Top Of The Pops

Top of the Pops, also known as TOTP, is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly from 1 January 1964 to 30 July 2006. It was traditionally shown every Thursday evening on BBC1, before being moved to Fridays in 1996, and then moved to Sundays on BBC Two in 2005. Each weekly programme consisted of performances from some of that week's best-selling popular music artists, with a rundown of that week's singles chart. Additionally, every year there was a special edition of the programme on Christmas Day featuring some of the best-selling singles of the year.

Although the weekly show was cancelled,[1] the Christmas special has continued.[2][3][4] It was also survived by TOTP2, which began in 1994 and featured vintage performances from the Top of the Pops archives.

In the 1990s, the show's format was sold to several foreign broadcasters in the form of a franchise package, and at one point various versions of the show were shown in nearly 100 countries.

At the moment, a local version of TOTP is still regularly running in Italy on Rai Due.[5]

History

The first show

Top of the Pops began on New Year's Day 1964 in Studio A on Dickenson Road in Rusholme, Manchester, which the BBC had bought from Mancunian Films in 1954. DJ Jimmy Savile presented the first show, which featured (in order) The Rolling Stones with "I Wanna Be Your Man", Dusty Springfield with "I Only Want to Be With You", the Dave Clark Five with "Glad All Over", The Hollies with "Stay", The Swinging Blue Jeans with "Hippy Hippy Shake" and The Beatles with "I Want to Hold Your Hand",[6] that week's number one (throughout its history, the programme always finished with the best-selling single of the week). For the first three years Savile rotated with three other presenters: Alan Freeman, Pete Murray and David Jacobs. A Mancunian model, Samantha Juste, was the regular "disc girl".

"It's still number one"

The show was originally intended to have only a few programmes but ran for over 42 years, reaching landmark episodes of 1000 and 2000 in 1983 and 2002 respectively. During its heyday in the 1970s, it attracted 15 million viewers each week.[7] Largely due to the varying levels of availability of chart acts throughout the 1970s and into the early 1980s, the show featured tightly choreographed dance troupes such as Ruby Flipper, Legs & Co. and Zoo. The original and most popular of these groups, Pan's People, were used when an act was unable to appear in person and no footage of them was available - a common occurrence in the era before promotional videos. By the mid-1980s the troupes were dropped and the audience took a more active role, often dancing in more prominent areas such as behind performing acts on the back of the stage, and on podiums. TOTP was traditionally shown on a Thursday night, but was moved to a Friday starting on 14 June 1996, originally at 7pm, but then shifted to 7.30pm, a change which placed the programme up against the hugely popular soap opera, Coronation Street, on ITV. This was when the major decline in audiences began as fans were forced to choose between TOTP and an episode of the soap.

The show saw many changes through the decades, in style, design, fashion and taste. It periodically had some aspect of its idents, format, or set design altered in some way, keeping the show looking modern despite its age.

The show was closely associated with the BBC radio station Radio 1, usually being presented by DJs from the station and between 1988 and 1991 the BBC1 programme was simulcast, audio-only, on Radio 1. During the last few years of airing the association was not as close as it once was, most notably in a radical shake-up in October 1991 when the Radio 1 DJs were replaced by a team of relative unknowns, such as Claudia Simon and Tony Dortie who had previously worked for Children's BBC, 17-year-old local radio DJ Mark Franklin, Steve Anderson, Adrian Rose and Elayne Smith, who was replaced by Femi Oke in 1992. The team would take turns presenting either in pairs or solo and would often introduce acts in an out-of-vision voiceover over the song's instrumental introduction and sometimes even conducted short informal interviews with the performers. Rules relating to performance were also altered meaning acts had to sing live. To incorporate the shift of dominance towards American artists, more use was made of out-of-studio performances, with acts in America able to transmit their song to the Top of the Pops audience 'via satellite'. These changes were widely unpopular and much of the team were axed within a year, leaving the show presented solely by Dortie and Franklin by 1993, on a week-by-week rotation. The arrival of Ric Blaxill as producer in February 1994 signalled a return to presentation from established Radio 1 DJs Simon Mayo, Mark Goodier, Nicky Campbell and Bruno Brookes.

Blaxill expanded the use of 'via satellite' performances, taking the acts out of studios and concert halls and setting them against landmark backdrops. As a consequence, Bon Jovi performed Always from Niagara Falls and Celine Dion beamed in Think Twice from Miami Beach. Blaxill also began experimenting with handing presenting duties to celebrities, commonly contemporaneous comedians and pop stars who were not in the charts at that time. In an attempt to keep the links between acts as fresh as the performances themselves, the so-called 'golden mic' was used by, amongst others, Kylie Minogue, Meat Loaf, Chris Eubank, Damon Albarn, Harry Hill, Jack Dee, Lulu and Jarvis Cocker. Radio 1 DJs still presented occasionally, notably Lisa I'Anson, Steve Lamacq, Jo Whiley and Chris Evans. In 1997, incoming producer Chris Cowey phased out the use of celebrities and established a rotating team (similar to the 1991 revamp, although much more warmly received) of former presenters of youth music magazine The O Zone Jayne Middlemiss and Jamie Theakston as well as Radio 1 DJs Jo Whiley and Zoe Ball. The team was later augmented by Kate Thornton and Gail Porter.

For most of its history the show had very strict rules about which singles could be featured. A song could not appear if it was going down the charts, nor could any track appear on consecutive weeks unless it was at number one. These rules were abandoned in 1997, possibly as a response to the changing nature of the Top 40 (in the late 1990s and early 2000s climbers in the charts were a rarity, with almost all singles peaking at their debut position).

When the programme's format changed in November 2003 it concentrated increasingly on the top 10. Later, during the BBC Two era, the top 20 was regarded as the main cut-off point, with the exception made for up and coming bands below the top 20. Singles from below the top 40 (within the top 75) were shown if the band were up and coming or had a strong selling album. If a single being performed was below the top 40, just the words "New Entry" were shown and not the chart position.

All New Top of the Pops

On 28 November 2003, the show saw one of its most radical overhauls in what was widely reported as a make-or-break attempt to revitalise the long-running series. In a break with the previous format, the show played more up-and-coming tracks ahead of any chart success, and also featured interviews with artists. The launch show, which was live and an hour long, was notable for a performance of "Flip Reverse" by Blazin' Squad, featuring hordes of hooded teenagers choreographed to dance around the outside of BBC TV Centre. The new show, hosted by MTV presenter Tim Kash launched to low ratings and scathing reviews [8][9]. Kash continued to host the show for a year before being dropped by the BBC, later taking up a new contract at MTV. The show was then co-hosted by Reggie Yates and Fearne Cotton every Friday night until 8 July 2005.

By November 2004, viewing figures had plummeted to below three million, prompting announcement by the BBC that the show was going to move, again, to Sunday evenings on BBC Two, thus losing the prime-time slot on BBC One that it had maintained for more than forty years.[10] This move was widely reported as a final 'sidelining' of the show, and perhaps signalled its likely cancellation. At the time, it was insisted that this was so that the show would air immediately after the official announcement of the new top 40 chart on Radio 1, as it was thought that by the following Friday, the chart seemed out-of-date. The final Top of the Pops to be shown on BBC One (barring Christmas and New Year specials) was broadcast on Monday 11 July 2005, which was edition number 2,166.

The first edition on BBC Two was broadcast on 17 July 2005 at 7pm with presenter Fearne Cotton. After the move to Sundays, Cotton continued to host with a different guest presenter each week, such as Rufus Hound or Richard Bacon. On a number of occasions however, Reggie Yates would step in, joined by female guest presenters such as Lulu and Anastacia. Viewing figures averaged around 1.5 million.

Top of the Pops: Alfresco

On 30 July 2004, the show took place in Gateshead to celebrate the show's 40th anniversary. Girls Aloud, Busted, Will Young and Jamelia were among the performers that night.[11]

The Final Countdown

On 20 June 2006, the show was formally cancelled and it was announced that the last edition would be broadcast on 30 July 2006. Edith Bowman co-presented its hour-long swansong, along with Sir Jimmy Savile (who had presented the first show), Reggie Yates, Mike Read, Pat Sharp, Sarah Cawood, Dave Lee Travis, Rufus Hound, Tony Blackburn and Janice Long. The final day of recording was 26 ...   More