Top of the Pops 27th June 1991

 Words: Chris Arnsby

Simon Mayo: “Hello this is Top of the Pops. Thirty minutes of songs for your folks to complain about. Question. Give me a singing superstar from Belgium. Yes, yes, yes. Singing nun. Any ideas? Plastic Bertrand. Yes. Any more? Well you can add this lot to the pile because they’re at number twenty two a spooky thing, the band are Cubic 22.”

 [22] CUBIC 22: NIGHT IN MOTION. Please welcome Stanley Appel to the Produced and Directed by credit. He’s been around for years, obviously, but now he is here to shepherd Top of the Pops into the nineties, and beyond. This is awkward. I don’t much like his style. I’ve previously described it as dull. Although, fair play to the man, he directed a storming performance by The Wedding Present on the 27/09/1990 show.

[14] PAULA ABDUL: RUSH RUSH. Promo VT and charts from [40] to [2]. According to Wikipedia, “The British Top of the Pops aired an alternate version of the video, re-edited to contain more "performance shots" and less story. Many more shots of Abdul dancing in the orange dress were present.[citation needed]”

[3] ERASURE: CHORUS. Multiple Vince Clarkes and a tableaux of Andy Bell as choristers. Shop display mannequins with lookalike heads? Waxworks? Maybe. But surely wax figures would melt under the studio lights?

Vince Clarke, for a funny joke, has decided to stand motionless (even more motionless than usual) amid his duplicates but the jokes on him. Standing intentionally still like that is really difficult and I’ll bet he was regretting his choice by the end of the song.

[25] ALICE COOPER: HEY STOOPID. Promo VT.

[18] OMAR: THERE’S NOTHING LIKE THIS. Simon Mayo waxes philosophical. “What do you think the summer of ‘91 will be remembered for? The great British weather? Don’t think so. A British victory at Wimbledon? Don’t think so. Terry Venables smile? Well maybe. More likely this, at eighteen this is Omar.” Sorry Omar, I remember the song but I thought it was sung by Terence Trent D'Arby.

BREAKERS

[27] CHESNEY HAWKES: I’M A MAN NOT A BOY

[26] INCOGNITO/JOCELYN BROWN: ALWAYS THERE

[11] LENNY KRAVITZ: IT AIN’T OVER ‘TIL IT’S OVER. BBC VT, repeated from 13/06/1991.

[8] BRYAN ADAMS: (EVERYTHING I DO) I DO IT FOR YOU. Promo VT. So soon? I thought I had more time.

[12] DIVINYLS: I TOUCH MYSELF. Notable for a caption which is extremely rude indeed. A stick figure using the name of the band and the chart position icon as the head torso and legs, and the name of the song as the arms. And then the left arm, how can I phrase this without getting This Way Up Subject to the online safety act… the left arm bends and touches itself… down below. You know… under the Plimsoll line. Gosh. Is it hot in here or is it just me? No, the thermometer is reading 28.6. It is hot in here. And out there.

The caption whisks off screen really quickly (briefly coming back for an encore appearance for the benefit of anyone watching who missed it the first time). It’s on and off screen so quickly, I could believe it was the subject of a bet to see if it could get passed the BBC scrutineers. It did. Well done Video Caption Artist Michelle Greaves. You foul-minded naughty person.

[1] JASON DONOVAN: ANY DREAM WILL DO. The performance starts with Jason Donovan a tiny white speck in a black picture, illuminated by a single white spotlight. Slowly the camera moves towards him. Two more white spotlights fade up as the lyrics begin. Jason Donovan is still tiny in the frame but gradually he gets larger as the camera moves in. Behind him, bits of the set are illuminated. They don’t look like any of the usual Top of the Pops stages. Has this performance been filmed on location at whichever theatre was hosting Joseph’s Coat! I can see the silhouette of heads bobbing around at the bottom of the frame but they could be that’s the cast of kids who eventually join Jason Donovan in song. We’re now forty seconds into the performance. Jason Donovan is in a mid shot and I still can’t work out if we’re looking at the Top of the Pops studio or somewhere else (shot on video). This is great. I can’t believe that 600-odd words earlier I was describing Stanley Appel’s directing style as dull.

Then, on the line “I wore my coat,” Terry Brett fades up the studio lights and, it’s the Main Stage in the studio. It’s really good and stylish. Terry Brett has packed the main stage with lights, of many colours and it’s a textbook example of how to lift a plodding song.

This is a sneaky pre-recorded performance. At the end of the song, Simon Mayo is back on the green screen to say goodnight, overlaid on to the standard camera view looking down on the Main Stage and Jason Donovan isn’t there. My best guess, this was recorded at the start of the studio session to give him more time to leg it back across London for the evening performance.

[28] CARTER -UNSTOPPABLE SEX MACHINE: SHERIFF FATMAN. Promo VT. Gary Davies next week.

 Countdown to Year Zero revamp: 14

Ratings: A very good week. [25] 6.67 million. Better than 1990 which scored [28] with 6.56 million viewers.

 Performance of the week: You know, I’m not sure. Erasure is best overall, but the Divinyls had the naughty caption, and the staging of Any Dream Will Do was brilliant. This week everyone gets a prize. All three of them.