After a hiatus of a few weeks the Bands In Places They Shouldn't Be series returns. Previous outings have included bands appearing on unlikely tv programmes- Echo And The Bunnymen on Wogan, Ice T on The Late Review, Aztec Camera on Pebble Mill At One, that sort of thing- and a few weeks ago JC of The Vinyl Villain blogging fame wrote a Scottish bands guest special. Today we find ourselves in the early/ mid 90s and some televisual feats that made many of us blink, rub our eyes and question what was going on.
In 1993 New order released Republic, an album that was made under forced circumstances (to prevent Factory from going bust- it didn't work and the single and album came out on London, irony of ironies) and which features some fairly uninspired songs, especially on side 2, but the lead single was classic New Order, released in April 1993. It was the first new New Order song since World In Motion, a long three years earlier, and had a Bernard Sumner guitar riff, deadpan lyrics, Hooky's bass clanging through and all seemed well with the world. The band found themselves promoting the single in the USA and in a Top Of The Pops live satellite link up, appeared from Venice Beach, California, the set of early 90s swimsuit show Baywatch, a recording complete with an appearance by David Hasselhoff (a man who tried to take some of the credit for the fall of the Berlin Wall).
New Order don't look dressed for the beach or for Baywatch. They look more dressed for Dry Bar on Oldham Street. They proceed to mime their way through Regret in bright sunshine while California's beach bums sun themselves and play volleyball. Hooky is wearing leather trousers. Gillian is all in black. Everyone ignores everyone else. Hasselhoff roams the beach. A kayakist paddles past. Dissonance reigns supreme.
In 1992 the Premier League took over top flight football in England. One of the innovations of this brave new world was Monday Night Football. In September 1992 the crowd at Highbury and watching at home/ in the pub were treated to the bizarre spectacle of The Shamen performing their chart topping single Ebeneezer Goode at half time, the launch night of Monday Night Football
Colin Angus and Mr C give it a go, all wrapped up in black plastic and leather, techno guitars and a song that most definitely wasn't a celebration of taking ecstasy. Another Sky innovation, a cheerleader troop called The Sky Strikers dance in the centre circle. Mr C looks a bit like he already knows this is a bad idea. As the performance went on the crowd chanted over the top and booed (Mr C is a Chelsea fan and this was well known to some of the Arsenal faithful).
The match went on to finish one- nil to Arsenal, Manchester City being the losers, so not all bad eh? Sky dropped both The Sky Strikers and half time musical acts within six months. Given the rapacious nature of hyper- capitalist 21st century football, this all looks quite quaint now but again as with New Order at Baywatch, who thought this was a good idea?