WARNING.....THIS WEEK'S EFFORT IS A BIT OF A LET-DOWN......
Prior to its release as a single, it was part of the what should by now be familiar Derby Assembly Rooms broadcast from December 1983:-
On 26 January 1984, after it went into the charts at #26, the band made the second visit of their career to the studios of Top Of The Pops. This was the debut of the hearing aid:-
Now I know there's folk who aren't that fond of this particular single, but this was probably the most exciting TV appearance the band had made in their short career at this point in time.
Twelve days later, they performed a live version on the BBC North YES programme which was the first time the NHS glasses made an appearance. Sadly, I haven't been able to track down a copy of this particular performance. But there is an audio only one kicking around:-
With the single climbing to #13, they returned to the Top Of The Pops studio just 48 hours later on 9 February:-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5DE8UQnM5Y
(you need to click on this one as I cant embed it...but it's a duller TOTP performance than the previous one).
The very next night the band were back on the telly. This time on BBC2's The Oxford Road Show which was broadcast at 7pm on Friday nights which meant you could switch over just as The Tube on Channel 4 had ended.....I know cos that's exactly what I did. And I have a copy of this performance on a VHS tape in a box under the stairs. I'm sure other folk have it as well. It's just that nobody seems to have loaded it onto youtube yet....
mp3 : The Ukranians - Spivaye Solovey
(yup.....its their unique indie-folk six-minute version of this hugely underrated single)
Next week....its Sandie Shaw and the barefoot band.
1 comment:
I cannot understand why some people aren't keen on this song. It has always been my fave Smiths track.
And how unusual was it for an entire song to be played on TOTP rather than be cut prematurely?
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