Top of the Pops 17th and 24th August 1989

 

Words: Chris Arnsby

17/08/1989

Nicky Campbell: “Hello, welcome to another unashamedly brilliant and superlative Top of the Pops. We've got Neneh Cherry, Alice Cooper, Jody Watley, everything and the girl. Anthea Turner.” 
Anthea Turner: “Thank you very much Nicky! Hey! Have I got an honest face?!
Nicky Campbell: “Scrupulously.”
Anthea Turner: “Believe me! Italian dance music's going to be the biggest thing to hit this country! And Black Box are here!”

 [11] BLACK BOX: ride on time. Call me Mr Cynical but I'm not sure I fully buy Anthea Turner's expert knowledge of Italian dance music and it's forthcoming impact on this country. Nicky Campbell has an odd look on his face, like he's primed Anthea Turner with this insight and is now trying to suppress a smirk. [Obligatory comment about Nicky Campbell always looking like that, goes here].

The opening to the show is a single camera shot, although it doesn't stand out because of the range of motion the camera goes through. From the opening pan up to the hosts, back down to the main stage, and then the pull back across the studio while the introduction to Ride on Time plays. Then there's some light editing trickery. After the transition, the hand held camera shot looking out into the studio comes from a different take because otherwise there's no time for the camera operator to get into position. It's unusual for Top of the Pops to cheat footage like this but it must have been irresistible because it perfectly captures the change in energy between the introduction and the song.

[31] JODY WATLEY with ERIC B. & RAKIM: friends. Promo VT.

CHARTS FROM 40 TO 31.

[5] MARTIKA: toy soldiers. More excellent use of the hand held cameras. In this case the shot pushing through the dry ice waterfall.

Watch out for the pan across the audience as they self-consciously wave their arms above their heads; some of them are nearly in time. Watch out also for the moment when Martika flings the microphone stand to the floor. If it's damaged, it's coming out of your fee.

[4] ALICE COOPER: poison. Promo VT.

BREAKERS:

[39] STARLIGHT: numero uno

[40] ALYSON WILLIAMS: i need your lovin'

[38] THEN JERICO:  sugar box

[24] FUZZBOX: self: More quality dry ice work. Derek Slee, back on Lighting, hangs a disco ball behind the band which reflects and projects onto another dry ice waterfall. It produces moving streaks of light which look like a live action attempt at the Doctor Who title sequence.

CHARTS FROM 30 TO 11

[23] NENEH CHERRY: kisses on the wind. Neneh Cherry again treats her appearance on Top of the Pops as a piece of performance art. For Buffalo Stance, there were the ragdoll dancers. Here we've got an actor taking the role of “she” in the song and miming the spoken word parts, and at times making it look like Neneh Cherry is being scolded by her teenage self.

Quantel update. Robin Lobb is doing the Video Effects this week and the box has clearly had an upgrade. It's now doing a, kind of, after image effect. So as the inset picture jumps around the screen it it followed by has orange rectangles. Giving a nice impression of motion and speed. If you remember the Windows “mouse trails” option. It's like that but with orange rectangles.

[26] QUEEN: the invisible man. Promo VT. I had that Renegade poster. Other game posters spotted; what looks like a generic one for software company Microdeal. There's one for a game called Xeno; Legend of the Sword, by Rainbird. Trap by Alligata. And, I think, Romulus by Quicksilva.

TOP 10

[1] JIVE BUNNY & THE MASTERMIXERS: swing the mood. Promo VT. With inset shots of the audience dancing and partying like it's 1979.

The last inset is the most interesting. It expands to full screen as the video, finally, ends so Nicky Campbell and Anthea Turner can bid us goodnight. But, it looks like Vision Mixer Carol Abbott cuts to the shot too soon. If you look at the postage stamp-sized version overlaid on the video, you can see the Floor Manager dragging people around and then dashing out of frame.

[36] ADVEA: warning: Promo VT. Jackie Brambles and Mark Goodier next week.

 Performance of the week:  Neneh Cherry, Kisses on the Wind.

24/08/1989

Mark Goodier: “Hi, good evening and welcome to this week's Top of the Pops. 
Jakki Brambles: “Great to be here and we've got a well wicked show for you.”
Mark Goodier: “Yeah we have some big stars too, Cliff Richard, Bon Jovi, Then Jericho as well.”
Jakki Brambles: “And right here in the studio we've got the fourth consecutive single from the Beatmasters featuring Betty Boo.”

[11] THE BEATMASTERS / BETTY BOO: hey DJ i can't dance to… Crank the Changed Graphics siren because we've got ourselves some changed graphics. This week the host's introductory captions are different. Up to last week both hosts were named on a single line caption with an asterisk in the middle to separate the names; or, if the show had one host then their caption had an asterisk at both ends; or, if the combined names were too long to fit on a single line, the two lines of text were styled with the top line left justified and ending with an asterisk, and the bottom line right justified and starting with an asterisk. I will be asking you to draw a diagram later.

This week, Mark Goodier and Jakki Brambles' names automatically get a line each and each line starts and ends with a graphic that looks a bit like a target. I think it's as close as the caption generator can get to the stylized O in the Pops bit of the Top of the Pops logo. Talking of captions. The Beatmasters and Betty Boo are truncated. When Top of the Pops showed the Promo VT (10/08/1989) they spread the caption over three lines, for some reason that isn't done here so the two line caption trails off into an ellipsis. We'll never know what Betty Boo can't dance to.

[13] LISA STANSFIELD: this is the right time. The Beatmasters and Betty Boo are on the main stage. Lisa Stansfield is set up on the stage diagonally opposite at the far end of the studio. Lisa Stansfield is of course a former protege of the Beatmasters and the arrangement of stages is odd; as if the programme is trying to keep the two groups as far apart as possible. I'm sure that wasn't necessary.

CHARTS FROM 40 TO 31.

[19] ALYSON WILLIAMS: i need your lovin'. Vision Mixer Kathryn Randall makes good use of vignettes to mix a long shot of Alyson Williams with a close up taken from a different angle. Occasionally the big screen (you remember, the one that used to be down the side of the main stage but is now up the wall) intrudes into the background of shot, showing the same picture, and there are four Alyson Williams.

[17] STARLIGHT: numero uno. Promo VT. Watch out for the clever transition into the video, which peels the picture of Mark Goodier off the underlying video as if it was a plastic film being pulled down. Nice one Ben Fuller, Video Effects.

[24] THEN JERICO: sugar box. Simon Parkin hosted the 27/07/1989 Top of the Pops and also recorded a behind the scenes report for But First This... I'm mentioning it now because But First This... showed it two days before this episode of Top of the Pops on 22 August (and definitely not because I forgot to mention it during the write up for the 27/07/1989 Top of the Pops. I can't stress that enough. It makes much more sense to write about it here than when it was recorded. I'm glad we cleared that up).

You can watch the report here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-TlEEdcv9I

It's well worth eight minutes of your time. The report catches the show in a week when there were only three studio acts, The Primitives, Kirsty McColl, and Sonia. Bros were pre recorded. Kirsty McColl is completely left alone. Sonia gets some coverage, unfortunately, but not as much as you might expect. The Primitives are interviewed in their spartan dressing room and shown during camera rehersals. And the remainder of the report is given over to Paul McCartney who was in studio to record This Time, for a performance that would be used a week later, 03/08/1989. Best bit, for me, is a chance to see how the Chart Countdowns are recorded during camera rehersals. We see Mark Goodier and Simon Parkin sitting down and reading from a script while a Floor Manager, between them, cues whoever is reading the next bit by giving them a tap. I always assumed the hosts were watching playback of the Chart Countdown but that's not the case although the Chart Countdown is being played into the big studio screen; so the screen must be showing the feed recorded by VT.

Why did But First This... sit on their report for a month? No idea. Maybe it takes that long to edit. Or maybe Top of the Pops wanted a bit of a delay so people didn't remember Paul McCartney didn't feature in the Simon Parkin episode.

[QUIZ TIME: If the hosts were Nicky Campbell and Steve Wright, please draw a diagram illustrating how their captions would be laid out on screen].

CHARTS FROM 30 TO 11

[23] BON JOVI: lay your hands on me. Promo VT. The structure of this edition is odd. The first half is all studio acts (with the exception of Starlight, obviously), and the second half is all videos.

[18] ADEVA: warning. Promo VT. If you have the chance, look at the transition into the Adeva video. It's really sophisticated. Two empty frames slide down the screen, one blue and one purple. It's as if two of the regular picture-in-picture Quantel boxes have had their border width turned up to the maximum, while the bit where the inset picture goes is left transparent. Ben Fuller then wipes into the video by thickening the blue frame inwards, to fill in the transparent gap, fading up the Adeva video at the same time. It's a couple of seconds work, but the effect goes a long way beyond anything the programme has used before. It ends up looking a lot like the neon frames used as set dressing in the video, which may have inspired the effect.

[10] CLIFF RICHARD: i just don't have the heart. Promo VT.

TOP 10

[1] JIVE BUNNY & THE MASTERMIXERS: swing the mood. Promo VT. For all the inspiration the programme has shown earlier with electronic effects, no one can be bothered to do anything interesting with the Jive Bunny video. A level of disinterest it deserves.

[28] DONNA SUMMER: love's about to change my heart. Gary Davies next week.

 Performance of the week: The Beatmasters and Betty Boo, Hey DJ I Can't Dance (To That Music You're Playing).