Top of the Pops 4 October 1990

 Words: Chris Arnsby

Simon Mayo: “Hello. Good evening. It's great to be back on Top of the Pops. Be... Before 7.30 we have the Pet Shop Boys, Mariah McKee, an outrageous piece of film from Bobby Vincent, and starting at number seven with Twenty Four Seven featuring Captain Hollywood, this is I Can't Stand It... the noise is unbelievable tonight.”

 [7] TWENTY 4 SEVEN Featuring CAPTAIN HOLLYWOOD: I Can't Stand It! What has Simon Mayo been up to? He's not been seen since 31/05/1990. In June he defected to another Thursday night programme called Life On One. “A topical magazine aimed at helping you survive the nineties.” This ran weekly from 28/06/1990 to 13/09/1990 and, along with the  Radio 1 Breakfast Show, presumably left little time for Top of the Pops. Although he did have time to record a Radio 1 series called In My Life, 10 one hour episodes about the life and music of John Lennon. Busy busy busy.

Also busy. Twenty 4 Seven and Captain Hollywood. They have been practising all week and put in an energetic and bouncy performance; watch out for the bit where the bloke who isn't Captain Hollywood (First Lieutenant* Pinewood?) slides between Captain Hollywood's dancing legs. And yet somehow it all falls a bit flat because Stanley Appel is still Producer & Director and I find his style dull; occasional bursts of excitement like last week's performance by the Wedding Present aside.

Also, Stanley Appel nearly misses Captain Hollywood's entry on stage. The song starts with three people dancing away and then, in the middle of a panning shot, Captain Hollywood runs on stage and joins them. The problem is, he's kind of lost in the smoke and lights and slightly masked by the other dancers. It doesn't help that just as he reaches the middle of the stage the camera cuts to a close up of Nancy "Nance" Coolen. Maybe it worked better in rehearsal.

*I am assuming Captain Hollywood is an army captain. If he's navy then the other bloke would be Commander Pinewood.

[19] M.C. HAMMER: Have You Seen Her. Promo VT.

CHARTS: 40 TO 31

[4] PET SHOP BOYS: So Hard. Having just said I don't much like Stanley Appel's direction, he goes and does something good during Simon Mayo's introduction to the Pet Shop Boys. Coming out of the Charts, the picture cuts to a hand held camera shot of the stairs up to one of the studio bridges. The audience are lined along the side and Simon Mayo is off in the distance. The camera operator walks towards Simon Mayo and then as he finishes his link, the camera looks over the edge of the bridge and down on to the Pet Shop Boys on stage.

It's good but it, kind of, sums up my problem with Stanley Appel. He does clever and innovative work but pushes it to the fringes of the programme. The introductions and the transitions. The actual direction of the music performances is frequently much more ordinary. Paul Ciani is better at making Top of the Pops as a complete package. Anyway. That's enough whining about Stanley Appel this week.

[12] TECHNOTRONIC: Megamix. Promo VT. “The BBC World Service has a very important magazine programme called Megamix,” this link isn't just a piece of whimsy on Simon Mayo's part. It did. A weekly 30 minute programme which ran from 1988-98. The programme was designed to attract a younger listenership and presumably Mr S. Mayo was one of the contributors.

TOP 5 SEPTEMBER ALBUMS

[5] OOH LAS VEGAS: Deacon Blue: Circus Light

[4] SOUL PROVIDER: Michael Bolton: Soul Provider

[3] SLEEPING WITH THE PAST: Elton John: Club at the End of the Street

[2] LISTEN WITHOUT PREJUDICE VOLUME 1: George Michael: Waiting for that Day.

Wondering why the video clip is a dull series of George Michael promotional stills that float slowly upscreen against a generic background? Well, it looks like this was made by the BBC because there wasn't a video.

(George Michael's previous single, Praying For Time also didn't get featured, even though it went into the chart at [8] and could have been played on either the 23/08 or 30/08/1990 show. The video was just a boring black screen with lyrics.)

[1] IN CONCERT: Pavarotti, Domingo, Carreras: O Sole Mio

[18] MC TUNES Versus 808 STATE: Tunes Splits The Atom. The boys from 808 State have too much electrical equipment for the normal Top of the Pops scaffold stands. Fortunately someone has found some very smart looking black units. They look like they might have been purpose build from the same stuff used to build the studio rostra and platforms. (John - 808 State were not, in fact, real scientists)

CHARTS: 30 to 11

BREAKERS

[31] ADVENTURES OF STEVIE V: Body Language

[30] THE BEAUTIFUL SOUTH: A Little Time

[29] NENEH CHERRY: I Got You Under My Skin

[28] THE CHIMES: Heaven

[31] BOBBY VINTON: Blue Velvet. Charting not off the back of the David Lynch film (like I thought because I am an ignoramus) but because the song was used on a Nivea advert. Where is this clip from? Simon Mayo identifies it as “a piece of film taken from an old 1977 American TV show.” This doesn't help.

Here's what I know. A) It's probably video. B) Bobby Vincent is probably singing with a group called The Peaches. C) It's probably The Bobby Vincent Show which aired on CTV (a Canadian channel) between 1975 and 1978*. Alas, the internet doesn't contain a detailed programme listing for The Bobby Vincent Show and so I cannot be more specific than that, although I think his shirt collar screams mid-seventies.

*The Bobby Vincent Show was syndicated to local US channels during the seventies but I don't think Simon Mayo is referencing the vagaries of American independent affiliates in his brief link.

TOP 10. Two new transmitters have come online bringing new parts of the country into the amazing world of stereo FM. 97.9 East Bayside (at least, I think that's what Simon Mayo says) and 97.3 in Grampian.

[1] MARIA McKEE: Show Me Heaven. Promo VT.

[24] HI TEK 3 Featuring YA KID K: Spin That Wheel (Turtles Get Real). Promo VT. Bruno Brookes next week.

More Turtlemania and the film hasn't even been released in the UK yet. As with Turtle Power, only Michelangelo and Leonardo are available for the video; what were the other two doing?

The later portion of this video gets pretty martial arts weapon heavy; including, gasp, prolonged use of nunchaku. Does this explain why this episode features both the Top 5 Albums and Breakers? Were the production team padding out the running time enough that the video could be played but also faded off air before ninja weapons got used?

 Countdown to Year Zero revamp: 52

Performance of the week: Pet Shop Boys, So Hard.