If you are over 30 and serious about music then you will at some time in your youth come across The Old Grey Whistle Test. From its first transmission in 1971 to the last 16 years later in 1987 this programme showcased some of the biggest acts in 70’s and 80’s music. To mark the 30th anniversary of the show the BBC released this 2 DVD set which includes a varied selection of the output over the years.
IN THE BEGINNING
I’m not old enough to remember the earliest editions of the show, I suppose I started watching it regularly in the late 70’s. Like all kids interested in music my main exposure came from watching ‘Top of the Pops’ with screaming studio audience, banal presenters and cheesy sets (and Pan’s People of course!). The Old Grey Whistle Test a complete opposite to this it was shown late at night, past my bedtime and I knew nothing of it, then one day I can’t remember the circumstances I came across it by accident. At first you could mistake it for a Open University programme, a bearded man with longish hair, wearing flares and a tank top was sitting in a swivel chair speaking in hushed reverential tone to the camera, but wait he wasn’t talking about social anthropology but about the latest release by Iggy Pop. But where was the audience? why was the studio poorly lit? and why was it so quiet?. Suddenly the man in the chair swivelled round and turned towards a small stage behind him and there was the man himself, bare-chested of course singing ‘I’m Bored’. I was then hooked. It was probably a few years after that I was actually old enough to stay up and watch it regularly but no matter I had been initiated, from that moment I knew that music even if it didn’t involve an orchestra could be taken seriously.
THE DVD
Featured on the DVD set are old and new footage of all the presenters from the show.
1) THE PRESENTERS
The bearded reconstituted hippie was of course the legendary ‘Wispering’ Bob Harris on of the shows earliest presenters. He was the face of the show throughout the 70’s and his quiet soporific laid back presentation became part of the inspiration behind the ‘Nice’ Jazz presenter on the Fast Show. Harris was and still is a respected Radio DJ. For many years he presented the
late night rock show on Radio 1.
Richard Williams was the presenter of the first series of the show. He was a music journalist by profession being the assistant editor of Melody Maker. I only have very vague memories of him presenting the show probably on re-runs I have seen.
Annie Nightingale presented the The Old Grey Whistle Test between1978-1982. She was also Britain’s first female DJ being a regular on Radio 1 for many years.
Andy Kershaw became a presenter on the show after a varied career in the music industry including being Billy Bragg’s driver. Through contacts he had made he eventually became the lead presenter of the show in the early 80’s and later went on to host his own Radio 1 show.
David Hepworth is now better known for his contributions as journalist and part-time editor of many well known music publicatiosn such as Q, Mojo and Empire. He joined the show in the 80’s, and was one of the studio presenters for Live Aid.
Mark Ellen began his career as a journalist on Record Mirror at the height of the post punk new wave scene in the late 70’s. He went on to write for the NME and Time Out. He started presenting the show in 1982 and was also involved in setting up and launching Q magazine.
THE MUSIC
The makers of this DVD set have set themselves a huge task, to condense 16 years of one of the top music shows featuring performances by almost all of the top artist at the time in to just 45 performances.
They were bound to miss out some great footage but they also managed to capture the essential elements of the show.
The first disc roughly covers the shows beginnings in the 70’s up to the start of New Wave in the early 80’s. Like the show itself the mixture of musical style included is refreshing. Included are some great footage of ‘The Wailers’, Tim Buckley , Capt Beefheart and The Alex Harvey Band.
Disc 1:
Alice Cooper "Under My Wheels" Elton John "Tiny Dancer" Curtis Mayfield "We Gotta Have Peace" Randy Newman "Political Science" Kris Kristofferson & Rita Coolidge "Help Me Make it Through the Night" Bill Withers "Ain't No Sunshine" Focus "Sylvia/Hocus Pocus" Rory Gallagher "Hands Off" John Martyn "May You Never" The Wailers "Stir it Up" Roxy Music "Do the Strand" The Edgar Winter Group "Frankenstein" New York Dolls "Jet Boy" Tim Buckley "Dolphins" Captain Beefheart "Upon the My O My" Little Feat "Rock 'n' Roll Doctor" Dr Feelgood "Roxette" John Lennon "Stand By Me" The Sensational Alex Harvey Band "Give My Compliments to the Chef" Lynyrd Skynyrd "Freebird" Emmylou Harris "Amarillo" Bonnie Raitt "Too Long at the Fair" Tom Waits "Tom Traubert's Blues" Otway & Barrett "Really Free"
Disc 2 covers the later period of the show and is heavily features the New Wave scene as well as then newly emerging Indie and Alternative music. Strangely enough the show missed out on the punk scene altogether being firmly part of the established music industry in the late 70’s when they finally got around to realising that Punk was changing music for good the era was over so the compensated by concentrating on the post punk movement.
Disc 2:
Talking Heads "Psycho Killer" XTC "Statue of Liberty" Blondie "(I'm Always Touched by Your) Presence Dear" Val Doonican & Charlie McCoy "Stone Fox Chase" Meatloaf "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers "American Girl" The Police "Can't Stand Losing You" Bruce Springsteen "Rosalita" Iggy Pop "I'm Bored" Tubeway Army "Are Friends Electric" The Specials "Message to You Rudi" The Damned "Smash It Up/I Just Can't Be Happy Today" The Ramones "Rock 'n' Roll High School" PL "Careering" The Teardrop Explodes "Reward" U2 "I Will Follow" Nine Below Zero "Stone Fox Chase" Japan "Ghosts" Robert Wyatt "Shipbuilding" REM "Moon River/Pretty Persuasion" Simply Red "Holding Back the Years"
The disc also includes interviews from the early run of the show featuring Bernie Taupin and Elton John, Mick Jagger, Keith Richard, Robert Plant, Bruce Springsteen and John Lennon.
The second disc is probably more varied in quality than the first but it also contains some of my favourite tracks. Robert Wyatt’s rendition of Costello’s ‘Shipbuilding’ still sounds wonderful. They have also included a very early performance by ‘The Specials’ and ‘The Teardrop Explodes’. I could have done without Val Doonican playing the shows theme tune on mouth harmonica amusing as it is since this took away the opportunity of featuring some other classic footage and why did they include Simply Red? I couldn’t understand at the time or now!
The DVD offers more than just a compilation of the show. The archive footage of the artists is also introduced by current day footage of the presenters giving us bits of trivia or personal recollections of the time when the performances took place, sometimes explaining odd incidences that occurred on camera, such as Stings dreadful choice of sunglasses while singing ‘Can't Stand Losing You’ (apparently an accident with a can of hairspray).
Mike Appleton the show’s original producer gives an interesting behind the scenes audio commentary mentioning details of how the performances came about and details of the recordings. Considering the age of some of the material the quality on the DVD is outstanding both audio and visually.
One big drawback is the facility to select individual tracks (apart with the Random play option). It is possible though to selects the songs by year.
*Full DVD features:
45 archive performances Interviews Artists’ Gallery Presenters' Choice Audio Commentary OGWT Museum Year by Year Selection Random Choice
Cat no. BBCDVD 1073 RRP: £24.99 Released on 17 September 2001
THE ONES THAT GOT AWAY
As I said before it is hard to make this kind of compilation. They have tried to include rare tracks some of which have not been since the original broadcast so I suppose I shouldn’t quibble too much with the choices… but I will anyway!
There are some wonderful performances that I can clearly remember, being omitted form this collection, David Bowie in his Ziggy Stardust era, the excellent Patti Smith singing ‘Because the Night’ and ‘Hey Joe’, Alex Harvey singing ‘Next’ a better choice of song than the one they did include. They have also left out some of the wonderful ‘videos’ that show produced. In the days before proper video release to accompany a song and where there was no live footage of the artist available the Old Grey Whistle Test used to add their own graphics to the track, this could include old film footage set to the music or strange experts of avant-garde cartoon films. Many time the choices of these graphics was inspired and it seemed like the tracks were specifically written to accompany them. Some of the most memorable included the surreal cartoon to Frank Zappa’s ‘City of Tiny Lights’, the 30’s dancing girls footage accompanying Led Zeppelin’s ‘Immigrant Song’ and ‘Tubular Bells’ accompanying a black and white film showing a downhill chase on skies. I’m sure I didn’t make these up!
Overall the DVD’s are a good record of the show and give you an idea of what the show was all about.
In the mid 80’s TOGWT tried to adapt to the changing times that required a looser less serious more magazine style approach to presenting music on TV. The leader of the pack by this time was ‘The Tube’ and despite TOGWT changing personnel and name (they renamed it ‘The Whistle Test’) it’s fate was sealed. It finished its run in 1987 culminating a special compilation show on New Year’s Eve.
Strangely enough Music Programmes on TV seem to have come full circle, after the demise of The Tube, music and new bands were left to be showcased on magazine like shows such as The Word or video based show a like Max Headroom and Snub TV. All these have come and gone until today we have ‘Later with Jools Holland’ that in its atmosphere and presentation seems to follow the ethos of TOGWT.
Music / Performing Arts, Comedy - Director: Trevor Nunn, Geoffrey Posner - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over, Parental Guidance - Starring: Duncan Preston, Celia Imrie, Julie Walters, Victoria Wood, Jim Broadbent
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in 1971 it was a unique platform for acts. During its run it featured performances from artists such as Elton John, Bob Marley, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Tim Buckley, Bill...
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music programme ever broadcast on television. During its 16-year run it showcased only the most earnest exponents of whichever musical style was currently popula...
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