First shown on 5/10/78
Words: Chris Arnsby
Words: Chris Arnsby
Kid
Jensen. “For all that's best in the chart welcome to Top of the Pops and this
week's chart countdown is to the tune of Abba!”
Chart
music: Abba, Summer Night City [5].
Third World: Now That We’ve Found Love [18]. It's another one of those Legs & Co routines where nothing matches. The girls are dressed in skimpy skin-tight leotards with ruffles, and are dancing on podiums in front of a star background rejected by Blake's 7 for being rubbish. Meanwhile the lighting director is trying to light the set all the colours of the rainbow, and the vision mixer's response is to occasionally mix in that false colour effect Doctor Who used when Jon Pertwee pulled out the crystal from Metebelis III. The result is hilarious and migraine inducing.
Buzzcocks: Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve) [30]. A repeat of the Buzzcock's first brilliant performance of this song from the 21/9/78 edition.
Elaine Paige: Don’t Walk Away Till I Touch You [NEW]. Wooomb, wooomb, goes the electric guitar in the background as the Top of the Pops orchestra do their best to mimic the sound of Elaine Paige's original single. It turns out that this silly noise is the most memorable feature of this song.
Boney M: Rasputin [9]. Oh my. It's strange to see the low key introduction of a song which has become an byword for seventies kitsch. Boney M aren't even in the studio, instead we get a video clip from, I'm guessing, a German variety show; probably their version of Seaside Special. It's not clear but to judge by the various audience members chewing away the format is some sort of variety show in a bierkeller. The most notable thing about the clip (apart from the song obv.) is the laid back reaction of the watching audience to Bobby Farrell's insane barefoot dancing .
Marshall Hain: Coming Home [NEW]. A dull song which suffers from following Rasputin in the running order.
Sham 69: Hurry Up Harry [NEW]. “'urry up 'arry c'mon,” sings Jimmy Pursey dropping his consonants and making Professor Higgins bite through his hat in frustration. How the name Harry has changed. In 1978 Harry was a salt of the earth bloke you'd take down the pub, now he's fourth in line to the throne.
Sham 69: He was so hungry waiting for `Arry that he started to eat his microphone |
Leo
Sayer: I Can’t Stop Loving You (Though I Try) [7]. Another outing for the first
performance of this song from Top of the Pops 7/9/78 rather than last week's
(BBC4 pace, we've skipped another D*v* L** Tr*v*s edition) nightmarish floating
Leo Sayer heads version.
The Boomtown Rats: Rat Trap [NEW]. I really liked the last two Boomtown Rats singles, Like Clockwork and She's So Modern, but this one seems all over the place. Maybe I'll like it better when I've heard it a few more times.
The Boomtown Rats: Rat Trap [NEW]. I really liked the last two Boomtown Rats singles, Like Clockwork and She's So Modern, but this one seems all over the place. Maybe I'll like it better when I've heard it a few more times.
Number One: John Travolta & Olivia Newton-John, Summer Nights. For anyone wondering how BBC4 would deal with Summer Nights when it gets
to number one here's the answer. The official promo film is snipped again in
place of a Legs & Co/Floyd routine from the 1978 Christmas show. Disappointingly
this routine misses out my 8 year old self's favourite part of the song where
one of the T-Birds says “Tell me more, tell me more/
Could she get me a friend?” and is flicked with a comb.
Could she get me a friend?” and is flicked with a comb.
Closing titles: Electric Light Orchestra, Sweet
Talkin’ Woman [17].
Performance
of the week: Boney M. When a man is tired of Rasputin he is tired of life.
*he
never did.
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