This week's repeat of Top of the Pops had a rare treat at number one - Doctorin' The Tardis by The Timelords, once described by Pete Paphides as 'the one novelty record most people admit to liking' and by The Timelords themselves as 'probably the most nauseating record in the world'
All I know is that, as a kid sat in front of the TV in 1988, I loved it. And I still do now if I'm honest! It's pointed title (sending up the recent hit Doctorin' TheHouse by Coldcut feat Yazz) mix of the Doctor Who theme tune, Gary Glitter's Rock and Roll Parts 1 and 2, The Sweet's Blockbuster and football-style chanting was the perfect primer for what was to come with The KLF.
It was fifty years ago this week that one of ITC's most enduring crime dramas Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) arrived on our screens.
Starring Mike Pratt and Kenneth Cope as Jeff Randall and Marty Hopkirk, private investigators who won't let a little thing like death get in the way of their business, whilst Annette Andre starred as Marty's widow, Jeanie.
Unlike much of its stablemates at ITC, Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) was, by its very nature, fantastical, and yet at the same time much more down-to-earth in its downbeat depiction of the then swinging London. Perhaps it's that slightly more recognisably real world vibe that has ensured it hasn't dated as much as Department S or Jason King say, whilst the fact that Reeves and Mortimer remade it for two series in the early '00s proved that this was a show that the public still had a lot of time for.
And then there's that theme tune. A wonderfully evocative, atmospheric track from ITC composer supremo Edwin Astley. It's the sonic equivalent of a tingle running down your spine.
It's time to bid the boys and girls of Craiglang a fond farewell tonight as BBC1 broadcasts the final episode of the long-running sitcom Still Game*
(*Unless of course like me you've already watched this ninth and final series care of the BBC Scotland iPlayer!)
Making it's debut in 2002, Still Game is one of the funniest sitcoms to come out of Scotland, indeed the whole of the UK. The adventures of Jack Jarvis, esquire and Victor McDade (writers and stars Ford Kiernan and Greg Hemphill) and their fellow OAP residents of Glasgow's Craiglang have entertained us for nine series now and the series boasts a brilliant theme tune; Cuban Boy from Frank Chacksfield's album West of Sunset. It is, as someone remarked on the Still Game documentary, the perfect TV theme because it immediately makes you want to tell everyone 'come on, it's just starting now' It announces itself beautifully.
And if you haven't already seen tonight's swansong. Prepare to have a ot of laughs, as per usual, but prepare to be moved too.
Created by Clive Exton, The Crezz was a 12-part Thames TV comedy drama series broadcast in the autumn of 1976. It concerned the daily goings on and the lives of the residents of Carlisle Crescent (affectionately known to all as 'The Crezz') a fictitious West London crescent with a large residential garden that often proves to be a meeting place, sticking point and even a battleground for the locals. Among those locals included Joss Ackland as Charles Bronte, the chair of the garden committee and an English lecturer, Peter Bowles as an adulterous sci-fi novelist from the north of England, and Nicholas Ball as ad man Colin Pitman whose talking piece drinks cabinet was the front end of a Mini Cooper! Anthony Nicholls (in what I presume was his last role prior to his death in 1978), Isla Blair, Janet Key, Elspet Gray, Hugh Burden, Carole Nimmons, Rolan Curram (playing a forerunner to his gay character in Eldorado), Eileen O'Brien, Frank Mills and Linda Robson, to name but a few, also made up TheCrezz's residents, whilst guest stars included Bob Hoskins and Ronald Fraser. With episodes penned by the likes of William Trevor and Willis Hall this was top drawer stuff.
As you can see from the image above, the TV Times went to town publicising the series but the viewing figures weren't as promising as Thames had hoped, resulting in the show being pushed from its 9pm primetime slot to following the News at Ten at 10:35 halfway through its run. An afternoon repeat was also shown the following day. I imagine that must have been trimmed a little of its more adult content at times though.
Essentially an up-market and light-hearted soap opera, it's a shame The Crezz lasted only one series as I feel there was plenty of mileage in it for a second helping at the very least. As it stands it's wonderfully '70s, utterly imbued with the spirit of the long, hot summer of 1976. Want to recreate that memorable summer this year? Then pop on a cheesecloth shirt, crack open a bottle of Blue Nun, fire up the fondue and grab yourself The Crezz on DVD from Network!
The funky theme tune, arguably the most '70s-sounding thing ever - was by Tony Ashton, formerly of Liverpool group and Beatles contemporaries, The Remo Four. Here it is, funked up to the max, in all its glory. Get down with your bad self...
I love it when the mainstream wakes up to the beauty of good folk music. And that's certainly what has happened to Yorkshire folk act O'Hooley and Tidow in the wake of Sally Wainwright's new BBC drama series, Gentleman Jack.
Back in 2012, Heidi Tidow and her wife Belinda O'Hooley released their second album The Fragile which featured on it a track called Gentleman Jack, recounting the life of 19th century Yorkshire gentlewoman, Ann Lister. Fast forward to 2019 and Wainwright has created a drama series about Lister, using O'Hooley and Tidow's song as its closing theme tune. The result? A surge in sales for a seven-year-old album that has seen it reach number 3 in the Amazon folk and songwriter charts, behind no less than Adele's 21 and George Ezra's Wanted on Voyage!
I've previously blogged about Anne Lister, or rather a previous adaptation of her life starring Maxine Peake, here, ahead of the opening episode of the new series. Whilst Sally Wainwright's take is very enjoyable and quite the rollicking, lusty romp, I must confess to preferring the earlier film. Peake created a more sympathetic heroine, whereas Suranne Jones can be a bit too haughty and frankly rather snobby. Then again, perhaps Miss Lister was somewhat unlikeable - after all her decision to leave one childhood lover sent the poor unfortunate to a lunatic asylum for the remainder of her life. Whatever, the exploits of Gentleman Jack are certainly brightening up these Sunday evenings and it's great news for O'Hooley and Tidow.
Ah yes it's time to look at that enfant terrible of Channel 4 in the 1990s, The Word
Love it or hate it, you cannot deny how influential and important The Word was. It's almost twenty-five-years since the last episode aired and yet almost everything The Word pioneered has now become absorbed by other shows and accepted into the mainstream.
Remember 'The Hopefuls' those shameless glory hunters who gave up their dignity by eating worms and sheep testicles (among other more disgusting stunts) because, as they would each gamely say to camera "I'll do anything to be on TV" Remember how offended and disgusted people were? They're all fairly quiet now when watching celebs eat the very same thing as part of an I'm a Celebrity bushtucker trial aren't they?
It wasn't just gross stunts though; The Word provided a platform for some of the best music of the day (often breaking new bands) and some brilliantly candid, off-the-cuff interviews with famous figures from the world of music, acting, sport and the arts, and the kind of through-the-looking-glass exposes of the weird and wonderful life in America that Louis Theroux would later mine with his Weird Weekends. It was The Tube via a kind of X-rated Tiswas - perfect for the laddish, baggy, grungey, britpoppy 1990s.
Described by Wikipedia as 'a mayhemic mixture of pop music and teen attitude' The Word was must-see post pub viewing on a Friday night for some 49% of the viewing public at that time. It ran from 1990 to 1995 and featured presenters such as Amanda de Cadenet, Mark Lamarr, Dani Behr, Hufty and Katie Puckrik, the one constant being it's main presenter, Mancunian motormouth Terry Christian whose book, My Word, is an eye-opening, candid and funny read of his time with the show.
The theme tune was entitled Olympic, provided by Madchester's own 808 State.
Some full episodes of The Word are available on YouTube, whilst a series of compilations can be viewed on All 4. They're well worth watching, whether you simply fancy a bit of nostalgia or whether you just want to see some cutting edge tele before it become so diluted. Chris Evans was only just around the corner, and he had obviously been paying attention.
Anyone remember the BBC Northern Ireland sitcom Safe and Sound that this was the theme tune too? It starred Des McAleer and Sean McGinley as a Catholic and a Protestant running a Belfast garage, and co-starred Michelle Fairley as McAleer's sister and the objects of McGinley's affections. It lasted just one series in the summer of 1996 and has made me love Brady ever since.
Sharing this stirring, instrumental gem of a track from The Corrs today because I've finally got my hands on the BBC drama it was written for (and which it shares a name with), Rebel Heart; a drama about the 1916 Easter Rising that was met with such controversy when it was screened back in 2001 that it hasn't been repeated or commercially released.
"Stand back Superman, Iceman, Spiderman, Batman Robin too. Don't wanna cause a ruckus but BA Baracus have I got a match for you"
Those opening lyrics alone should give you an instant rush of nostalgia, for it's the theme tune to the one and only Super Gran sung by the equally inimitable Billy Connolly!
Based on the books by Forrest Wilson about a grandmother with superpowers, this kids TV series was adapted by Jenny McDade for Tyne Tees Television and ran from 1985 to 1987. It starred Gudrun Ure in the titular role, with Iain Cuthbertson as her nemesis, Scunner Campbell. The show attracted several guest stars including George Best, Spike Milligan, Roy Kinnear, Patrick Troughton, Geoff Capes, Charles Hawtry and um, Gary Glitter. The least said about him appearing in a show for children, the better.
This was a firm favourite of mine as a kid but I'm surprised it ran for just two series and one Christmas special. Apparently there were plans for a third series and even a movie, but the kibosh was put on it all when Tyne Tees decided to focus their budget on daytime quiz shows such as Chain Letters instead. What a stupid decision!
In 2003, The Glasgow Herald conducted a poll to find The Most Scottish Person in the World, with Super Gran coming a respectable seventh. At around the same time the show was a huge ratings hit in Cuba, where it was dubbed into Spanish.
Drawing to a close last night was the BBC drama Age Before Beauty. Written by Debbie Horsfield, the Making Out and Cutting It creator who brought Poldark back to our screens, the programme starred Polly Walker, Kelly Harrison (stealing the show at every turn), Robson Green, James Murray, Madeleine Mantock, Lisa Riley and Sue Johnston and told the story of the complex lives and loves of a Manchester based, family-run beauty parlour.
The theme tune heard over the closing credits was something of a sweet sounding hidden gem. Entitled Slo Mo Tiger Glo, it's a track from a 2015 album entitled Talk to Strangers by Suffolk born singer/songwriter Fiona Bevan and had previously been used in an advertising campaign for HSBC in the UK and Ireland.
Now, because I am 39 this year I hadn't heard of Bevan - a woman who co-wrote Little Things, a worldwide smash for One Direction with Ed Sheeran - before so it was only by looking at the programme's closing credits that my ignorance could be halted. Here is the song performed in full...
Bad Girl Warning! Bad Girl Warning! Bad Girl Warning!
Alright cock? Today's Theme Time concerns the worst girl in the world, Marmalade Atkins who first came to life in Andrew Davies' 1979 children's novel Marmalade and Rufus about a badly behaved little girl and her horse. Davies went on to pen several adventures for his juvenile heroine (see here) and two classic ITV series, Educating Marmalade and Danger! Marmalade at Work, which saw the late, great Charlotte Coleman bring Marmalade wonderfully to life.
The title track was performed by the utterly suitable Bad Manners
However, a friend whose opinion I value, recommended I give it another try and I'm currently halfway through the second series and I'm struggling to see why I found it so objectionable after all. Certainly the first two episodes - indeed much of series one overall - aren't exceptionally good, but I do feel that Drifters slowly finds its feet and it is quite endearing and funny thanks to the performances of the central trio Jessica Knappett (who created and wrote the series), Lydia Rose Bewley and Lauren O'Rourke.
So this post is by way of an apology for my earlier criticism and a chance to share the theme tune, the ramshackle glory of Amanda Palmer's Leeds United
This takes me back. Man Stroke Woman was a fine BBC3 sketch comedy series featuring an impressive ensemble cast consisting of Nick Frost, Daisy Haggard, Nicholas Burns, Amanda Abbington, Ben Crompton and Meredith MacNeill. The series was directed by Richard Cantor and produced by Ash Atalla, who had just come from The Office. The show ran for two series from 2005 to 2007 and was innovative and fresh enough to break away from most sketch show conventions by containing no laugh track or studio audience and centring mostly around a general theme of relationships, as the show's website put it:
Some people think men are from Mars and women from Venus. Well, this show pits the two together and turns it into sketch comedy. Acted by a troupe of 20 to 30 somethings, the situations all strike close to home, but with a more extreme and comedic bent.
I recently picked up both series on DVD quite cheaply for plenty of laughs and nostalgic feels. Chief among those feels was the show's beautiful theme tune from an unsigned band called The Sanderson Pitch. Back when the show was airing in the mid 00s, the band had a Myspace page and I got quite friendly with them, chatting back and forth and professing my love for the theme tune, which was entitled Dive. It really is a beautiful song...
Unfortunately, The Sanderson Pitch never got the big success they clearly deserved. The cast of the show have fared much better though, with Amanda Abbington and Nick Frost having both gone on to become household names (though admittedly Frost had already done Spaced and Shaun of the Dead prior to making the show). The rest of the troupe all continue to work regularly; Daisy Haggard continues to be a familiar and beautiful face on our screens, most recently having starred in the hit comedy series Episodes, whilst Nicholas Burns has appeared in Benidorm and in the title role of Nathan Barley, as well as the films The Lady In The Van and The World's End, which reunited him with Frost. Meredith MacNeill starred in the films Confetti and FAQ About Time Travel and appeared as Merry in Peep Show before returning to her native Canada where she now stars in the all-girl Baroness Von Sketch Show. Meanwhile Ben Crompton has starred in several seasons of Game of Thrones as Eddison Tollet, appeared in Ben Wheatley's cult film Kill List and was most recently in an episode of BBC2's very funny Motherland. For me however, he'll forever be Colin, the scally who is perpetually on probation in the BBC3 sitcom Ideal.
You can check out several sketches from Man Stroke Woman on YouTube, including this one which also features a pre-fame Miranda Hart
Following the death of Rodney Bewes yesterday, an anecdote he once shared with Richard Herring has surprisingly come to light; did he once jam with Jimi Hendrix?
As you'll see from Herring's Metro article (click on the link above) Bewes - admittedly no stranger to embellishment - claimed that Hendrix poked his head around the studio door that housed Bewes and Likely Lads songwriter Mike Hugg and asked if he could join them and play on the theme to Whatever Happened to the LikelyLads? It's a great story, but it's impossible as not only was Hendrix was dead by then, Bewes wasn't even involved in the theme tune anyway. But, as Herring argues, had Bewes misremembered? Was he really thinking of the psychedelic theme he and Hugg wrote for his overlooked sitcom Dear Mother...Love Albert?
Dear Mother...Love Albert was a sitcom written by Bewes himself based on the letters he wrote his mother back home in the north of England. Bewes starred as Albert Courtney (a nod to his good friend Tom Courtenay?) who moves to London to work in a confectionery company and shares a flat with two girls, finding love with Doreen (played first by Liz Gebhardt and later Cheryl Hall). His letters home are prone to exaggeration (as was Bewes himself in real life, as we have seen). The series ran from 1969 to 1972, but only three series exist as the first was wiped by Thames TV. Hugg and Bewes' theme tune was memorably groovy with the leading man relying on a bottle of port to give him the confidence to get the vocals down. But was Hendrix really there? Have a listen and see what you think...
Sad to hear that the talented TV theme tune composer Dudley Simpson has died at the age of 95.
Born in Australia in 1922, Simpson studied at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music and worked at the Borovansky Ballet Company (now the Australian Ballet) before moving to the UK where he became the principal conductor of the Royal Opera House Orchestra. In 1961 he turned his talents to TV, composing themes and scores for several dramas before catching the eye (or ears) of Doctor Who's Mervyn Pinfield who recruited him to score the music for the William Hartnell serial Planet of the Giants. From there, a 15 year association with the programme commenced which saw Simpson become the most prolific composer attached to the popular series, culminating in arguably my most favourite of his work, the An American In Paris inspired piano suite for Tom Baker's 1979 Parisian shot serial City of Death
Simpson's association with the series came to an end that year when new producer John Nathan Turner announced he wanted a new sound for the 1980s, but Simpson continued to be a familiar name in the credits of many a TV show, providing the scores or theme tunes to a plethora of shows including Blake's 7, The Tomorrow People, The Brothers, Moonbase 3, Paul Temple, Target, The Ascent of Man, Super Gran, and many of the plays in the BBC Shakespeare season.
Simpson returned to Australia in the 1990s and lived out the rest of his retirement there until his death yesterday.
Running for two series between 1972 and 1974, Colditz was an impeccable production and a jewel in the BBC's crown during that illustrious, prolific decade. Loosely based on former Oflag IV-C POW Major Pat Reid's 1952 memoir, The Colditz Story (which had been made into the film of the same name in 1955), the series - devised by Brian Degas and Gerard Glaister - Colditz told the story of the brave and plucky Allied POWs, including Captain Pat Grant (Edward Hardwicke, playing a thinly disguised Reid), Flight Lieutenant Phil Carrington (Robert Wagner), Flight Lieutenant Simon Carter (David McCallum), Lieutenant Dick Player (Christopher Neame) and the Senior British Officer, Lieutenant Colonel John Preston (Jack Hedley), who each pitted their wits against their German captors, the Kommandant (Bernard Hepton), Hauptmann Ulmann (Hans Meyer) and Major Mohn (Anthony Valentine) and dared to escape from the seemingly escape-proof Colditz Castle.
My own particular favourite from the cast was McCallum's Carter, a hot headed RAF officer that was a world away from the usual 'chocks away' urbane charmer. Carter had a chip on his shoulder, and often found himself frustrated by the escape council and the formalities of captivity. As a result, this quick temper and a fervent passion to return home meant that he was more often than not found in solitary confinement or punished by the guards. As with many of the characters presented in the drama, Carter was based on a real person; Flight Lieutenant Dominic Bruce. Alongside the impressive regular cast the series boasted some fine guest performances from the likes of Patrick Troughton, Ian McCulloch, Jeremy Kemp, Geoffrey Palmer, and Willie Rushton. Most memorable of all however was Michael Bryant's BAFTA nominated turn as Wing Commander George Marsh who feigns insanity in a bid for freedom in the brilliant, unforgettable episode 'Tweedledum' by writer John Brason.
Unsurprisingly, Colditz was a huge hit for the BBC with a real cross generational appeal. Children were utterly transfixed by the brave exploits each week whilst their parents and grandparents, who experienced the war first hand, were equally as absorbed. The success led to numerous tie-in novelisations, an atmospheric effects album (Colditz Breakpoint) and even a popular board game, Escape from Colditz.
Robert Farnon's theme music was the perfect accompaniment to the series. Those bombastic doom laden and fear inducing opening chords immediately conjure to mind the perceived might of the Nazi foe and the confines of the imposing, legendary castle, before breaking into a more reassuring and familiar militaristic march that offers hope and the suggestion of escape and victory.
Creators Degas and Glaister would go on to strike gold again at the BBC later that decade with Secret Army, their dramatisation of the experiences of the French Resistance that is just as highly regarded and shared many of the same cast.
How's this for an '80s nostalgia rush? Yes, it's the theme to Perfect Strangers
This was a US sitcom that ran from 1986 to 1993 and was quite a favourite in our house. It was shown over here fairly quickly, with screenings on Saturday evenings in early 1987 before settling down in the post Wogan 7:35 slot on Monday evenings. I also have memories of reruns in the early '90s on Friday mornings during the summer holidays, but as far as I'm aware it hasn't been repeated since and despite being popular, the series is not available on DVD here in the UK.
The series starred Mark Linn-Baker (who starred opposite Peter O'Toole in the film My Favourite Year) and Bronson Pinchot (who had appeared as Serge in Beverly Hills Cop) as distant cousins, Wisconsin born Larry Appleton and Balki Bartokomous, a shepherd from the Mediterranean island of Mypos, who each attempt to strike out in Chicago. The series was created by Mork & Mindy creator Dale McRaven who was inspired by the renewed patriotism he felt in America after the 1984 Olympics and wanted to write something about a couple of people who dream they can make it in a big city. The show's theme, written by Jesse Frederick and Bennett Salvay and performed by David Pomeranz encapsulates that bright, optimistic, empowering American Dream vibe with effortless, catchy and utterly '80s ease...
And if you don't like that, then you've no poetry in your soul!
A consistent hit across its eight seasons in America, much of the success of Perfect Strangers came down to the great chemistry between Linn-Baker and Pinchot, a chemistry that thankfully seems to exist in real life too (how refreshing is it to find actors from a favourite '80s show who genuinely get on with one another? Yes Moonlighting I am looking at you) The pair perhaps haven't reached the peaks of success they deserved once the show concluded, but they continue to work extensively to this day, with Linn-Baker even appearing as himself in the recent HBO series The Leftovers, which looks at the inexplicable disappearance of 2% of the world's population. In the show, it's revealed that the entire cast of Perfect Strangers where amongst those who 'departed', but Linn-Baker is actually revealed to have faked his disappearance.
Perfect Strangers had its own spin-off in the sitcom Family Matters and was even remade for Russia television in 2006.
Sad to hear that the great Martin Landau has died at the age of 89.
In tribute to the Hollywood veteran, here's Barry Gray's bombastic theme for Gerry Anderson's Space: 1999
Starring alongside his then wife Barbara Bain, Space: 1999 ran for two seasons from 1975 to 1977 and as John Koenig remains, certainly on this side of the pond, as one of Landau's most enduring starring roles. Only that of Rollin Hand in TV's Mission Impossible could match it. Landau was, along with Steve McQueen, the only applicants out of 500 to enter the acclaimed Actors Studio in 1955 where he was tutored by Lee Strasburg and Elia Kazan to name but a few and would go on to become an executive director with the Studio. His films include Hitchcock's North by Northwest, Cleopatra, The Greatest StoryEver Told, Nevada Smith alongside Actors Studio contemporary McQueen, Empire State, Francis Ford Coppola's Tucker: The Man and His Dream, for which he earned an Oscar nomination, Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanours, which earned him a second nomination, and Tim Burton's Ed Wood which finally bagged him the Oscar.
September 29th this year will mark the 50th anniversary of Patrick McGoohan and George Markstein's iconic, innovative yet utterly incomparable cult TV series The Prisoner, one of my absolute favourites
