Top Of The Pops. It's a right good laugh. Have a laugh with Bods, while he does some ranting.
I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes. It's cramp. Wet Wet Wet got to number one and stayed there for a while. Appeared on Top Of The Pops. Did quite a good little appearance. I don't always watch TOTP for the bands though. I watch it for the comedy. And for many years, the biggest laughs to be had when watching the program where from watching the audience 'dancing'.
Nowadays the dancers do what Danny Baker described as an 'indifferent bob', which isn't remotely funny. So if you want a laugh, you'll have to look elsewhere. Fortunately you don't have to look far. Just as far as the groups that are performing. And their outfits.
If you are performing on Top Of The Pops, then it is impossible to wear normal clothes. The men do tend to wear something 'semi-normal', but the female stars haven't got a clue. Indeed, some of them might as well be wearing nothing at all, as what they are wearing is already breaking public decency laws.
The outfits they wear are on par to those you'd find on any typical cat-walk, which just look stupid. The majority of sane people would never wear the clothes that are paraded by the broomstick handle shaped Kate Moss (please give generously, she needs food. Your money will help pay for a new Jewish mother for Kate.) So if no sane person would wear these clothes, why do the stars of Top Of The Pops wear them?
The problem is exclusive to Top Of The Pops. The White Room and Later with Jools Holland all have acts who perform wearing 'normal' clothing, these being items that you or I may wear if we felt that way inclined.
So if bands are capable of wearing normal clothes, why don't they on the nations premier music show. Personally I think it's a competition to see who can wear the stupidest outfit when performing their hits. First prize? Another ridiculous outfits by some rather insane designer perhaps?
Amazingly Ric Blaxhil, TOTP Producer has never heard of Bods, but that doesn't stop Bods from hoping that Ric will ask him to present the show. After all, by current standards, they'll let anyone do it.
Top of the Pops eh? That takes me back. I mean when I last updated the background info for this piece in 2007 I was talking about how TOTP had been joined by enigmatic shows like CD:UK... Now the UK's music on TV scene consists of Later with Jools Holland, a few late night music shows and some opera on BBC Four...
Of course I now know the cause of the dress codes - record labels and idiotic stylists... Rampant sexism because sex sells, etc etc.
Incidentally Rik Blaxhill was producer of the show in the mid 1990s.
