Top of the Pops: 10th November, 1977.

Bryan Ferry and Roxy Music.
By AVRO (Beeld En Geluid Wiki - Gallerie: Toppop 1973)
[CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

This week, to avoid the reception difficulties that so plague me whenever I do this, I'm leaping into the 21st Century in a way that only 1977 can make you do, and watching online.

Needless to say, almost the moment the show starts, I lose my connection.

When I get it back, we've already missed the intro and I'm confronted by what I assume to be the Jacksons over the chart countdown.

If it is them, it's a song I've never heard before - unless it's the song they did the other week, that I'd also not heard before.

A song I mostly definitely have heard before is on next, as Tom Robinson's back.

And there's still something about it that doesn't quite work for me. I love the record but this performance feels too pub for my liking. It's 1977. I'm going through an awkward phase. I'm having strange feelings I've never had before. Mostly involving my internet connection going down. I need some proper punk rebellion.

Meanwhile, the camera man's hanging from the ceiling.

I suppose that might count as punk rebellion.

That guitarist's got very untidy strings. I shouldn't be annoyed by that but, somehow, I am.

But now Tom's gone, and Noel claims that both Donna Summer and Ruby Winters used to be in the Four Seasons. I suspect that may not be true

What is true is that Ruby's on next, doing I Will.

Didn't the White Guardian have a chair like that in Dr Who? If he didn't, he should have.

She seems a bit confused in her movements, like she doesn't know where to look.

But who can blame her? Adrift in a sea of whiteness, it's much she's not got snow-blindness.

She needs to watch out. I once knew someone who insisted that, when a polar bear attacks, it puts one paw over its black nose and thus becomes invisible against the polar ice, meaning there could be one stood right in front of you and you'd never know it.

Something for Ruby to think about there as she rambles around the set.

Roxy Music are on with their brand new hit; Virginia Plain.

I wonder if Bryan Ferry was ever young? No matter how old the footage, he always looks middle-aged.

I've just realised, after all these years, I don't have the slightest clue what Bryan Ferry's singing about.

Oops, connection's gone again.

It turns out I've not missed much, as we're back with Boney M still solving all of Northern Ireland's problems by wearing silly costumes and dancing around a bit.

Elvis Costello's back with Watching The Detectives, the song that first brought him to my eagle-eyed attention when he appeared on the Mavis Nicholson show.

Now it's Legs and Company dancing to How Deep is Your Love? by the Bee Gees. A lot deeper than your voices, that's for sure.

For some reason, "Company" seem to be recreating Dick Van Dyke's legendary turn in Mary Poppins.

I don't have the slightest clue why.

But now it's one from left field because we're given Kenny Everett and Captain Kremmen.

I have no memory of this at all.

Obviously I remember Captain Kremmen and I remember Kenny Everett. So elephantine is my memory that I can even remember both of them at the same time but the record itself means nothing to me.

I have to say, it isn't the most thrilling song I've ever heard.

Or the most interesting video.

Now Noel's with two baffling looking women.

And now it's Santana in a video that seems to have been filmed on a mobile phone, which is quite an achievement in 1977.

Then again there's that infamous footage that seems to show a woman using a mobile phone in the 1920s, or whenever it was, so all things are possible.

I still don't have a clue who the singer is. My Steve Senses tell me it's probably not Colin Blunstone, despite what I thought last week.

Have we actually seen Santana yet?

But yes! Hooray! At last we get to see him, fuzzily, just in time for him to be faded out. Poor old Santana. Not even allowed to star in his own videos.

Not needing a video - because she's here in person - it's Tina Charles who, according to Noel, has a Love Bug. What an unfortunate link that is.

Darts are back.

And Daddy Cool's still playing his piano machine. I wonder what exactly a piano machine actually does?

Den's still looking far too inhibited.

ABBA are still Number 1.

And we go out with Rod.

When I say, "Go out," I of course don't mean that in the Rod Stewart sense of the phrase. Despite rumours to the contrary, I'm not, after all, a statuesque Scandinavian blonde.

I have to say this week's show wasn't really up there with last week's blockbuster epic but it did at least give us Darts, Roxy Music and the Bee Gees - and what I'll always regard as Elvis Costello's first Top of the Pops appearance even though it wasn't.

In some ways, tonight's edition was ahead of its time, with mobile phone recorded videos, and in some ways it was behind its time, with a revived classic from 1972. But I suppose that sums up this time of year for you, when we look both forward at what's to come and backwards at what's already been. In that sense, perhaps it captured the quintessence of the pre-festive season. Then again, maybe I'm just desperately trying to think up some philosophical point with which to end this post.

Blimey! Look at that! I've managed it!

Top of the Pops: 27th October, 1977.

David Bowie was supposed to be on tonight's show but,
thanks to the Dave Lee Travis thing, wasn't.
Poor David. He must be wondering if he'll ever get to appear
on Top of the Pops.
Meanwhile, here is is in 1974, by AVRO
(Beeld En Geluid Wiki - Gallerie: Toppop 1974)
[CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Well, it's all been a right old kerfuffle, with tonight's planned edition being pulled, thanks to the Dave Lee Travis arrest.

But, undeterred by such shocks and surprises, I'm here and raring to go.

Can David Kid Jensen pull off a coup and be the first Top of the Pops presenter not to get arrested at an inconvenient moment?

Only the next half hour can tell.

 And we kick off with Santana doing She's Not There.

Who's doing the singing on this? I assume it's not Carlos.

Is it Colin Blunstone? It sounds like him.

And this week's obligatory Rock and Roll revivalists are...

...Slade!

But not looking or sounding like Slade.

Noddy of course still sounds like Noddy. Even in these days of the much-lauded New Rock, some things don't change.

They seem to be doing My Baby Left Me. That's All Right.

They're doing it competently enough but is this really what we want to hear from our favourite Wolverhampton foot-stompers?

Dave's gone bald. Is this an attempt to jump on that New Music bandwagon that's sweeping the land?

Definitely not trying to jump on that bandwagon is Mary Mason who's here to treat us to her version of Any Way That You Want Me.

She doesn't look very happy.

Was this from a musical?

Whatever it's from, it's not grabbing me.

It's turned into Angel Of The Morning but I'm still not getting into it.

Massive eyelashes cast humongous shadows across her face, like the legs of giant, eyeball-eating spiders.

And now it's all gone Cilla Black.

Learning nothing from recent scandals, Kid's with a zillion young girls.

And now Darts are here with Daddy Cool.

I did always feel Darts should have been the cast of Blake's 7. Somehow you could see them pulling it off.

A man's playing a guitar solo on his saxophone, which takes some doing.

And now Den Heggarty's getting stuck in.

He still looks like Beaker from the Muppets.

But forget Muppets - because Ram Jam are back, and being danced to by Legs and Co.

Incited by such wild music, they're going for it, the brazen hussies.

Lots of hair flinging.

Fists in your face from one of them

And now Kid's back, with yet more young girls.

Possibly, I think, singing about the more mature woman, it's Rod Stewart and You're In My Heart.

What a lovely song this is - one of those tracks, like Nobody Does It Better, that you could only imagine coming out in 1977.

And he's, so far, resisted the urge to ruin it by waving his bum in our face.

But who was the big bosomed lady with the Dutch accent? It can't have been Britt Ekland. That wouldn't make any sense at all.

And just what are Celtic United?

You have to hand it to him, only Rod Stewart could do a tender love song that massed ranks could wave their scarves along to.

Now it's Boney M and Belfast.

I do always feel this track was somewhat of a mistake.

Leaving aside the fact it's got to be one of the dullest hits they ever had - and its optimism for the city proved hopelessly premature - does anyone really want to see Boney M tackling social politics of the day?

And, speaking of people who should be in Blake's 7, what on Earth are they wearing? Let's be honest, nothing says, "The Troubles," more than dressing up like something from Star Maidens From Outer Space.

The truth is, I'm getting bored listening to it, and I can't usually say that about Boney M.

No reason to be bored next - because it's Tom Robinson, making his debut with 2-4-6-8 Motorway.

Is it my imagination? The show's volume seems to have dropped noticeably for Tom.

I must admit, despite my liking for the record, this seems a workmanlike performance and he's coming across like an English teacher trying to convince his class he's a punk star.

People who didn't need to convince anyone of anything are on next, as ABBA give us The Name of The Game.

I love this song. I love this video. When it comes to ABBA, they're both the virtual definition of quintessential.

Is that Ludo they're playing? You don't get enough Ludo in modern pop.

And now it's Smokey Robinson with what Kid tells us is the theme from The Big Time.

He doesn't mean that Esther Rantzen show, does he? The one that discovered Sheena Easton?

It's not very interesting, whatever it is.

The audience looking riveted by Smokey's performance.

He's brought his band with him but he seems to have forgotten to bring a song with him.

Kid's back with more girls.

Kid's flirting with one of them.

And Baccara are somehow at Number 1.

It's that same terrible performance we seem to have had inflicted on us every week for months now.

Is it me or is the drummer not quite in time?

Then again I once read a thing in a newspaper, where a Classical musicologist said the secret of the Beatles' greatness was Ringo never quite drumming in time, so perhaps Baccara were shrewder than we might have thought.

Oh my God, it's Peter Powell, Radio 1's newest recruit!

Oh my God, it's the Sex Pistols and Holidays In The Sun!

Like the sneakiest of sneaky devils, the show leaves its two big dramatic reveals till right at the end!

What a mixed bag that all was, with probably the least memorable record Slade ever unleashed on the 1970s public, Tom Robinson's debut and the shock arrival of Peter Powell and the Sex Pistols. Overall, despite Mary Mason, Smokey Robinson and Baccara, I generally approved of it.

And no one got arrested. Which, let's face it, these days, is the most important thing on a music show.

Top of the Pops: 9th June, 1977.

The usual problems finding a decent free-use image of
any of tonight's acts, so here's Tomb Raider and
Alexander sex-bomb Angelia Jolie.
Almost uniquely, Angelina Jolie has no valid links to
Top of the Pops.
By Angelina-Jolie. jpg: www.promiflash.de
- Bitte bei Bildverwendung auch Link setzen derivative
work: Born Slippy (Angelina-Jolie.jpg) [CC-BY-SA-3.0
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)],
via Wikimedia Commons

The nation's greatest banks may currently be facing bankruptcy and desertion thanks to the revelation they've been fiddling  interest rates but, no matter what the interest level Top of the Pops generates, we return to it time and time again.

Who'll achieve chart solvency tonight and who'll merely drive us to solvent abuse?

Only Tony Blackburn can tell us. For it is he who is to guide us through the balance sheets of history.

We launch into the show with the continuity announcer telling us we're going to be treated to Bob Marley and the Wurzels. I don't know about you but Bob Marley and the Wurzels were my favourite group of the 1970s.

Not my favourite group of the 1970s are the first act on – mostly because I don't have a clue who they are.

That's because Top of the Pops is continuing its grand tradition of kicking off each show with an act and a track I don't recognise. Just how did the producers way back in 1977 know just what acts I'd have heard of in 2012?

Whoever they are, one of them has a cape. Capes are always impressive on a singer.

Is this Osibisa? I have no reason to think it is other than it might be.

Whatever it is, it's all very cheery and summery, though I suspect I won't remember it for more than thirty seconds after it's over.

It is Osibisa. Well done to me. Yet again my stunning knowledge of music pulls me through.

Now it's ELO and Telephone Line. It's the same video as the other week - and it's still one of my favourite ELO songs.

It's clearly not one of the producer's favourite ELO songs, as, three-quarters of the way through, it has a dirty great edit inflicted on it that's so devoid of subtlety you wonder if it was done with a lawn mower.

Now it's Gladys Knight and the Pips with Baby Don't Change Your Mind. It's on video and it's all very 1970s.

I think this may be the first time I've ever seen what Gladys Knight looks like. Somehow I always imagined her differently. The woman in the video seems far too young and small to be Gladys Knight.

Still, they all seem very happy people and that makes me pleased for them.

Gladys has gone and, for a moment, I get all excited thinking I can hear the strains of Billy Don't Be a Hero as Tony does his next link.

Tragically it's not Paper Lace at all. In fact it's turned out to be Neil Innes with a song I don't recognise.

Frankly, I don't want to recognise it. It's about the Queen and it's not exactly the Sex Pistols.

In fact it's positively puke-inducing. I'm listening hard to see if I can hear any signs of subversive irony in it all but it seems to be a straight tribute to the Her Maj. Frankly, in my eyes, this isn't doing Neil's standing a lot of good.

“Sailing on the yacht Britannia,” he sings. “Nowhere in the world would ban yer.” It's like he's desperately trying to undo all the good-will generated by his work with the Rutles.

That was genuinely appalling and makes you realise what some people'll do to try and get a knighthood.

In total contrast, you get the feeling the Stranglers'd just give a knighthood the good kicking it deserves...

...because they're back - and still in, “Evil Chas and Dave,” mode.

Thanks to Neil Innes, I'm enjoying this a lot more than I probably should be.

As though Greece hasn't suffered enough, Demis Roussos is back – this time with a strangely Scottish-sounding song.

It brings to mind the Goombay Dance Band - and I don't care what anyone says, that can't be a good thing.

He's hiding behind ferns, like a sniper who doesn't believe the war's over.

The way he's looking at the microphone you just know he's desperate to eat it.

Honky are with us.

Is this the song they did the other week or is it another one?

Whatever it is, the singer's still as unpleasant and disturbing as he was before. I really do feel he should have been banned from television.

Next, it's Legs and Company dancing to Show You The Way To Go by the Jacksons.

They've borrowed Demis Roussos's vegetation.

For some reason, the sun behind them's started flashing. Is Flick Colby sure the sun's meant to do things like that?

As promised before the show, it's Bob Marley.

Disgracefully, he's dumped the Wurzels and is hanging around with some other bunch called the Wailers.

I don't care who they are. They'll never have the magic of the Wurzels.

They're doing Exodus which I've never found to be one of his more interesting songs, mostly because it sounds like he's just making it up as he goes along and randomly throwing in the sort of words and phrases that'll make it sound like it's about something.

It's no I Am a Cider Drinker, that's for sure. Oh Bob, did you really not realise how much you needed Adge Cutler?

From someone who needs Adge to someone who needs a kick in the nadgers because Rod Stewart's still at Number 1! Is there to be no escape from that man's backside?

There is now because Rod's finally gone, and we're playing out with Emerson Lake and Palmer's Fanfare for the Common Man. This is more like it. It might all be a bit Prog but it's a cut above most of the acts on tonight.

I can't say it was a riveting show. The highlights were the Stranglers and ELO with performances we've already seen before. Lowlights have to have been the singer of Honky, Neil Innes' dismal bandwagon-jumping and the total absence of the Wurzels.

Still, we did get to see Bob Marley, even if it wasn't one my faves by him, we got to wave our little Union Jacks at something and I finally found out what Gladys Knight looks like.

Top of the Pops: 2nd June, 1977.

Who'd have thought it'd be so hard to find a Free-Use
image of Twiggy?
In its place, here's one of former Hollywood wild-child
Drew Barrymore.
Michael Barrymore's catchphrase was, "Aw-wight?"
and sometime TOTP presenter Steve Wright had a hit
with I'm Alright. Therefore, Drew Barrymore has many
valid links with TOTP.
By David Shankbone (David Shankbone)
[GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html),
CC-BY-SA-3.0
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)
or CC-BY-SA-2.5-2.0-1.0
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5-2.0-1.0)],
via Wikimedia Commons

The nation may be vexed by talk of Jimmy Carr's financial doings but there's only one matter taxing Steve Does Top of the Pops right now.

And that's who's going to be Number 1 this week in 1977? Who'll be finding a safe haven of chart liquidity and who's to become adrift off the shores of achievement, entangled in the loopholes of failure?

Only Noel Edmonds can tell us - for it is he who's to guide us tonight through the balance sheets of Nostalgia.

He wants to borrow my cheeky bits. I won't let him. I need my cheeky bits. I don't know what I need them for but I feel it's best to keep them close to hand, just in case.

Speaking of hands, someone has his on a piano.

It seems he belongs to Elkie Brooks who's doing a song I've never heard before in my entire life.

After the way thing have gone in recent times, it's now clear that each week's opening slot on Top of the Pops is reserved for songs I don't recognise.

It's all very jolly, whatever it is, but you do wonder if anyone at the record company really thought it had hit potential. I think it probably sums it up that I half expect Jools Holland to appear and join in.

Now that it's over, Noel tells us it's called Saved.

Sadly no one's saved us from the horror that's to come next as we get the Muppets and Halfway Down the Stairs.

I hated it at the time. Will 35 years of not having heard it have softened my heart?

No.

It won't.

Not only that but it's bringing back terrible memories of Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop.

Yes I know Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop was a totally different act but, spiritually, it's hard to spot the difference.

The only thought that impresses me is the Muppets have nicer banisters than I do.

Now it's the Four Seasons and something that's either called Rhapsody or Vaseline. Noel's intro's got me confused.

It's another one I've never heard before. So far it's not sounding riveting.

In fact, they seem to be going for Liverpool Express's title of the world's most comatose group.

Even the presence of a balloon on stage can't create a sense of spontaneity.

Finally rid of the Four Seasons, we're joined by Twiggy.

She's doing that song the Three Degrees had a hit with. I was until now totally unaware Twiggy'd ever done a version of it.

Out of four songs on the show so far, I've only ever heard one before – and that was by the Muppets. It's not shaping up to be a vintage week.

In fairness, this is a perfectly functional version and she has a perfectly pleasant voice. You can't get round it though; she does have the eyes of a a murderer.

Now It's Jesse Green - and another one I've never heard of.

Whoever he is, he's very patriotic, with a great big Union Flag behind him, surrounded by light bulbs. Was this to do with the Silver Jubilee or was there some other reason for this rampant show of national pride?

Jesse's in an outfit that defies conventional description. He's wearing a hat The Shadow would wear if he wanted to look a berk, a tight leather jacket and what seems to be a very wide cravat.

The look might be distinctive but the song sounds like something you'd expect to hear on a cruise liner.

It's over - and we suddenly get a bizarre shot of vast acres of bare studio floor. Is this an accident or has the director decided this'll look somehow impressive?

Not that Legs and Co care. They're too busy dancing to Marvin Gaye.

I do quite like the lighting effects they're using for this performance - lights flashing on and off to highlight various different dancers. It was clearly choreographed back in the days before anyone cared about epilepsy.

No disrespect to Marvin but I'm getting a bored with him now. He seems to be dragging on forever.

Far livelier is Carole Bayer Sager with the same performance of You're Moving Out Today she did a couple of weeks ago.

I remember Jimmy Young playing this on his radio show at the time. That's not an interesting fact but it is at least a fact - and proof that I recognise something from this show.

She's doing her best but the Top of the Pops audience are as hard to please as ever.

Now it's the Strawbs with yet another one I've never heard of.

Weren't the Strawbs secretly the Monks who had a hit with Nice Legs, Shame About the Face? Or did I just imagine that?

The song itself has little life in it and sounds like a Kinks B-side.

Now Noel's interviewing the Alessi Brothers who seem about as excited to be there as the audience are.

Rod's still at Number 1. He seems to have been there all year. I'm starting to miss ABBA, especially as it's the same video every week.

Now Rod's gone and we play out with Genesis and yet another song I've never heard before.

Well, that was a very singular show, packed solid with songs with which I was previously unfamiliar, all of which made it clear very quickly why I was unfamiliar with them. Sadly, there was no Stranglers or Jam to up the energy levels – or even a Joy Sarney or Contempt to boggle the mind - so it just flopped there like a pancake someone had dropped and left half-hanging off a table with bits dropping onto the floor to be nibbled at by a bored-looking dog.

Who says this isn't the Steve Does Top of the Pops' Age of Simile?

Top of the Pops: 26th May, 1977.

In the absence of a free-use image of any of tonight's acts,
here's a photo of Twilight sexpot Kristen Stewart at Wondercon
2012.
Kristen Stewart has a very large chin. Nicky Chinn has written
very many large chart hits. Therefore Kristen Stewart has many
valid links with Top of the Pops.
Photo by Gage Skidmore
[CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)]
via Wikimedia Commons.

Football fever may be sweeping Europe even as I speak but there's only one goal that matters to the wise man.

And that's getting to Number 1 in 1977.

In that quest to reach the top, who'll smash it in from 35 yards and who'll score a pitiful own goal that has his own fans booing him off at half-time?

Only the man my late father used to know as Dave Lee Travesty can tell us. For it is he who's to guide us through the congested midfield of nostalgia and spray his balls deep and wide into the corridors of uncertainty.

We kick off with the original Blue, yet again getting the first, unannounced, slot on the show.

Sadly, the early start hasn't fired them up with enthusiasm. Their performance is as lacklustre as their previous one.

They're still going to take their soul to town but they're still not telling us what they're going to do with it when they get there. I like to think they're going to sell it to Satan but, given their dullness, I fear such melodrama to be beyond them.

But they've drifted away on the breeze and we're suddenly blessed with Olivia Newton John and Sam.

It's all very pleasant but I really don't have anything to say about it. Who could've thought when we were first hearing this that, a year later, she'd be giving us some of the most iconic pop moments of the 1970s?

It's the return of Liverpool Express. For such a barely remembered act, it really is amazing just how often they managed to be on TOTP.

Whatever the song is, it's not off to a promising start. So far, it's flatlining as badly as all their other stuff. I'm quickly coming to the conclusion that Liverpool Express were the Mogadon Smokie.

Would that make them Smogadon?

Didn't Godzilla once have a fight with Smogadon? If he didn't, he should have. After all, if Godzilla won't keep us safe from the terror of Smogadon then who will?

Not Dave Lee Travis, that's for sure. Now the song's finally curled up and died, he's up on stage with the culprits, doing something that approximates an interview. Such is the power of Dave Lee Travis that, within seconds of him joining them, Liverpool Express are trying to kill him. All of a sudden I'm warming to them.

Now it's Legs and Co and something that's clearly meant to be Chinese.

In fact it's meant to be Japanese because it's Bryan Ferry with Tokyo Joe.

It's another track I have very little to say about.

That's not the case with our next turn because, from out of the blue, we launch into the Stranglers with Go Buddy Go.

This is more like it.

Or is it?

Something's not quite right here. I was anticipating snarly spleen-venting and hard-core contempt but, in truth, they seem rather jolly. In all honesty the thing seems to owe more to Chas and Dave than it does to the Sex Pistols.

We get the keyboard solo and it's all starting to sound like the Only Fools and Horses theme. You have to say it's no No More Heroes.

Also no No More Heroes is Marie Myriam with this year's Eurovision winner.

This is quite nice. It's certainly better than Rock Bottom and she seems far less sinister than Lynsey De Paul.

It's one of those songs that doesn't really go anywhere and, so, craftily makes up for it by constantly building as it goes along.

Next up it's ELO and Telephone Line. DLT does the joke about them being from Yorkshire - the one he seemed to do every single time he ever played them on the radio.

Matching the debut of the Stranglers for out-of-the-blueness, is the left-field return of Brendon with another of his smashes. This time it's a thing that seems to be called Rock Me.

And this is weird because I quickly realise I remember this.

How can it be?

How can I remember a Brendon song? What madness is this that's come over me?

But this is strangely endearing.

He's doing his best to get the audience going.

And he's actually succeeding. The famously apathetic TOTP audience is actually clapping along with him. I do feel that in many ways Brendon has been the true star of TOTP since these repeats began, if only for his ability to engage with the audience in a way few acts seemed able to.

But now Brendon's gone and it's time for this week's Number 1. The half hour's flown by and we're back with Rod and his musical arse.

Appropriately, bearing in mind that this post began with European football talk, we play-out with the Liverpool team who've just won the European Cup.

In fairness it's about as close to punk as the Stranglers were.

So there we are. The Stranglers were a disappointment to me, bringing far too much pub and too little punk to the table. Brendon scored a personal triumph by getting the audience to notice he existed, and Liverpool Express almost killed Dave Lee Travesty. I don't think this week's show'll go down as a classic but at least we can't claim it was devoid of incident.

Top of the Pops: 19th May, 1977.

Rod Stewart by Helge Øverås (Own work)
[GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html),
CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)
or
CC-BY-2.5 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5)],
via Wikimedia Commons

The Olympic Torch may be wending its way through the streets of this land even as we speak but there's only one beacon to be seen lighting the boulevards of Nostalgia.

And that's this week's TOTP.

Will it burn bright - a symbol of hope for all mankind?

Or will it splutter and die like the dampest of squibs?

Only David “Kid” Jensen can tell us. For it is he who's to guide us through the flaming cul-de-sac that men call, “The Past.”

Straight away, we launch into Suzi Quatro and - inevitably for an opening song - a track that rings no bells with me whatsoever.

It's a performance that can only be labelled, "Relaxed."

But that seems inevitable. Like whatever that single was she was on doing a few weeks back, it's not the most grippingest of tracks. In fact, some might call it positively lukewarm. Suzi really did seem to be treading water at this stage of her career. Still, thanks to hindsight, we at least know better was to come.

The song seems to be called Roxy Roller and, as it finishes, Kid declares it to be, “exciting,” suggesting he's incredibly easily excited.

Now it's Heatwave and Too Hot to Handle.

It's the typical Heatwave performance, them in silly outfits doing a song that sounds like Heatwave.

Now it's time for The Moon And I, sung by Linda Lewis.

I always thought Linda Lewis was a porn star. Assuming she isn't, just who was I mixing her up with?

Three songs into the show, and this is the third track I've never heard of.

But what a sweet little thing she seems.

Was this really written by Gilbert and Sullivan? Why isn't it all short notes and silly words?

Whoever wrote it, in the hands of Linda it's all going a bit Minnie Riperton.

Still, whatever its unlikelihood, I find it strangely intriguing and have the desire to hear it again, if only to find out what I make of it second time round.

Now for the Bay City Rollers with It's a Game.

If this hadn't been on two weeks ago, it would've been tonight's fourth consecutive track I've never heard of.

One solitary audience member waves a scarf. I wonder if she was the only Bay City Rollers fan left in Britain at this stage?

Now it's Carole Bayer Sager and You're Moving Out.

At last, a track I recognise!

I may know the song but I'm not sure I've ever seen her before. On first viewing, it does strike me that she looks like Popeye's Olive Oyl.

Like Barbara Dickson all those weeks ago, while she's making a good go at it, she's somewhat hindered by the invisibility of her backing singers.

I remember seeing Lynda Carter doing a version of this somewhere. It wasn't a patch on Carole's version.

Then again, Carole Bayer Sager'd probably struggle with playing Wonder Woman – especially when it comes to finding her invisible plane.

Joe Tex is at it again.

And now Legs and Co are dancing to Disco Inferno.

You'd think this was a perfect track for them to dance to, as it gives them an excuse to just dance and not have to act out any kind of narrative.

The only problem is that, for no noticeable reason, Flick Colby's ordered hub caps be strapped to their every extremity, meaning that, instead of focusing on their dancing, all you can notice are flashing discs. Flick Colby, a woman who could be relied upon to achieve defeat no matter how much easier it'd be to achieve triumph.

“From the land of a thousand dancers,” declares Kid, it's the Jacksons.

Are there really only a thousand dancers in the United States?

That does seem an unlikely stat.

Actually in the studio, rather than on video, they're doing Let Me Show You. I must admit it's not one of my favourite Jackson tracks, feeling oddly leaden compared to others of that vintage.

Michael seems to be the tallest of the Jacksons, which can't be right, can it?

To be honest, Michael's starting to get on my nerves now, with his random exclamations.

But at last it's the moment we've all been waiting for. Entire musical epochs collapse before our eyes as punk finally hits TOTP, with the debut of the Jam. Admittedly, you could argue the Jam weren't really punk but it's as close as we've got thus far on the show.

Paul seems a little angry. Bruce seems a little angry. It's a contrast from the Jacksons, that's for sure.

And an even bigger contrast is with Rod Stewart who's hit the heady heights of Number 1 with The First Cut is the Deepest.

He's on the TOTP jumbotron. I thought it'd long-since been retired due to the audience's disheartening tendency to stand with their backs to it.

It's that performance from last week.

He's waving his bum again.

As the show draws to a close, Kid signs off by wishing us, “Good love.” Heaven alone knows where he got that one from.

We play out with Boz Scaggs' Lido Shuffle.

This is my favourite Boz Scaggs song, by a mile. It sounds like Rick Davies' efforts for Supertramp. Given that Davies was always overshadowed by Roger Hodgson, that might not seem a good thing but Boz clearly knew how to make that sound work.

So, it was a night when musical differences were stretched almost to breaking point. What other music show could ever have dared give us Gilbert and Sullivan and the Jam in the same broadcast?

But that was the greatness of TOTP. While the BBC's other great 1970s music show The Old Grey Whistle Test had to crunch gears furiously to adjust to the arrival of the "new" music, TOTP's great amoeboid mass simply absorbed and accommodated any sound the charts could throw at it, before rolling on unperturbed.

Top of the Pops: 5th May, 1977.

By Musphot (Own work)
[CC-BY-SA-3.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)],
via Wikimedia Commons.

Well, I've girded my loins. I've strapped on my armour. Now to see what challenges the second of this week's instalments of the world's greatest music show has in store for us.

What it first has in store is Noel Edmonds, as always looking as unlike the presenter of a popular music show as it's possible to be. You did always feel Noel would've been far more at home working in banking than in the entertainment business.

And, for once, we kick off with an act I actually recognise.

It's the Bay City Rollers...

...and a song I don't recognise.

Remembering they're meant to be objects of lust for girls too young to feel lust, they're showing off a lot of chest, which is a good thing, as I'm sure it's the sort of behaviour that gets us all a little excited back here in 1977.

The song seems OK but lacks the overwhelming sense of optimistic pop unstoppability of their earlier hits. Even at the time it must have seemed clear the sun was slowly setting on the Rollers' days of supremacy.

Someone whose sun was still hovering somewhere around noon, was Rod Stewart who's on next with First Cut is the Deepest.

It's a pleasant enough track but not one of my Rod favourites.

And this is where we get a reminder of the problem with Rod. He's doing a sensitive ballad then suddenly turns round and starts waving his arse at us all.

This is why I believe people are wrong when they say he sold out by going disco. For a man with a determination to wave his bum in everyone's faces at every opportunity, when disco came along he must have felt like at last he'd found his true calling in life.

Delegation are back, and looking older than ever. I don't like to be narrow-minded but I can't help feeling that men of that age really shouldn't be wearing such figure-hugging, chest-revealing outfits.

Mac and Katie Kissoon are up next.

Noel introduces them like they're old friends of the show, though I must admit I've never heard of them.

Nor have I ever heard of the song but they seem to continue that Marilyn McCoo/Billy Davis Jr tradition of an attractive woman paired with a man who looks like talent scouts found him lurking in the cellar beneath Paris Opera House.

As for Katie, she has some strange sort of creature attached to her chest. It seems to be one of Molly Sugden's old hats from the Liver Birds.

The audience are suddenly heading for them just as they're fading out. Bearing in mind the audience were presumably there to see some pop acts, just where have they been all the way through the song?

Noel cracks a joke I don't understand at all, about something doing you good.

What I do understand is Leo Sayer who's back with his video of multi-layered Leos and still showing us his “fun” side.

Next, on to Joy Sarney - yet another act I've never heard of before.

It soon becomes obvious why, as she quickly plummets into what must be the worst performance in TOTP history. Actually managing to make Rick Dees look like a latter-day Beethoven, she launches into a truly bizarre duet with Mr Punch.

At this juncture I should point out she looks like Steve Does Top of the Pops favourite Jolene Blalock.

I like to think that, if Jolene Blalock ever launched a pop career, this is what it'd be like.

I suspect that Jolene Blalock, on the other hand, likes to think otherwise.

But it has to be quite the cheeriest song about domestic violence I've ever heard. "He's been in trouble with the law for grievous bodily harm," she gushes, prompting the thought that Joy Sarney should've been in trouble with the law for grievous bodily harm to music.

Now it's Frankie Valli, and yet another song I've never heard before. It really is turning out to be a night of discovery for me.

Seeing as it's Frankie Valli, I keep expecting him to go all high-pitched but he resolutely refuses to do so. In places, the track vaguely brings to mind the work of Harry Chapin. In others it doesn't.

Now, proving he really would have been more comfortable in banking, Noel tells us it's, “Legs and Company.”

It's that weirdly happy dance they did the other week to Andrew Gold's Lonely Boy.

ABBA have finally been kicked off the Number 1 slot and replaced by Deniece Williams with Free.

I'm pleased to report that, after finding it boring the last time it was on, I'm starting to get into it again after all these years. It can't be denied it's a classy track and she has a decent set of pipes on her, even if she does blow too hard on them from time to time.

She's doing the waggly thing with her fingers again, which still impresses me far more than it ought to.

It's Stevie Wonder's turn to get the fuzzy end of the lollipop this week by receiving the honour of playing us out.

So, what can you say? The night's earlier edition was completely dominated in the memory by one strange and inexplicable act in Contempt, and this show was likewise dominated by the bizarre horror of Joy Sarney - whereas perfectly tasteful acts like Frankie Valli and Delegation are already slipping from the mind. It just goes to show that, in the magical world of showbusiness, being memorable and being worthy of remembrance aren't necessarily the same thing.

Top of the Pops: 28th April, 1977.

10CC By AVRO (Beeld En Geluid Wiki - Gallerie: Toppop 1974)
[CC-BY-SA-3.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)],
via Wikimedia Commons.

Britain's greatest music show's clearly determined to work me into a frazzle by broadcasting two editions in one night.

Needless to say I shall rise like a lion to this challenge by running away from it and saving my account of the second of tonight's shows for a couple of days' time when the internet has had chance to recover from the strain of this posting.

It's Steve Does Top of the Pops' first ever cliff-hanger. I feel just like an episode of Dr Who.

But first it's Dave Lee Travis doing the honours.

And, with no introduction from him, we launch straight into a song by...

...someone.

The first few bars in and I still don't know what it is yet. So far it all sounds a bit Cockney Rebel but the singer seems to be Mr Benn – and I don't mean Anthony Wedgwood.

We're well into the thing and I still don't have a clue who it is. Is it someone from a musical? They sound like Queen but don't look like them.

Is that Mika on guitar?

Frankly I'm baffled. Is that the bloke from The Band on the drums?

Whoever they are, they do seem fixated with money.

Dave Lee's back-announced them but I didn't hear what he said. So I still don't have a clue who they were or what they were on about.

Not only that but, while I was typing, I missed the intro to the next act.

It's a woman being danced to by a totally different woman who I assume to be from Legs and Co.

Actually I'm not sure it is a woman singing. It might be a high-pitched man.

Wait. It seems to be I Wanna Get Next To You. If only I could remember who did that.

Was it Gladys Knight?

Oh. No. It seems it is a man singing.

It turns out it was Rose Royce, danced to by Pauline, which leaves me no closer to knowing if it was a man or a woman singing.

Now for a bunch of people whose gender is never in doubt. It's the Detroit Spinners with Could It Be I'm Falling In Love?

Blimey they're getting stuck in. They're moving around like their backsides are on fire. You have to hand it to them; they're not very coordinated but they certainly are frisky.

Now it's 10cc and Good Morning, Judge.

I liked this when I was younger but will I like it now? I must confess that, in adulthood, the appeal of 10cc has paled somewhat. I can't help feeling they sacrificed emotional integrity for the sake of futile cleverness.

Now that it's almost over, I've come to the conclusion that Good Morning, Judge is still acceptable to my adult ears, although I'm really not that bothered if I never hear it again.

From them, we launch into Joe Tex, with Ain't Gonna Bump No More (With No Big Fat Woman) in another clip from Soul Train.

I do like what I've seen of Soul Train. Everyone on it seems to be enjoying themselves so much more than the audience on TOTP ever do - although you do start to realise after a while that each of the the dancers has just one move that they keep repeating endlessly like they're a living animated gif. It's an effect that reminds me of the dancing scenes they sometimes used to have in old Charlie Brown cartoons.

Someone's got up on stage to dance with Joe! If it were TOTP instead of Soul Train, that person would've been Dave Lee Travis. Bearing in mind the title of the song, he'd probably have been in drag and blacked up. I'm sure that would've gone down well on Soul Train.

Next it's Kiki Dee. Until I started watching these repeats, I never realised how many hits she'd had. Or what an attractive woman she was. For some reason, until I was reintroduced to her by these shows, I'd always remembered her as having a face like a slapped haddock. What a fool I was.

Billy Ocean's back for what seems like his 99th consecutive week. I don't mind, as it's a great song and he always gives it his all but he does seem to be hogging the show somewhat.

At least this time he's got company, as he now has a pair of dancers with him.

I assume they're also from Legs and Co, clearly determined not to be outdone by Pauline's earlier bid for solo glory.

I once bought some wrapping paper like Billy Ocean's jacket. It was actually quite expensive.

When I say expensive, I mean I didn't get it from Poundland. I might have got it from WH Smiths.

Barbra Streisand is on now with Evergreen.

This is all a bit creepy. Some bloke with his back to us keeps doing stuff to her.

Is it Kris Kristofferson? We can't see his face and I always get him mixed up with Kurt Russell anyway.

Either way, it's a terrible video. Objects and backs of heads keep getting in the way, and now Babs is trying to strangle herself.

Barry Biggs is back with a thing called You're My Life.

What the hell is he wearing?

He's somehow managing to make Billy Ocean look conservatively dressed.

Frankly, I don't fancy his chances of reaching the top of those stairs.

I never realised before that Barry Biggs looks remarkably like Hans Holbein's portrait of Henry VIII, with the huge body, the beard and the tiny head.

Not that ABBA need worry about that - or anything else. With the staying power that saw them become Sweden's biggest export apart from Volvo, they're still Number 1.

This week's victim of the play-out curse is Rod Stewart with First Cut is the Deepest, which, going on previous experience, presumably means we'll never get to see it on the show proper.

All in all, it was an odd edition. In terms of quality it was probably the most consistent since I started watching. Off the top of my head, I can't remember a single bad song - even the first act were too weird and disorienting to actually be described as bad - but, then again, it seemed an oddly unfocused show that never quite got into its stride. The breaking up of Legs and Co into splinter groups was a noteworthy innovation and it'll be interesting to see if it's a policy that's maintained in coming weeks.