A DIY TOTP FOR W/C 06/05/2013

The one thing people forget about Top Of The Pops is that, for every heart-stopping performance by The KLF or Destiny’s Child, you had to sit through half-a-dozen dismal efforts by Eiffel 65 or Jive Bunny. Yes, it’s bad that primetime TV continues to snub the music industry, but maybe the people who gave us Peter Andre got what they deserved.

Anyway, thanks to the beauty of YouTube, you can now curate your own Top Of The Pops with the added benefit of zero Fearne Cotton. For instance, if you trawl through the last seven days of chat shows and Jools Hollands, you could compile an episode featuring Vampire Weekend, Rudimental, Thom Yorke, Marina and the Diamonds, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Phoenix. But we kick off the show with the biggest song in the world right now...



Icona Pop - I Love It


Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Sacriliege


Rudimental ft Ella Eyre - Waiting All Night (acoustic)


Vampire Weekend - Diane Young


Phoenix - Trying To Be Cool


Thom Yorke - Ingenue


Marina and the Diamonds - Lies


Not bad, eh? And of course we'd play out with the UK's Number One. And of course we would cut it off half way through, in true TOTP tradition.

Daft Punk - Get Lucky (Peter Serafinowicz video edit)

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I have seen the future of music television, and it stars one of the kids from Outnumbered

Ever since Top Of The Pops went tits up six (six!) years ago, there's been a lot of hand-wringing about TV's attitude to music. Jools Holland is too exclusive, X Factor is too vulgar, MTV doesn't show any music videos, and the Album Chart Show audience consists solely of people who fell asleep during 8 Out Of 10 Cats.

Music TV is broken and no-one knows how to fix it. The generally-accepted point of view is that TOTP peaked in the 1970s, when families watched programmes together. Now, I spend more time tweeting stupid things my wife says to me about what's on TV than actually watching the TV.

So what can music shows do? The obvious answer is "find a niche". That's why Jools Holland thrives, despite his astonishing inability to conduct a halfway competent interview: His programme appeals to the sort of music fan who likes to be in-the-know. But these are the sort of people who spend hours debating which of the 42 guitar solos David Gilmour recorded for Comfortably Numb should be considered the definitive take. What about mainstream music fans?

Well, I think I might have discovered the answer. Flicking through the channels at the weekend, I stumbled across a programme called Friday Download. It's not exactly cutting edge (one of the presenters is Tyger Drew-Honey from Outnumbered) but it's made a genuine attempt to reflect how the kids consume pop music.

Produced by CBBC, it's free from the crippling need to be "authentic" or "edgy". Each week, there'll be a performance by a Wanted or a One Direction in front of a couple of dozen braying, hysterical girls. But the similarities to pop shows of the past ends there.

In the most impressive segment, the audience are asked to film themselves lip-syncing to a current chart hit. Then a professional BBC editor cuts that footage together with the original video to make a sort of "You've Been Framed Goes Pop" montage. Here's an example from last summer, featuring Martin Solveig and Dragonette's Hello.



In another regular feature, Dionne "I'm Amy Winehouse's goddaughter but I don't like to mention it" Bromfield performs a top 40 hit with the studio audience. As she warbles, the words pop up along the bottom of the screen, SingStar-style, to encourage participation at home.

And then there's the old music show standby of reviewing the week's new videos. It doesn't have the bitchy frisson of Mel C and Louis Walsh's bust-ups on CD:UK (last week's review of Noah And The Whale contained the baffling observation: "I think they are going to be even bigger than they actually were") but it gets the job done.

The show, which also has segments on fashion, film and video games, may not be perfect but, by embracing fan participation, it reflects children's relationship with and excitement about pop music without the increasingly-irrelevant prop of a Top 40 countdown. Best of all, the tone is genuine enthusiasm, rather than the sneering disdain that's become Channel 4's default position.

Now, if someone could raise the pyrotechnics budget, throw in a song or two "for the dads" and schedule it on BBC One at teatime, I reckon we could have a genuine hit on our hands.

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It's still number one... Sort of

Wooo! I just stumbled across the recording of the Christmas edition of Top Of The Pops (it's only bloody back!).

How did I find out about this momentous recording? Because I had just finished buying a sandwich in BBC Television Centre when I turned round and walked into Mark Owen and his hat.

As often happens in these situations I thought, "I work here, I recognise this person's face, therefore I know this person". So I said hello. Mark very politely sang a greeting back to me. I like to think of it as our personal "moment".

Anyway, I stalked the band into studio 3 and watched them run through Greatest Day, which was suitably amazing. In between takes, Gary Barlow revealed he'd been "on t'internet" to look up how many times Take That had been on TOTP - a grand total of 67! The rest of the band were suitably incredulous at this figure. Mark suggested it included clips and repeats. Jason ventured that it included solo appearances by Robbie Williams - "which makes it sixty-six times for Robbie and one for us".

Ouch.

Anyway, the programme looks like it'll be a good'un. Duffy and McFly also performed, and the line-up is also supposed to include Girls Aloud and Leona Lewis. Hopefully, unlike the so-called "last ever" TOTP, they'll make it down to the studio, rather than replying on some ropey old taped performance.

Which makes me think: Maybe I should go and get another sandwich?

Take That - Pray (TOTP)

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Pop on the box: A comparative history

People keep asking why Top Of The Pops, CD:UK, Popworld, and all the other decent pop programmes have died and gone to telly heaven. I think I have a theory...

Exhibit A: Otis Redding performing I Can't Turn You Loose on ITV pop show Ready Steady Go, 1966.

To gee himself up for an appearance on national TV, Otis burns his hand on a stove, licks a car battery and shoves a frog up his bottom. That's why he dances like an epileptic windmill. It's invigorating stuff:



Exhibit B: Gnarls Barkley on chin-stroking muso wankfest Live from Abbey Road, 2007.

The biggest moment of drama in this performance comes when someone turns the volume knob on their keyboard from four to slightly louder than four.

Cee-Lo may have the voice of an angel, but it would have been better if, just before the director called "action", someone had slapped him with a kipper and called his mum a slag:




I put it to you, the jury, that music television went wrong when we stopped making singers flail around like demented baboons and decided that exhibiting any sort of enjoyment somehow "devalued" the "music".

I blame Oasis, myself.

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End of an era!

Guess where I ended up tonight?



In Studio Three of BBC Television Centre, trying to muscle my way into shot on the final ever Top of the Pops!!

To be honest, it was a bit of an anti-climax. There were no bands, only video clips, and an array of aging TOTP presenters.

Surely they could have managed to book someone on the show - if not Robbie or Madonna, I'm sure Chico would have done it.

In the end, though, it was quite a nostalgic night. The staff were very emotional (although speculating that they'd be back within two years) and the presenters seemed genuinely fond of the show they were saying goodbye to.

"Maybe we should just say 'See you next week'," laughed Mike Read as they prepared to read out the closing link.

If only they could...

Read my 'professional' summary of the night's events here

PS I couldn't quite hear him over the screaming teens, but I'm sure Reggie Yates said that the programme would be back for a one-off look at the singles of 2006. Does this mean we get the Christmas Day show, after all? I do hope so!

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Unsurprising news

It's not Thursday, it's not seven o'clock, and it's definitely not Top of the Pops. The BBC have only gorn and axed the only pop music programme left on the telly (I'm not counting the new Popworld because it is, frankly, a load of old toss).

Oh well, it's just me and the 47 cable tv music channels from hereon in.

The BBC statement 'in full'

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The end of pop?!

What a depressing era for music this is turning out to be. Top Of The Pops has been shunted off to BBC2, CD:UK has been cancelled, James Blunt has sold ten squillion records, and now Smash Hits is closing.

So, what's the problem? Has the UK lost all interest in music? Certainly, the tabloids have ditched all serious coverage of music. If it's not Kylie's Bum, Pete Doherty's hilarious antics with crack cocaine, or Cheryl Tweedy flashing her pants, it's not worth covering.

My theory is that the deliberate fragmentation of the record market has dealt a fatal blow to pop music. Noawadays, most artists are marketed to a particular demographic. Norah Jones is innofensive mum music, Black Eyed Peas is rap for slightly timid white kids, Daniel Powter is for all of satan's minions here on earth.

Our radio and TV stations reinforce this segregation. All of the national music radio stations take the view that rock is the only credible form of modern songcraft (although Radio One gives some breathing space to rap). Music television and in-store radio cater to the pop kids, and most local radio goes follow the easy-listening classics formula.

Thus, if you want to make it big, you have to straddle these genres. To do that, you play it safe. That's why Coldplay are the biggest new band of the last 5 years - because there is nothing suprising, offensive, or vaguely original about their corporate bland-rock. Mums, Dads, kids and introspective teenagers can all tolerate Coldplay together, without ever having to make any kind of emotional connection to the music itself.

Compare this to the 80s - the heyday of TOTP and Smash Hits. The crossover acts of the New Romantic era were Duran Duran, Soft Cell, The Human League, Dexy's Midnight Runners, etc. They were seedy, exciting, experimental bands, with a huge musical palette, and they managed to straddle the adult and teen market without diluting their style.

Somewhere along the line, then, pop became a dirty word. If you read through the BBC's "Your tributes to Smash Hits" messageboard, you'll discover that the majority of the public blames Stock, Aitken and Waterman for this turn of events. I disagree. SAW's best songs did have a broad appeal. You Spin Me Round Like a Record, for example, is due its third Top 20 appearance this Sunday. And who doesn't get up and dance like a lunatic when a DJ plays "Love In The First Degree"?

In my opinion, the real culprits here are New Kids On the Block. They were the first band to be precision-targetted at 13 year-olds. And their unqualified success is directly responsible for the likes of The Backstreet Boys, Take That and (shudder) Westlife.

NKTOB's dubious achievement was to make music so mind-numbingly, nursery-rhyme simple that it could only be tolerated by pre-teens on a candy cane sugar rush. Whereas parents had been able to appreciate the New Kids' forebears (The Osmonds, Jackson 5, New Edition), this music was so lacking in sophistication that pop suddenly seemed like alien territory. A bit like Jordan Knight's forehead.

This is partly what killed Smash Hits. Before the New Kids, the magazine could interview The Cure and The Flying Lizards. Afterwards, they were constantly chasing a market more interested in the free gel-pens on the cover than the music inside the magazine.

TOTP, paradoxically, has gone down the dumper because it tried to be all-inclusive. When they put Green Day side by side with DJ Casper, they ensure that everybody has a reason to turn off in the first five minutes. (Tim 'what's my line' Kash was of no great help here, either).

So, what's the answer? Well, as we alluded to earlier this week, acts like Arctic Monkeys don't seem to be afraid of dirtying their hands in the murky waters of pop. The Kaiser Chiefs and Franz Ferdinand seem to enjoy a bit of froth, too. All we need now is for our pop acts to raise their game in return. Surely there's room for more than one Sugababes?

And perhaps the greatest reason for hope is found in US radio. After years of strict formatting, station programmers have come to the shocking realisation that most people like more than one genre of music. This slapping-of-hands-onto-foreheads piece of insight is all down to the ipod. Noticing that the most-loved feature of the digital music player is it's shuffle function, all-rock or all-R&B playlists are being ditched in favour of a format they call "Jack" or, intriguingly, "Bob".

Turning on Bob radio, you might find U2, Michael Jackson, Whitney, the B52s, Scissor Sisters, Beyoncé or The Strokes... anything goes, as long as it's a hit. The success of these stations is mannah to marketing managers, who can suddenly advertise to several demographics at once. You should expect it to start appearing in the UK very soon.

If, over the next couple of years, we can make pop music relevant again, it would be an amazing turnaround. After all, music should be enjoyed universally - in the same way as film and literature - not squeezed into an increasingly small series of sub-genres.

Perhaps then we'll see the likes of Smash Hits and CD:UK again. Perhaps bands will be less afraid to push the envelope. Perhaps kids will once again gain some idea of our musical heritage. And, best of all, perhaps we can finally tell Coldplay to go away and stop bothering us.

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