Top of the Pops 2 August 1990

Words: Chris Arnsby

Bruno Brookes: “Good evening. How the devil are you? All this lovely hot weather and of course all these hot hits. Coming up later on we've got Madonna, Duran Duran, and New Kids On The Block. First of all a band making their debut on Top of the Pops with a new entry. Little Angels and She's A Little Angel.”

[21] LITTLE ANGELS: She's A Little Angel. Ron Bristow has been given access to the studio light switches this week and I like the white spotlights he's set up around the main stage. They white out the picture as the camera tracks in from Bruno Brookes. It gives a real stadium-rock feel.

[17] NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK: Tonight. Promo VT.

CHARTS: 40 TO 31

[14] LFO: LFO. Promo VT.

[20] BELL BIV DEVOE: One Love. Midway through the performance, the bloke in yellow decides to lean down and do something into the lens of one of the handheld cameras at the front of the stage. I'm not sure what it is, I don't think it's anything more sinister than pointing but the reaction of the programme could make you believe he was doing all the most obscene gestures in the world at the same time.

Hilary West, our Vision Mixer for the week, immediately cuts to a second handheld camera. It's clearly too early and not in the right position. The picture makes no sense. Half the screen is blocked by the lower torso of the bloke in yellow, and the camera operator has to make a startled lurch to the left to get something resembling a broadcast acceptable picture (they manage it, more or less, although a chunk of screen remains obscured by a buttock area profile view).

I can't stress this enough. Don't do anything during recording that you didn't do in the camera rehearsal. No matter how much fun it seems. The response from the gallery will always be “NO!”.

Likewise, when the guy in red climbs the stairs at the back of the stage. He disappears off into the rear of the shot and the studio smoke. He doesn't get a close up even though he's singing at the time. I assume in the gallery Paul Ciani just said “oh leave him to it. Ignore him and keep on the other two.”

Fair play to the guy in yellow at the end. When he decides to sit at the front of the stage and hold hands with one of the girls in the audience, he does get the camera to follow him, reluctantly.

TOP 5: JULY ALBUMS. Remember the Top 5 Albums? A new monthly feature introduced in July? Paul Ciani remembers. I wonder if it will still be running by September?

[5] I'M BREATHLESS: Madonna. Promo VT for Vogue.

[4] SUMMER DREAMS: Beach Boys. Footage...? It's probably a promo put together for the 1990 re-release of Wouldn't It Be Nice; released as a single 02/06/1990. It got to [58]. Week 2 it was down to [78] and then fell out of the Top 100. If that is where this footage comes from, then the video is not on the internet.

[3] HOT ROCKS 1964-1971: Rolling Stones. Paint It, Black. This footage probably comes from a promo VT put together for a 1990 re-release which was less successful than Wouldn't It Be Nice. Paint It, Black peaked at [61] and spent three weeks in the charts. Albums and singles were clearly aimed at different markets in 1990. The sixties footage (which appears to be film transferred to videotape in the worst possible way) comes from this performance, https://archive.org/details/paint-it-black-rolling-stones-live-1966 I'm guessing this was a promo film like the ones The Beatles were doing in 1966. Where does the helicopter come from? Paint It, Black had been featured in Full Metal Jacket and the TV series Tour of Duty so maybe it was dropped it in during the 1990 edit.

[2] THE ESSENTIAL PAVAROTTI: Luciano Pavarotti. Promo VT for Nessun dorma.

[1] SLEEPING WITH THE PAST: Elton John. Promo VT for Healing Hands. Not previously seen on Top of the Pops because the 1989 single didn't get into the Top 40.

[2] MADONNA: Hanky Panky. Promo VT.

CHARTS: 30 to 11

[11] PRINCE: Thieves In The Temple. Promo VT.

[16] DREAM WARRIORS: Wash Your Face In My Sink. “Dream Warriors, right over there,” says Bruno Brookes pointing at a videotape machine playing BBC VT footage from 19/07/1990. Looks like we're only getting two new studio performances this week.

[23] DURAN DURAN: Violence of Summer. All together now, Promo VT.

TOP 10

[1] PARTNERS IN KRYME: Turtle Power. Live in the studio no Promo VT! Sorry, I've messed up all the punctuation. That should: read Live in the studio? No, Promo VT. We don't even get a couple of foam rubber Ninja/Hero Turtles this week.

How come Partners In Kryme could only get two turtles for the video? Were Raphael and Donatello unavailable? (John- Perhaps they were busy fighting crime?)

[22] TRICKY DISCO: Tricky Disco. Promo VT. Bonus points for featuring lots of footage of the Cadbury's Smash Robots but minus those points for extensively featuring the “woo” “yeah” sample.

 A very studio performance light week. There were apparently two pre-records, one for Phil Collins and That's Just The Way It Is. The other for Dave Stewart and the Spiritual Cowboys with Jack Talking. Neither would be broadcast. That information comes from Top Pop 1964-2006 by Pete Seaton, and thanks as always to mumu03 for telling me about it.

 Performance of the week: To hell with it. I haven't played my Joker for a while. Partners In Kryme, Turtle Power.