we've agreed it's going to be enormous". This red hot pop chat has visibly bored the girl's companion, who is resting his/her (can't tell) chin on his/her palm, only to perk up and grin in Noel's direction when he begins his link. We still saw you.

Carol Bayer Sager – You’re Moving Out Today
As Noel riffs on triple barrelled names, only one of which is a name as opposed to a thing, the producer has late in the day spotted a problem. It's a repeat showing, but it only cuts directly to the stage when Bayer Sager starts singing, the intro taken up by Kid's camera ride. What to do? Well, simply run the right half of the screen on split screen, hoping nobody notices everyone looking round, and fade the rest in when Jensen's image has left the picture. What this means in practice is an awkward few seconds of Noel watching an offscreen monitor in half interest. And still no clue as to what 'he' does with bread.

The Strawbs – Back In The Old Routine
An awkward fade edit from Bayer Sager to this is the best reason why Hot Chocolate lost out in the early edit, but it's still quite glaring given some of the material left in. The singer, who would do well in a Noel Edmonds Without The Beard Lookalike Contest if such things ever existed, is fighting a pitched battle with his own band's mix and with audience interest, most turning round to look for the camera well before it's anywhere near them, though admirably not the person at the front in a top hat. Having mentioned "union rules" in the first verse - oh, give the old canard a rest - it's a simple folk-country tale involving lots of drinking, the wife in her negligee watching a horror film - that might be routine where he's from, let's be fair - and dreaming of winning the pools so he can "sail away for a year with Susan George for company". Of its time, shall we say. Speaking of which, it's the grand return of The Awkward Interview With A Non-Performing American Star Just Before The Number One. Noel has the Alessi Brothers with him, obligingly in a red and white hooped top and a blue and white hooped top. "They've got a hit single, Oh Lori" says Noel, correct in prediction for once as it entered the charts the following week. What they don't have is charisma, as one of them just lists people who've recorded their songs with the emotion of a phone messaging service. Noel doesn't even allow them to introduce the number one...

Rod Stewart – The First Cut Is The Deepest
...which is this again. Noel hopes we can join him on the breakfast show, promises "the very best in music" next week and plays out the second song this show after the Strawbs to lyrically lionise the weekend football programming, Genesis' Match of The Day. This never happened with The Big Match. The camera operating the kaleidoscope shot gets to have his own fun this week, starting with a close-up on the piano and ending with the Union Flag in full central shot seven times over. Next week it's the silver jubilee (the recap for which will be up on Friday, by the way, let's put that in type right now) Don't forget to get your bunting up and the trestle tables out in the streets for next Thursday evening.

TOTP 19/5/77 (tx 31/5/12): Jam, Jacko, Joe and Joy

"Time to bop with the best in rock and pop" Say this for Jensen, he goes that extra yard to make his intros stand out. In the background what seems to be the keyboard player with our first act of the evening tries to mime along with the end of his spiel before Kid triumphantly punches the air as final visual punctuation, a la Diddy.

If ever a smile said "I don't really understand what I'm doing here or supposed to be smiling about, but..."



Suzi Quatro – Roxy Roller
Mixed in emerging from the centre of the number one picture, which is a new one. Suzi would be given big billing by Pops for a little while yet, and it'd pay off eventually, but for now it's another, unsuccessful go-round with the glam sound. For some reason the drummer starts with his foot on top of the bass drum, making the kit look children's sized until he realises that's not really a good enough angle to play more than the snare from. Suzi for her part, in a powder blue jumpsuit, is sitting cross-legged on a box at the front of the stage, singing down to the camera, which just means she looks like she's wearing a distracting huge crown of lights until the angle changes to one lengthways on. Eventually Suzi gets up like her music teacher would have told her to, straps on the big bass and... contributes? Well, she plays the instrumental break bit while standing on the box, sadly stepping down rather than take a showbiz flying leap. The director finds Kid a second or two too early at the end, finding him in the midst of some enthusiastic arm swinging to the beat.

Heatwave – Too Hot To Handle
On grainy video with flames superimposed over the top, like someone saw the Bohemian Rhapsody version with flames at the start and took the wrong bit of inspiration. The band seem to be wearing kimonos with individual colour patterns taking up only half the outfit, as if they were meant to stand side to side and make subtitles for the Chinese. Halfway through, and it's not clear for reasons I'll come back to for a later performance whether these were added at the BBC end or not, very bright flashing lights appear in the middle of the screen of a contrast that might have blown out the RGB settings of colour sets of the time. They seem intrusively bright enough on HD. As the video cuts out one of the frontmen is into full-on karate moves. Kid finds it understandably hilarious.

Linda Lewis – The Moon And I
Why Lewis should get special treatment being alone on a stage is anyone's guess - maybe, being a rewrite of a song from The Mikado, they thought it demanded extra culture - but her entire performance is framed in a blue-purple oval, as if a dry run for the graphics of early 80s BBC news. Close-ups of cellos and a clarinet too. None of this overshadows that Lewis' great soul voice is being parlayed into somewhere it barely belongs, and that after Feelings and We'll Gather Lilacs it's the nation's pop program falling back on the classics songbook again. Very few audience shots to determine what the kids think of it, though they hardly need help in coming across as catatonic.

Bay City Rollers – It's A Game
Same as two weeks ago. Health and safety, can't have that many tartan scarves in one built up area too often.

Carol Bayer Sager – You’re Moving Out Today
Kid sees this as "a real treat", and to emphasise how special he is he gets a ride on a camera trolley while introducing it, to the evident delight of several of those he passes. DLT or Jimmy would have done all sorts of business while there; Kid just introduces it without reference or playing up to it, as if nothing were amiss. There's the mark of the man. As it stops he embarks on some self-conscious strutting on the spot as Sayer, hands deep in high waisted white trousered pockets, peppily/quirkily sings like you'd imagine Diane Keaton would, complete with mid-lyric face 'trying to remember' acting, before miming along to the trumpet/scat solo before realising it makes her look foolish. Meanwhile offscreen the male vocal role is shared by a too casual bloke from the office and a Speak & Spell machine. "The grocer told me what you do with bread"?

Joe Tex – Ain’t Gonna Bump No More (With No Big Fat Woman)
I mean, he's not exactly svelte either, is he? Great as it is and as successful as the single was, strange to see this make the early edit, not least because you'd imagine Soul Train would have to be paid an extra set of export repeat fees. Kid's virtually pissing himself laughing afterwards. It's been on before, man!

The Trammps – Disco Inferno
Big old edit in the early version: "For fans of Legs and Co, we have a bonanza for you today (massive jump cut) as they dance to the Trammps' new record" Hard to see in the light what the costumes are, but they appear to consist of gold bras and pants, quite a bit of tinsel and, for some reason, large gold buttons on fronts and sides. I say hard to see because the whole routine is overlaid with a screen of flashing red lights at epilepsy rates. The routine shows up the problem with still nascent Legs & Co - they're fine dancers, fully conversant in getting down, but the actual choreographed bits don't seem to have much going for them. The version on One For The Dads confirms that it wasn't BBC4 cutting the song off in mid-flow but BBC1 in 1976. Must have been given razor blades for Christmas.

Tony Etoria – I Can Prove It
"Good disco fun" says Kid, the song already long well underway behind him. In a Harry Hill-collared white shirt and elaboratedly knotted snood-cum-neckerchief with with a rarely utilised guitar strapped on, Etoria seems more than a bit nervous, perhaps because orchestra and singers are throwing everything they can at the arrangement. At various points he seems to be singing behind the rhythm, vainly trying but missing the click track altogether.

Joy Sarney – Naughty Naughty Naughty
I think all has been said that neeed to be said here.

The Jacksons – Show You The Way To Go
"From the land of a thousand dances!" Even Michael only exhibits two or three here, but it's enough. This has gone down as the record where Michael really started showing what he'd become, the eighteen year old's voice achieving full range under the new tutelage of Gamble & Huff as writers and producers. As for their actual studio presence, it's a wonder. People are dancing! Kid's swinging his mike cord! The brothers have broken out their colour coded martial jackets with glittery designs on the front that might as well have been based on the outfits from a lost Gerry Anderson series! Michael's straight to the front, leaving Jackie and Marlon to try and pull off a full choreographed synchronised routine when there's two of them and their brother's in front spinning away and adding ad-libs. Unfortunately, after a commanding performance Michael decides he can trust a Top Of The Pops crowd with participation. "Everybody clap your hands! Put 'em up high so I can see 'em!" By the time we cut away five people have done so.

Van McCoy – The Shuffle
Legs & Co again, clearly without time to rehearse new bits for this prime example of Sport On Four Pop as Sue and Lulu pretty much replicate their routine from the other week and everyone else follows their moves in pairs of Patti/Pauline and Gill/Rosie on seperate podiums behind, all sporting bedouin-based trousers.

The Jam – In The City
Ah, the point of no return, how are you.



Well, that was effervescent. Note Kid's brief spate of air guitar when he thinks he's far enough off camera - he did it again at the end - the two blokes pogoing at different speeds from first to last while everyone else remains rigid, fighting that good fight, and that in his indoor shades at that angle at 0:43 Rick Buckler looks a bit like Roger Taylor does now. Note the expert coincidental timing that sees this appear the day before BBC4's Punk Britannia season kicks off, and then wonder, while neither song nor performance are really recognised as major moments in punk's heritage, whether a crack hadn't just appeared in the prime-time pop continuum. "Right at the forefront of a new rock phenomenon known as New Wave", Kid declares confusingly.

Rod Stewart – The First Cut Is The Deepest
Toppotron™'s back! Three months after the last use of a pretend big screen, one seems to grow into the set out of nowhere, giving away its secret with its initial picture-in-picture shot, replicating what we're seeing only with a big blue bit of cloth where Toppotron™ is, eventually replaced by a projection of the countdown still of Rod in full emotive body language which someone then walks in front of, none too cleverly. Song introduced, Kid turns towards it. So does most of the audience. What were they expecting to see there? We see the video in all its back-guitar-playing, arse-waggling glory. Boz Scaggs' Lido Shuffle sees us out. Just one thing for Kid to do before the end, and he doesn't disappoint: "from me it's good love!"

TOTP 24/2/77 (tx 1/3/12): oh, what a circus

Here's something entertaining One For The Dads has found - Legs & Co on Larry Grayson's Generation Game in 1978. Patti, Rosie, Gill and Pauline to be exact, plus friend Floyd and a couple of others, doing a very teatime-friendly version of ballroom disco dancing, while Flick is in charge of choreography, scoring and getting a round of applause for not being male. Of course Larry and Isla have a go afterwards.

Meanwhile, here's someone's stream of consciousness version of Pops recappage.

Noel this week, before a chart the captions for which have turned an uncomfortable mushy peas green. Barry Biggs is still in the top ten.

Heatwave – Boogie Nights
Lots of videos this week but none with a more forceful setting than this. Heatwave are in virtual silhouette at the front, some neon pink lines behind, and every so often a set of full beam lights dazzle everything in their path as the two singers sway in a fashion that suggests meaningfulness. Eventually the lighting change reveals a band costume of black jumpsuits with some sort of yellow 'sun rays' motif around the wide collar and belt. On the energetic frontmen it works a treat. On the '70s British detective series criminal of the week' keyboard player and the well built, defiantly English session drummer, less so. Midway through the clip gets the Toppotron™ treatment, excitingly this week at a slight angle to the shot, the proleteriat in at least one Panama hat and who knows how much poor knitwear shuffling before their telescreen. Noel calls it "a somewhat melodic way to get proceedings underway" as if it's MOR pop, while not for the last time this week the applause at the end is overlaid by a medium-sized youthful sounding cheer. One or the other, come on.

The Racing Cars – They Shoot Horses Don't They?
"One of the songs that is particularly beautiful at the moment" is Noel's take on a ballad that takes the average RPM down hugely, before offering a blacksmith-based pun that does nobody any good. Once you've got over how alarmingly singer Morty looks like Bill Bailey with short dark hair and Simon Pegg's eyes it's notable how carefully it treads the line between anthemic and catatonic, never one thing nor the other. At the end the guitarist starts kissing/biting the neck of his instrument, possibly just because he can.

The Real Thing – You’ll Never Know What You’re Missing
And out of the tombola this time comes Eddie in the hat to go with his wedding suit from last time and a jacket that looks like it's made out of his dining room carpet, a white jacket with velvet pantaloons and the other two looking like they were rushed on stage in what they arrived in, including dungarees. Had they still not learned from the Americans about coding their gear? There's an acoustic guitar restored to the lineup too.

Mary McGregor – Torn Between Two Lovers
"She doesn't know whether to marry McTavish or marry McGregor". No. Serious, Noel, no. The video is a series of shots of tight close-ups of McGregor's face, but she still feels it necessary to hold a mike throughout. These were the early days of promo shoots, maybe some still needed the crutch.

Electric Light Orchestra – Rockaria
And another video, a full ELO onstage extravaganza in which the track's opera singer starts high up in a false castle and a quartered screen reveals Jeff's gang going at it ten to the dozen. Duelling cellists drag their instruments at right angles around the stage.

Barbara Dickson – Another Suitcase In Another Hall
Before Barbara can get underway Noel wants to introduce us to some people, Andrew Lloyd Webber looking about twenty while simultaneously not actually looking young at all and Tim Rice looking like a provincial PE teacher. Noel starts with a very strangely worded question: "Everyone says to me you've got so many hits on that LP, so many hits behind Evita, is that true?" Lloyd Webber, understandably confused, points out the first single was a number one and they've released the second. "I think we like this one at the moment best" Rice offers when asked which his favourite is, which is handy. It turns out to be both Noel's record of the week and his prediction for a number one, so its chances are sunk well before it can ever begin. Dickson looks very stern in her knockoff Laura Ashley, choker and ostentatiously huge flower in hair. To add artistic merit there's a shot from the far side of a harp being played by a disembodied hand. At the end a man in a bobble hat looks nonplussed.

Earth Wind & Fire – Saturday Nite
As ever, Noel's off on his own logic perambulation: "The next introduction sounds a bit like the sort of insurance company you'd need cover from if you were going to walk round a volcano". Having given Legs & Co mini-tunics that make no attempt to cover the underwear Flick seems to have set them on autopilot and let them go on the standard uptempo move set. Gill's trying, though, if the addition of what seems to be a Chaplin sped-up shuffle qualifies by itself as trying to add something new. It's not impressing the audience surrounding the dancefloor, who spent three minutes listening to disco, watching professional dancers and don't move a muscle throughout. Some men at the back stand with their arms tightly folded, women at the front look like they're being forced to be there. Is this Legs & Co's first time in front of a live audience on the regular show? They really needed to involve the crowd more, unless Flick's still reeling from the Ruby Flipper reproach - they did crowd participation a few times - and vowed not to go that far again.

Leo Sayer – When I Need You
"Two weeks at number one, it's got to stay there even longer". It did! Noel got a chart prediction right! Stopped clock and all that. Leo, the very definition of 'always available', gets all sort of multiplication camera tricks, but more telling is his standing before a catatonically swaying audience with his hands in his pockets again. It doesn't mean casuality by itself, Leo. Before cueing up Bowie's Sound And Vision to play under the credits - and at this stage of 1977 aren't we all waiting for certain gifts of sound and vision? - Noel promises Leo will be joining "the Swap Shop supergroup this coming Saturday". And yes, this was a thing - the show put together an actual supergroup which recorded covers of Roll Over Beethoven and Bo Diddley under Mickie Most's production. Leo sang, with backing from John Miles, Suzi Quatro, Kenney Jones of the Faces and... John Christie! 1977 was going to be marvellous for him after all.


And yes, he still had that smug face he pulls. Via this set of Swap Shop Book 1978 scans, which also features actual slides used in the chart rundown

EDIT NEWS: videos by Bryan Ferry (This Is Tomorrow) and Boston (More Than A Feeling, which you'd have thought would have been more of a pull than Rockaria)