Words:
Chris Arnsby
Simon Mayo: “Welcome to Top of the Pops. Coming up before seven thirty, you're going to see some of the UK's top live bands. Don't go away. Sorry about the glasses by the way but underneath I look though I've done about five rounds with Mike Tyson. I might show you later. We'll start at number fourteen with the FPI Project, Going Back to My Roots.”
Simon
Mayo is doing the whole Roy Orbison bit. Black leather jacket and dark glasses
indoors. He looks like an idiot. Alas for my powers of attention, I talked over
his explanation for the glasses because I was too busy having a conversation
about how silly he looked. Conjunctivitises, apparently.
Meanwhile,
the F.P.I. PROJECT have gained a singer. Sharon Dee Clarke. This results in the
group getting their third caption from two performances; the 21/12/1989 show
credited them as F.P.I. PROJECT present RICH IN PARADISE; the 04/01/1990 repeat
listed them as just the F.P.I. PROJECT; and now they are F.P.I. PROJECT
featuring SHARON DEE CLARKE.
Sharon
Dee Clarke is a distinguished theatre and television actor. She has worked
consistently from 1986 and her career spans The Singing Detective to Waffle
the Wonder Dog. I wonder if it's her presence here that justifies the
two-weeks-in-a-row outing for Going Back To My Roots. With her on stage it is
basically a completely different song. Alternatively, it could just be a lack
of coordination between Stanley Appel (Producer and Director last week) and
Brian Whitehouse (this week).
[24]
JIMMY SOMERVILLE: you make me feel (mighty real). Promo VT.
CHARTS: 40 to 31
[16]
D MOB featuring NUFF JUICE: put your hands together. Check out the bloke to the
left of Simon Mayo. He's delighted to be there, and during a 10 second link he
manages to wave at the camera, give a thumbs up, a devil horns sign, another
thumbs up, applaud, and point at the stage before the camera pan. Give this guy
a contract and make him part of the studio crew.
Chris
Kempton is on Lighting this week. He colours the studio in shades of blue and
purple. He was also on duty last week to colour the studio in shades of blue
and purple. Looking back to the 21/01/1988 show, I find I described Chris
Kempton lighting “the stage in shades of blue and purple”*. Change the colours
Chris.
*To
be fair, 21/01/1988 seems to have been his first time out and I described it as
looking “very nice.” How quickly tastes change.
[12]
MANTRONIX featuring WONDRESS: got to have your love. Promo VT.
[25]
FISH: big wedge. Fish is dressed as Uncle Sam for reasons. It's a good look and it
suits him. The vertically striped trousers really emphasise his height.
CHARTS: 30 to 11
[17]
THE MISSION: butterfly on a wheel. The Mission's drummer looks like he's playing silly buggers. For
the first chunk of the performance he's just sitting in the background not
doing anything. When one of the hand held camera operators catches an angle on
him, he's just sitting there staring awkwardly off into space and holding his
drum sticks in his hands. That shot gets faded off screen pretty quickly. He
warms up a bit later. Did he miss his cue? I apologise in advance to any
drummers who want to point out he's actually doing amazingly technical things
with all the foot pedals.
[21]
DEACON BLUE: queen of the new year. The handover from The Mission to Deacon Blue is the first
back-to-back studio performance since 23/11/1989; the memorable pairing of The
Stone Roses and Happy Mondays.
(This
assumes you don't count the 25/12/1989 edition which I don't. There was also a
near miss on 30/11/1989 when the Breakers separated Rob 'n' Raz 'n' Leila K
from Tina Turner.)
TOP
10
[1]
NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK: hangin' tough. Promo VT.
[30]
HALO JAMES: could have told you so. Simon Mayo closes the show by giving us a look at his
conjunctivitises; ew. Nicky Campbell next week; eeww.
Fast
forward:
New Kids on the Block.
Mute:
No one.
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