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Have A Cuppa Tea With The Kinks

Strictly Come Dancing

Mildly Interesting Pop Fact: The Kinks' first UK Top 40 hit for eleven years, Come Dancing peaked at number 12 in the Gallup charts in the late summer of 1983. As a child I thought this record was by Paul McCartney for some reason. Ahh, the complete stupidity of youth.

Anyway, here, in an exciting Radio 1 top 40 countdown stylee, are the eleven records that kept it from its rightful place at the top spot in that fateful week of 27th August:

11 - Malcolm McLaren - Double Dutch

"Hey ebon, eboneh!" Eh?

10 - David Grant - Watching You Watching Me

Isn't that what the presenters used to say at the end of Game For A Laugh?

9 - UB40 - Red Red Wine

This was one of the five singles my mother let me buy in order to placate me for the trauma of having to move fifty miles and switch schools when my dad relocated for work. The other four were: They Don't Know by Tracey Ullman, Modern Love by David Bowie, Heaven 17's Crushed By The Wheels Of Industry and Big Apple by Kajagoogoo.

8 - Herbie Hancock - Rockit

Successful jazzy type leaps on vogueish
body poppin' 'n' a-scratchin' bandwagon to great effect. Or does he?! (Yes.)

7 - Depeche Mode - Everything Counts

As The Kinks found to their cost this week, IT'S A COMPETITIVE WORLD.

6 - Madness - Wings of a Dove

I somehow managed to, ahem, inherit Matty Davis's copy of this. Hah! In your fizzog, Matty D!

5 - Wham! - Club Tropicana

..drinks are free. Fun and sunshine - there's enough for everyone... Admit it, this is great!

4 - Elton John - I'm Still Standing

Alongside my lovely wife Renata. Pfft.

3 - Style Council - Long Hot Summer

This just passed me by I'm afraid.

2 - Spandau Ballet - Gold

The royalties Gary Kemp must earn from this whenever there's an Olympic games - and accompanying musical montage - on. Must be almost enough not to have to swallow his pride and reform two decades later with the bandmate(s) he ended up despising. Almost.

1 - KC & The Sunshine Band - Give It Up

The song that must've launched a thousand - or at least a dozen - Radio 1 roadshows. Oh Smiley Miley, where are you now?

Come Dancing was, of course, a nostalgic paean to Ray Davies's childhood in post-war Britain, when dance halls like the one his big sister used to frequent were all the rage. It's quite poignant too in parts: "The day they knocked down the Pally, part of my childhood died - just died". Makes you think.

Tenuous link ahoy! Similar themes to those above were explored in classic BBC sitcom Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads AKA arguably the best sitcom of all time, which can now be bought in its entirety - 26 episodes, a Christmas Special plus all 8 surviving episodes from the 1960s precursor The Likely Lads - for a bargain £11.99 from HMV. Possibly the greatest theme tune ever too!

Three of a Kind #64

Feast your mince pies, dear reader, on Swedish popsters of yesteryear, Skip'z. Phwoarr! Eh? Aren't they dreamy? (especially the bloke second from the right.) Skip'z are just one of over fifty equally sartorially-challenged Swedish dance bands from the seventies pictured over on this fantastic webpage. (muchos credit and [ahem] a big shout-out must go to my old mucker Jon H here for sending me that link in the first place. Ta, matey!)

Words can't really do justice to the mind-boggling sights on offer over there, anyway, so let's just have some more band pics and some suitable songs by way of tribute to these men (and the occasional woman) who remain, even now, on the most wanted lists of fashion police the world over.







The Kinks - Dedicated Follower of Fashion mp3

Cud - You Sexy Thing mp3

Lucky Soul - Ain't Never Been Cool mp3

Three of a kind #33

A trio of songs to mark the UK's Work Your Proper Hours Day today - which the eagle-eyed amongst you may have noticed just so happens to fall on this very day!

From the Worksmart website:

Work Your Proper Hours Day (22 Feb 2008) is the day when the average person who does unpaid overtime finishes the unpaid days they do every year, and starts earning for themselves. We think that's a day worth celebrating!

Nearly five million people in the UK regularly do unpaid overtime, giving their employers an average £4,955 of free work a year. If you're one, why not take some time to reflect on how well (or badly) you're balancing your life?

This is one day in the year to make the most of your own time. Take a proper lunchbreak and leave work on time to enjoy your Friday evening - You deserve it!

You can find out more about Work Your Proper Hours Day here.

Hue and Cry - Labour Of Love mp3

Heaven 17 - Crushed By The Wheels Of Industry mp3

The Kinks - Do It Again mp3

(mp3s available for 7 days)

Buy music here.

Three of a kind #30

In a society with so much pressure to conform, it's always refreshing to hear a lyric that stresses the importance of individuality, of not running with the pack, of doing your own thing, so to speak. And today we're featuring three fine examples of such songs. (the fact that I've had to go back 30 and 40 years here may or may not be entirely coincidental. Do people even still write songs with lyrics like these?)

Eddie and the Hot Rods - Do Anything You Wanna Do mp3

The Kinks - I'm Not Like Everybody Else mp3

Mama Cass - Make Your Own Kind Of Music mp3

(mp3s available for 7 days)