Top of the Pops- 7th / 14th May 1987

 

07/05/1987. Reviewed by Chris Arnsby: Mike Smith: “Good evening. It's Thursday night. Seven o'clock on BBC1. Studio 8. Live from Television Centre. Time to put on another big suit and bring you this week's Top of the Pops. Here's Living In A Box.”

[6] Living In A Box: Living In A Box. There's an odd effect on the transition from the opening titles to Mike Smith. The transitions are normally regular shapes, circles, rectangles, squares (all right, settle down Pythagoras). This one is very chaotic. The colour is muted as well, as if the picture is a tenth generation copy. It looks like something terrible has been done to the output of the Quantel box, like feeding it back through the input of the Quantel box multiple times until the picture has faded and distorted. Obviously Danny Popkin, who is credited with Video Effects, has done something very clever. I mention it mainly because the muted colour persists into the programme for several seconds -long after the picture has gone back to being full screen- it's very noticeable.

Meanwhile, keep an eye on Living In A Box's unnamed backing singer. She's got one move, which involves bending her left leg, and twisting her upper body so she's looking over her left camera. She does this every second or so, like a metronome. Can she keep it up for the whole song? Yes she can.

 

[13] Fleetwood Mac: Big Love. On video.
[23] Depeche Mode: Strangelove. Or, Depech-eh Mode, as Mike Smith calls them. Really? I thought the Depeche/Depech-ey debate had been settled years ago. Even Simon Bates gets it right four times out of five. Depeche Mode sing their song, named presumably following the 28^th December 1986 repeat of Dr Strangelove on BBC2.
Top 40 Charts. Mike Smith favours us with an Algernon Winston Razzmatazz impression when mentioning Carey Johnson at [25]. Please don't ever do that again Mike.
[19] Spear Of Destiny: Never Take Me Alive. Lead singer Kirk Brandon looks like he's wandered in early for the Bros audition. Fred Wright, Lighting Director, cloaks the stage in shadow, except for a white spotlight illuminating Kirk. It looks very nice but the rest of the band must be wondering if their families will see them in the gloom. Fortunately, Fred turns up the lights for the big crescendo at the end of the song. Even more fortunately, the big crescendo at the end of the song goes on for about 90 seconds, so Vision Mixer Hilary West has time to vignette a smaller picture over the main picture and everyone gets a lovely close-up. Except the keyboard player.

Top 40 Breakers: Michael Hurll is away, and Stanley Appel is back in charge. We immediately change back to Appel's preferred format for the Breakers where the host introduces all the songs at the start, and the Breakers aren't interrupted by someone yakking over the top of each song. [27] Europe, Carrie; [17] The Cult, Lil' Devil;
[22] Sly & Robbie: Boops (Here To Go). “Watch out for the man playing the part of Frank Bough,” says Mike Smith of whoever is doing the Howard Cosell impression at the start of this performance (he's on the video as well). It looks like Ken Campbell, but the internet is silent on the subject.

Another small mystery is the “newsflash” caption card just before Frank Bough does his thing. Now obviously it can't look like a real newsflash card to avoid startling the viewers, but the one in the video and the one used by Top of the Pops are identical. Is there an international standard fake newsflash card? Did Sly & Robbie bring theirs along? Did the BBC fake up a card to match the video and, if they did, why is the BBC one black and white compared to the red and black video one? So many questions.

Top 10 Charts.

[1] Starship: Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now. On video. Once again the caption is truncated to Nothing Gonna Stop Us Now. Does the BBC caption generator have a character limit like Twitter?

[9] Kim Wilde & Junior: Another Step. Gary Davies next week. This being a live edition there's a fragment of studio chatter at the end of the recording. “Right, thank you very much we are off the air,” says a voice -probably Floor Manager Iain McLean,” if you've recorded it you can go home and watch yourselves. Can you please leave exactly the way you came being very careful to take handbags and coats because they are very hard to find afterwards. Good night. Thank you.”

 Performance of the week: Sly & Robbie: Boops (Here To Go)

 

14/05/1987. Gary Davies: “Hi. Good evening welcome to Top of the Pops. Not just any old Top of the Pops. Tonight is show number one thousand two hundred and thirteen. A-ha! Thought you'd be impressed. We start with a band who've been together for round about a year. They're at number eighteen in the charts tonight. It's their first appearance on television. This is Johnny Hates Jazz.”

[18] Johnny Hates Jazz: Shattered Dreams. Drummer Calvin Hayes is doing most of the work. Keep an eye on the way he has to keep switching from bongos to cymbals or whatever the thing is he holds in one hand and taps with a drumstick; possibly some sort of clave?  Why not change the whole tone of the song by substituting the word “dreams” with “pelvis”.
[14] The Cult: Lil' Devil. On video.

[22] Europe: Carrie. Also on video. Two in row? I wonder who fell through for a studio appearance?

Top 40 Charts.
[4] Labi Siffre: So Strong. A return to the Top of the Pops studio for Labi Siffre although this week he's allowed to sit down at the piano. Like his previous appearance, Labi starts off alone on stage and is then joined by backing singers and a saxophonist but unlike last time the staging doesn't seem so effective. Previously, we saw everyone walk on stage and (sorry this is going to read a bit pseudo-intellectual) there was a sense of a crowd gathering and a protest growing. This time, the camera cuts from a close up of Labi Siffre to a wide shot of the stage and everyone's just there; as if they've materialised out of the dry ice.

Top 40 Breakers: Who's sitting in the Director's chair this week? It's Brian Whitehouse. Michael Hurll is off preparing for the 1987 The Montreux Rock Festival. Last week Stanley Appel changed the format of the Breakers back to the way he prefers (all the talking done at the start, rather than as each clip begins) and Brian Whitehouse does the same. Let's hope Michael Hurll doesn't review the final edits. He'll be cross. [21] Wet Wet Wet, Wishing I Was Lucky; [13] Cameo, Back And Forth.

[3] Tom Jones: A Boy From Nowhere. Gary Davies reminds us that Tom Jones first appeared on Top of the Pops in 1965 singing It's Not Unusual. I wish he was singing that now.

[1] Starship: Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now. On video. Someone's worked out how to do apostrophes on the caption generator, and the song is finally credited with its proper title.

[24] Zodiac Mindwarp & The Love Reaction: Prime Mover. On video. Next week the show is hosted by Peter Powell and Simon Bates.

 Performance of the week: Johnny Hates Jazz: Shattered Dreams