Your ways are hypnotizing me

Timeslip moment again...

We've parachuted from the Space Shuttle Voyager 1 into 1977, a very different world indeed - before mobile phones or the internet, when we only had three television channels and all of them focussed in on HM The Queen's Silver Jubilee, the year Virgina Wade won Wimbledon, the "Yorkshire Ripper" murders were first linked to a single perpetrator, the world's worst ever air disaster that killed 583 people happened in Tenerife, Star Wars premiered in the USA, the National Front goaded violent opposition by holding a series of rallies, there were clashes between strikers and police at the Grunwick film processing plant, the Sex Pistols Never Mind the Bollocks was released, and the Jeremy Thorpe scandal hit the headlines; born this year were Jonathan Rhys Meyers, HRH Peter Phillips, Apple Computers, Chris Martin, Skytrain, Orlando Bloom, Michael Fassbender, the M5 motorway and Kanye West; and Joan Crawford, Marc Bolan, Elvis Presley, Bing Crosby, Sir Anthony Eden, Gary Gilmore, Groucho Marx, Zero Mostel and Charlie Chaplin all died.

In the news headlines in January '77: Home Secretary Roy Jenkins resigned to become President of the European Union, IRA bombs went off in London's West End (thankfully this time with no casualties), EMI dropped the Sex Pistols from its label, U.S. President Jimmy Carter took office, and The Pompidou Centre opened in Paris. In our cinemas: Rocky, The Pink Panther Strikes Again and Survive! On telly: Wings, Robin's Nest, Children of the Stones .

And in our charts this week forty-two years ago? One-hit-wonders Althea and Donna had scored a left-field Number 1 with Uptown Top Ranking, ending [to mass applause from a grateful public, I might add] the nine-week run at the top by the dreary Mull of Kintyre by Wings. Also present and correct were Odyssey, Scott Fitzgerald & Yvonne Keely, Donna Summer, Bonnie Tyler, Bob Marley, Bill Withers and Abba. But - fortuitously for our continuing countdown this week - lurking just outside the Top 10 were the eternally cheery Spanish duo Baccara...

I have featured their single Sorry I'm a Lady quite a few times on this very blog over the years, so I thought, for a change, I'd play the B-side - see what you think:

Baccara - Love You Till I Die

Fab lyrics. Fab choreography. Fab hair flicks. Ahem.

A million years ago...

---

STOP PRESS:

That one is a little dreary, I have to admit. And I just discovered this..!

Baccara - By 1999

Your (Magic) Fly's down

Timeslip moment again...

We have been unceremoniously ejected from the "Death Star" and dumped in the middle of September 1977 - Silver Jubilee year (again), the year of Punk, Jimmy Carter, the Tenerife air disaster, the National Front, Donna Summer, the "Son of Sam", Star Wars, Lynsey De Paul, Virginia Wade, the Vietnam-Cambodia war, and the births of Apple Computers, Orlando Bloom. Princess Anne's son Peter Phillips and Claire from Steps.

In the news this month forty years ago: the Voyager 1 space probe was launched off to the outer reaches of the Solar System (and is still there, sending signals back to Earth on its trek), the last guillotine execution took place in France, the Red Brigade continued its terrorism in Germany with the kidnap and murder of industrialist Hanns Martin Schleyer; in the ascendant: Freddie Laker (who launched his new budget airline Skytrain), Atari (which released its pioneering home video game console, soon-to-be-home of Space Invaders and Pac-Man) and Ford (whose Granada Mark II arrived on our streets); but the greatest of the Glam Rock trailblazers Marc Bolan was killed in a car crash in West London. In our cinemas: Smokey and the Bandit, New York, New York and Truffaut's The Story of Adele H. On telly: The Krypton Factor , It'll Be Alright on the Night, Secret Army.

And in our charts this week in '77? The world was still mourning the death of Elvis Presley, and his posthumous Way Down continued its five-week run at #1. Contenders to the top slot included David Soul Silver Lady (eventually to get there in October) and Jean-Michelle Jarre Oxygene; also in attendance were the aforementioned Miss Summer, The Floaters, Carly Simon, Candy Staton, Meri Wilson and Brotherhood of Man. But frustratingly held at the #2 slot again was this amazingly influential synth number by Space [surely the inspiration for Daft Punk?]...

Space - Magic Fly

Forty
Bloody
Years
Ago!

Hurry, hurry, step right on in

Well, my dears - it's our first "timeslip moment" of 2017...

Our rusty old TARDIS has wheezed its way down to January 1977 - the Silver Jubilee year - an era when Punk was supposed to be "the big thing", but in reality things had not really changed a lot: big hair, big flares, big lapels and double-denim were all still very much in evidence, and the closest we came to "anarchy" was an outraged complaint letter in The Spectator expressing "dismay" that the magazine had begun "to give space to advertisements which serve to promote homosexual purposes"...

In the news this week forty years ago: IRA bombs hit the West End of London (thankfully with no fatalities); EMI sacked the Sex Pistols for saying the word "fuck" on ITV's Today Show (the presenter Bill Grundy was also dismissed); the (remarkable at the time) new Sinclair two-inch screen television set went on sale; there was a breakthrough in science as a previously unknown bacterium was identified as the cause of Legionnaires' disease; in the ascendant were Apple Computers (newly incorporated), the new Ford Fiesta (which became the most popular car of the year in the UK, and remained so for several years) and incoming US President Gerald Ford, but Home Secretary Roy Jenkins (the man who a decade earlier had steered the legalisation of homosexuality through the UK Parliament) resigned to take up the Presidency of the European Union; and devastating 40-mile-an-hour lava flows erupted from Mount Nyiragongo in the Congo, killing seventy people. In cinemas: Sweeney! (the film spin-off from the TV series), Carrie and King Kong. On telly: Wings, Children Of The Stones and Robin's Nest.

And in our charts this week in January 1977? The lovely David Soul was at #1 with Don't Give Up On Us, and following in his wake were (the recently-deposed) Johnny Mathis, Abba, Showaddywaddy, 10CC, Julie Covington, Tina Charles, Mike Oldfield and Smokie. But the highest climber of the lot was this (almost) "one-hit wonder" - Mr Barry Biggs [Whoooo?] with his Sideshow:

Barry Biggs - Sideshow

So let the sideshow begin
Hurry, hurry, step right on in
Can't afford to pass it by
Guaranteed to make you cry
Let the sideshow begin (hurry, hurry)
Hurry, hurry, step right on in
Can't afford to pass it by
Guaranteed to make you cry

Indeed.

Always the best in town

The weekend nears - and party-planning begins (for those of us who are not still clomping around in a "big boot", of course) - and it's time for another timeslip moment.

Our trusty ship The Liberator's computer Zen [a little nod there to tacky 1970s TV classic Blake's 7, the eponymous hero of which Gareth Thomas died on Thursday] has deposited us in the midst of the glittering, lamé-clad, strike-ridden, Silver-Jubilee-obsessed Britain of thirty-nine years ago...

In April 1977: the papers were full of coverage of HM The Queen's return from her official tour of the Antipodes and South Sea island nations; Abigail's Party (with Alison Steadman) made its stage debut at the Hampstead Theatre; the Yorkshire Ripper murders gripped the nation, and the Tenerife air disaster gripped the world; Punk, the Baader-Meinhof gang, the National Front and the Anti-Nazi League were at their height, while the Labour government under Jim Callaghan was at an all-time low; and British Aerospace was born. On our cinema screens were The Eagle Has Landed, Airport '77 and Demon Seed; while on telly were Citizen Smith, Jesus of Nazareth (starring Robert Powell) and The Muppet Show.

In our charts this week in '77: Abba were leading the pack, with David Soul, Showaddywaddy, David Bowie, Manhattan Transfer, Elvis, Boney M, Brotherhood of Man and Maxine Nightingale all holding on in there - as, just making its descent after a triumphant twelve week run in the Top Ten, was this one. Ironically on this, the stormiest, most rain-sodden day for weeks, here's the inappropriately-named Heatwave and Boogie Nights. Don't go out dressed like this, kiddie-winks!

Heatwave - Boogie Nights

Thank Disco It's Friday - and have a good one!