Top of the Pops 4 February 1988

 

Reviewed by Chris Arnsby. Mike Smith: “Good evening. Welcome to Television Centre and Top of the Pops once again. We have Bros in the studio tonight, Elton John is with us, we have the Screaming Blue Messiahs, and over here with Get Out Of My Dreams. Billy Ocean.”

 [27] BILLY OCEAN: get out of my dreams. Eric Wallis starts off the show with a simple but effective Lighting trick. The camera pans across the studio during the introduction to the song (the bit that does the rising “wwooooooohhh”) and only Billy himself is visible, lit from above by a white spotlight, then as the song kicks in the rest of the studio lights are turned up revealing the group and, how many people are on stage? Three backing singers, two guitarists, two keyboard player, a saxophonist, a drummer, and Mr Ocean himself. There's a lot of people crammed on to one smallish stage. I think it's more people than featured last week with the inaccurately named Two Men A Drum Machine And A Trumpet.

Top of the Pops doesn't tend to open with performances on what I've always called the main stage, the one with the neon logo to stage left and the big screen to stage right. The trend recently has been to reserve then for big set piece performances, see Krush, 14/01/1988, or TMADMAAT as I've taken to calling Two Men A Drum Machine And A Trumpet (it's quicker than typing out the full name). Given the size of Billy Ocean's band, why don't they get given the bigger stage? What's the big set piece performance coming this week? Stay tuned listeners.

Fact. Billy Ocean's entire band could fit in the capacious pockets of his enormous coat

 

[16] KYLIE MINOGUE: i should be so lucky. On video, “filmed specially for Top of the Pops,” says Mike Smith. How many times does that car drive across the Sydney Harbour Bridge? At least four. Wikipedia makes Mike Smith a liar. The site claims this recording premiered on Christmas Morning With Noel his 1987's live up the Post Office Telecom Tower. Mike or Wikipedia? There's no way to check because that edition (and that edition alone) is not on the internet.

[28] THE SCREAMING BLUE MESSIAHS: i wanna be a flintstone. “I think they're terrific,” David Bowie (Rolling Stone magazine, 23 April 1987). (John- He was misquoted, he was actually asked what he thought about The Dancing Donuts)

The Flintstones was a frequent presence on BBC1 in 1987, appearing in that weird backwater slot which existed at 17.35 between the end of Children's BBC and the Six O'clock News. Alas such innocent fun couldn't be allowed to continue and Michael Grade, pantomime demon and Managing Director designate (whatever that means), stuck Neighbours in the 17.35 slot from Monday 4^th January 1988. This was the cause of Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Danni Minogue, The Wedding Theme from Neighbours by Angry Anderson, and probably more.

Singer Bill Carter risks incurring the wrath of the BBC Sound department (represented tonight on Top of the Pops by Martin Deane). It looks like he's taken a microphone off its stand and popped it in his pocket for later use. He later compounds the sin by casually dropping the microphone on the floor. Then he moves over to another mike, plucks it off the stand and briefly uses it as a guitar pick. Those things cost money Bill.

TOP 40.

[2] BROS: when will i be famous. “Now, we all know that Tiffany is still top of the British chart,” says Mike Smith, spoiling the chart reveal in the context of his introduction to Bros. The bothers (and the other one) are back again, like the atomic logging machine from Thunderbirds, they CANNOT BE STOPPED.It's a smart, well directed performance, with lots of sweeping crane shots and good hand held camera work. It's just, Bros. Unfortunately. How many close ups does the one who isn't Matt or Luke get? Zero. (John- Poor Ken, an outcast from the start)

TOP 40 BREAKERS: [26] LUTER VANDROSS, give me the reason; [29] SINEAD O'CONNOR, mandinka.

[10] ELTON JOHN: candle in the wind. “Now a special treat from one of the world's biggest rock stars. This song was in the charts in 1974. It was in the Top 20. These days it's up there and it's even bigger, it's up to number ten this week. With Candle In The Wind, here's Elton John.” This Mike Smith bigs up Elton John's trip to the Top of the Pops studio. He's always been careful to give his time to Top of the Pops and since 1979 he's clocked up about one studio appearance a year (with a couple of exceptions, nothing in 1981, 1984, and 1986).

It's tempting to compare Elton John's attitude to some of the other big beasts around at the time, but given David Bowie recorded an unused performance (18/06/1987, and I'm still bitter about it) maybe the better question is what guaranteed Elton John such an open door? He's been given studio time for forgettable songs like Sartorial Eloquence which peaked at 44, in 1982. Were Split Enz not available? (The Dancing Donuts were available)

Anyway, this is the big show-stopping performance hinted at earlier. Elton's tinkling on his keyboard and standing behind him are eighteen members of the audience, 16 of whom are holding small torches which are supposed to look like candles. Why only 16? Did Floor Manager Carmella Milne not bring enough for everyone? Or have the two on the end dropped theirs in the dry ice?

I hate Candle in the Wind. I didn't like it much in 1988 and my dislike for it only hardened during 1997. Candle In The Wind has accreted a myth that it's some Great Song and Mike Smith's reverential introduction buys into that myth and tries to sell this performance as some televisual landmark like the Moon landing. Bah! Oh Elton, do please give us the crumbs from your table. The best moment of the performance comes right at the end, as Elton John's caption is displayed on screen (it's in the shape of a candle, natch) a member of the studio crew realises he's supposed to be somewhere else. He's standing on a stage right to the left of the camera, so when he jumps off he goes right through the bottom left of the picture, he's also lit bright orange which jars against Eric Wallis' sombre blue colour scheme. I'll bet Paul Ciani was cross.

TOP 10.

[1] TIFFANY: I think we're alone now. A repeat of last week's performance. Which is odd because the BBC has access to a perfectly good Top of the Pops USA performance (13/11/1987). Does Paul Ciani not like using TOTP USA clips, or is their use being wound down because the programme is coming to an end, or is no one making the effort because everyone's assuming Bros will be Number 1 next week?

[12] JACK 'N' CHILL: the jack that house built. Gary Davies and the lesser spotted Bruno Brookes next week. Mike Smith closes the show with a plug for Comic Relief day, “tomorrow” (and not 8^th February 1988 like Wikipedia claims). A Night of Comic Relief ran from 19.35 until late (with a break for the Nine O'clock News) but time-travellers might also like to tune to BBC2 at 23.20 for the inaccurately-named Midnight Movie, giant ant (gi-ant) thriller Them!

Top of the Pops closes with the video for The Jack That House Built. Towards the middle of the video a strange wire-frame figure appears on the screen; one of the baddies from top 1986 computer game Starglider. I hit Google to find out if this was taken from the ZX Spectrum or Atari ST version (these things matter, a lot) only to find quite a saga:

 

Chart Watch UK - Hits of 1988, by James Masterson: “Promoting the hit single caused the duo one or two headaches, there being little for them to even pretend to perform. Hence a rather infamous Top of the Pops performance where the two producers assembled their equipment on stage and proceeded to play 'Starglider' on the Atari ST computers on which the track had been created, leaving the cameras instead to focus on the only other person onstage -the heavily oiled bodybuilder flexing his muscles in time with the music.”

 Chart Watch UK was written in 2015 so it's fair enough that the author didn't know there was another pop-game in town in 1988, but readers of this blog won't be surprised to hear that the oiled-bodybuilder incident didn't take place on Top of the Pops. It was on The Roxy, and you can watch it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWbbl3si_oo

 Performance of the week: I don't much like any of the ToTP performances this week. Not even The Screaming Blue Messiahs, sorry David Bowie. So it's Jack 'n' Chill, The Jack That House Built, on The Roxy.

 The Roxy Playlist, 02/02/1988: In studio; Jack 'n' Chill, The Jack That House Built; T'Pau, Valentine; Sharpe & Numan, No More Lies; Sinead O'Connor, Mandinka; Bros, When Will I Be Famous. On video; Kylie Minogue, I Should Be So Lucky; Tiffany, I think we’re Alone Now.