TJ, I don't think Chris Morris was IN The Goodies. What on earth do you think you're doing?

Ignoring the fact that this thread has NO Chris Morris content whatsoever, I liked pretty much all the Goodies series...even the ITV ones. Mind you, i haven't seen them for donkey's.

Mmm..the Goodies were definitely of the 70's and the ITV transfer did them no favours. They have my undying admiration for shooting Tony Blackburn.

>the ITV transfer did them no favours.

received opinion, or do you actually have reasoning for that remark?

Of all the people with whom to enter into a Goodies-related argument....

I've always prefered the later episodes. There were some good shows in series 1-4, but in my opinion there was a higher proportion of duds in those series, than there was after that. Series 5 is the high point of the show, with all episodes in series 6-9 being above average.

The LWT series is great. Robot for example is a true classic and with the exception of Holidays (which is pretty average), they were all extremely good.

>>the ITV transfer did them no favours.
>
>received opinion, or do you actually have reasoning for that remark?

I wasn't aware that it was received opinion but the main reason may be that I was no longer 5-years-old and had progressed onto Derek and Clive! I also remember Bill looking 'dated' in his beard, Tim looking not-so-enthusiastic and Graeme looking generally pissed-off. Or perhaps that was me?

Right, I'm going to have to dig out my old UK Gold Goodies videos now!!

Roy Kinnear was great in those two shows he guest starred in.

And he was in Ripping Yarns as well.

Dunno, but I'm going to think about it while wanking over a laminated picture of Chris Morris.

>Dunno, but I'm going to think about it while wanking over a laminated picture of Chris Morris.

So it wipes clean. Clever. Almost too clever.

>Mmm..the Goodies were definitely of the 70's and the ITV transfer did them no favours. They have my undying admiration for shooting Tony Blackburn.

I haven't seen the ITV shows since they were first broadcast, but I can clearly recall that I personally did not notice any kind of drop in quality. And I certainly don't remember any pervading sense that they had 'lost it'. So did the ITV shows actually get bad reviews at the time, or is their supposed inferiority just a myth that has sprung up since then?

>I've always prefered the later episodes. There were some good shows in series 1-4, but in my opinion there was a higher proportion of duds in those series, than there was after that. Series 5 is the high point of the show, with all episodes in series 6-9 being above average.

I agree that there were more weak episodes in the earlier series, but I personally find the good episodes of the early series superior to many of the good episodes from the later series. Some of this is what might be termed 'superficial' - I prefer the music when Bill Oddie used to write bubblegum pop songs instead of throwaway funk workouts, and I also feel that in some ways the cheaper visual effects of the earlier series suit the larger than life nature of The Goodies better - but there is also a quality to the writing that I find more prominent in the earlier episodes. There was more drive and motivation behind the exploration of vaguely topical issues and a greater desire to experiment with the format, whereas many of the later episodes, while not actually being 'formulaic' by any stretch of the imagination, seem in many cases to have been written in strict adherence to a set formula.

They're still absolutely fantastic though. And is there actually any point to distinguishing between great things?

>They're still absolutely fantastic though. And is there actually any point to distinguishing between great things?

Correct.

Series 1: feeling it's way, still full of goodness. See Toothpick, where I've said more than enough.

Series 2: generally more coherent scripts, which are storming by the last few eps.

Series 3: some of the weakest episodes in the whole Goodies canon. "Difficult third series" rings absolutely true.

Series 4: contains 'Archaeology', thus the start of an unbroken run of good stuff. Even though series 3 and 4 were shot back to back there is still the sense that the trio were more clear with their aims for this particular run of shows. The early style was polished, just as the denser scripts started to surface.

Series 5-7 - a triumph from beginning to end.

Series 8 - some scripts/ideas had been hanging around for too long and eps like 'Politics' and 'A Kick In The Arts' are sluggish in places. Still contains 'Saturday Night grease' and 'Animals', which are fabulous.

Series 9 - typically overlit LWT production, but film sequences reach their zenith with 'Big Foot' and the scripts seem more rejuvenated than in series 8. Besides, 'Snow White 2' is as sophisticated as the series ever got.

As I've said before, I accept all Goodies eps as part of the show's evolution. You can't have corkers like 'South Africa' without messy predecessors such as 'London to Brighton' or 'The Lost Tribe' before it.

Well, 'nuff said, then. Talk about killing a thread stone dead.

Or perhaps giving it a new lease of life on a basis of informed discussion?

We can but dream!

Animals and Saturday Night Grease from the 1980 series were the first things I tried to audio tape from the TV (I had no video until 1985). I also remember enjoying the LWT series and can't understand why people just did the usual "They were rubbish after they went to ITV" argument.

I certainly remember giggling like a fool at the "Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World" spoof, especially the Loch Ness Monster Theory.

>I certainly remember giggling like a fool at the "Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World" spoof, especially the Loch Ness Monster Theory.


"A common or garden rhinoceros lying upside down in the water, holding a French loaf in its mouth, balancing a tortoise."

Magnificent. I've been trying to get a hold of this episode for 10 years now. Wah. Sob...

Opening 5 minutes of Football Crazy is one of the best things they ever did. Goodies Rule OK is the moment where amusing, surreal comedy that the young people seem to like turns into something very very special. We shall never see their like again, cos it's not sophisticated or "dark" enough, is it Jane Root?

Except the episodes where they die at the end.

>>I certainly remember giggling like a fool at the "Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World" spoof, especially the Loch Ness Monster Theory.
>
>
>"A common or garden rhinoceros lying upside down in the water, holding a French loaf in its mouth, balancing a tortoise."
>
>Magnificent. I've been trying to get a hold of this episode for 10 years now. Wah. Sob...

"Arthur C. Clarke, writer, broadcaster and inventor of the digital lawnmower." - still makes me laugh that.

I can sort of see why people clain the LWT series wasn't as good. In the one period between the final BBC series and the LWT series the cast did seem to age. Maybe it was just the brighter lighting at LWT, but they did look older.

Tim's face looked fatter, Bill looked grey-ish, Graeme looked more lined. The idea of Bill Oddie wearing flares in 1981 seemed odd too, especially as he was then aged 40. From a purely looks perspective I guess it seemed a bit old and getting past it.

Comedy-wise it was still great, although it did seem a tad more commercial which is understandable as it was made in a commercial environment. Still great stuff though. Except Holidays which was generally weak.

>I agree that there were more weak episodes in the earlier series, but I personally find the good episodes of the early series superior to many of the good episodes from the later series. Some of this is what might be termed 'superficial' - I prefer the music when Bill Oddie used to write bubblegum pop songs instead of throwaway funk workouts,

Oddie's music throughout The Goodies changed with the times. The early songs captured the late 60s and early 70s, they were in that sort of hippy style, before becoming more progressive, then poppy and bubblegum, then disco and then very early 80s. (Apologies if I'm getting my terms wrong here, but I'm not as in to music as TJ, Justin and Bent. Anyway, you get what I'm saying?)

A lot of Oddie's early songs in the Goodies had lyrics, whereas the later ones didn't. Some of the early songs came from ISIRTA, others were written for the show. I assume that Oddie felt that it was pointless writing lyrics for the visual sequences, as people's main focus was and should be the on-screen action, not the backing music and the lyrics were a slight distraction at times (especially if they didn't entirely fit the sequence they were backing), although always enjoyable. Hence the lyric-less tunes you get every week in the later series.

>and I also feel that in some ways the cheaper visual effects of the earlier series suit the larger than life nature of The Goodies better - but there is also a quality to the writing that I find more prominent in the earlier episodes.

Whilst I remember liking the visual chase sequences as a child, I found them a bit boring as an adult. These days I much prefer non-chase visual sequences like the bit where they're panning for gold in "Bunfight". Lots of nice, funny visual gags but none of the idiotic running around. In the chase sequences I often felt they were being entirely illogical. If someone's coming at you with a polo mallet, why stand stock-still? You'll just get hit, and it's stupid and unfunny. Accidents are funnier, because the party who gets injured isn't expecting it. Oddie and Garden seemed to learn this in the later episodes and pretty much left behind the illogical Buster Keaton-isms, making the visual stuff more enjoyable.

>There was more drive and motivation behind the exploration of vaguely topical issues

Erm...Saturday Night Grease, Punky Business, Politics, A Kick In The Arts, Football Crazy even Earthanasia, were all topical.

>and a greater desire to experiment with the format, whereas many of the later episodes, while not actually being 'formulaic' by any stretch of the imagination, seem in many cases to have been written in strict adherence to a set formula.

That's one thing I can't disagree with, there was the "one person goes mad" formula in a lot of the later episodes (or similar). But I feel it was a winning formula. As they commented in Wilmut, with a guest-star they were often left standing meekly in a line while the guest-star had all the good lines. This seemed to weaken the Goodies a tad. And they seemed to find a better balance later on. In Punky Business both The Goodies and the guest stars get some wonderful lines and take an equal part in the proceedings.

>They're still absolutely fantastic though. And is there actually any point to distinguishing between great things?

But surely that's what this discussion is about? There has been an opinion that The Goodies went through various stages and levels of quality for ages. This is the same as The Beatles, Picasso and loads of other creative works and people.

What Goodies period people like the most is different from person to person. I think one can draw lines between the early shows, the mid-period shows, the later shows and the LWT shows. The style does change in a number of ways.

As a side issue, did anyone see the way Steve Wright sneared at "Funky Gibbon" on the TOTP2 Comic Relief special? He said something along the lines of "Can you believe that was considered funny in the 70s? Aren't you glad we've moved on?"

My opinion is this, Funky Gibbon is basically a pastiche of all those silly pop songs in the mid 70s incorporating ludicrous dances. It wasn't really a funny song. The lyrics weren't funny, the movements were just silly and at best it was mildly amusing. Steve Wright was missing the point of it.

Would people go with that?

>As a side issue, did anyone see the way Steve Wright sneared at "Funky Gibbon" on the TOTP2 Comic Relief special? He said something along the lines of "Can you believe that was considered funny in the 70s? Aren't you glad we've moved on?"
>
>My opinion is this, Funky Gibbon is basically a pastiche of all those silly pop songs in the mid 70s incorporating ludicrous dances. It wasn't really a funny song. The lyrics weren't funny, the movements were just silly and at best it was mildly amusing. Steve Wright was missing the point of it.
>
>Would people go with that?

Well, this would be the same Steve Wright who said on his Radio 1 show in 1993, "The Goodies were *so* funny, their stuff was so well written, why don't the BBC repeat it?".

>>My opinion is this, Funky Gibbon is basically a pastiche of all those silly pop songs in the mid 70s incorporating ludicrous dances. It wasn't really a funny song. The lyrics weren't funny, the movements were just silly and at best it was mildly amusing. Steve Wright was missing the point of it.

Inspired by Stevie Wonder and Sly Stone, no less. Plus, as you say, all those stupid dances like "The Bump".

Best Oddie track: Boomerang Love from Clown Virus. The best of both worlds. Traditional song at the start, then works its way into funky freeform jam. As Homer Simpson would say, "Excellent guitar riff".

>>As a side issue, did anyone see the way Steve Wright sneared at "Funky Gibbon" on the TOTP2 Comic Relief special? He said something along the lines of "Can you believe that was considered funny in the 70s? Aren't you glad we've moved on?"
>>
>>My opinion is this, Funky Gibbon is basically a pastiche of all those silly pop songs in the mid 70s incorporating ludicrous dances. It wasn't really a funny song. The lyrics weren't funny, the movements were just silly and at best it was mildly amusing. Steve Wright was missing the point of it.
>>
>>Would people go with that?
>
>Well, this would be the same Steve Wright who said on his Radio 1 show in 1993, "The Goodies were *so* funny, their stuff was so well written, why don't the BBC repeat it?".

Yet another media arsehole denying his now "un-cool" opinions of the past. Was Steve Wright ever worth respecting as a commentator or broadcaster? If so, I put it everyone that he's anymore.

Good. Goooood point, well made.

>As a side issue, did anyone see the way Steve Wright sneared at "Funky Gibbon" on the TOTP2 Comic Relief special? He said something along the lines of "Can you believe that was considered funny in the 70s? Aren't you glad we've moved on?"

Well Steve Wright seems to be forever pouring scorn on bands from yesteryear. One comment that particularly annoyed me was when they had a rare showing of Prefab Sprout on TOTP2 he remarked 'Girls actually used to fancy Paddy, were they mad?' Yeh right, cos obviously good looks is the only thing girls go for and Steve Wright is oh so sexy himself, maybe we should play some of his records on TOTP2 and let us make our own comments.

> Steve Wright... remarked 'Girls actually used to fancy Paddy, were they mad?'

Get that rapier wit. Did you know he writes his own material now? Genius.

>We shall never see their like again, cos it's not sophisticated or "dark" enough, is it Jane Root?

I actually think many of The Goodies episodes were very dark. Look at the topics covered, Police Brutality, A world were people are used for food, governmental destruction of the Earth, animal exploitation, sex and violence on TV, hunting and Wales to name but a few. Topics way darker than anything on BBC2 at the moment.

However they used these topics in a humorous way, the Likes of 'Velvet Soup' just use topics for the same of using them and find they can't get humour into the show which is a shame.

Ummm... I was being sarcastic actually. It seems like "dark" comedy is the fashionable thing to talk about, ie Jam and League Of Gentlemen. Like black comedy never existed before these two shows.

The Goodies could be a very biting programme at times, which is something those bozos at BBC2 don't seem to appreciate, they'd rather call it the kids' version of Python.

"Politics" is a very cynical look at Saatchi & S's campaign for Maggie in 1979, while stuff like "Alternative Roots" effectively put the boot in prime time BBC1 shows like - choke! - the Black & White Minstrel Show (still airing in the mid 70s, let's not forget).

No wonder they were on the minority channel, eh? A shame that channel has disowned them.

Not only that, but someone died laughing during a Goodies transmission. How "dark" is that, eh?

Quite literally dying laughing, eh? Smashing.

Can I just say I always really liked 'Holidays' ?

"Tell you what, let's play Spat!"

"Ooooh, Spaaaaat! Hahaha! Oh why didn't you say? Spat, eh? We're gonna play Spat! Ha, what the HELL'S SPAT?!"

You're not a 'League Of Gentlemen' fan by any chance?

>You're not a 'League Of Gentlemen' fan by any chance?

What? This is Spatz! Not Bamalamafizz Vaj!

>Can I just say I always really liked 'Holidays' ?
>
>"Tell you what, let's play Spat!"
>
>"Ooooh, Spaaaaat! Hahaha! Oh why didn't you say? Spat, eh? We're gonna play Spat! Ha, what the HELL'S SPAT?!"

I'm not saying it didn't have some good lines/bits in it, like Spat, the rubber duck bird-watching and the sign on the back of the door telling them all the things they couldn't do. But the whole episode seemed to have a "well we've done some great locked in a room shows before, let's do another one, evem though we have no comic inspiration" feel to it.

You can feel the desperation a lot of the time. And the ending is just sad.

>As a side issue, did anyone see the way Steve Wright sneared at "Funky Gibbon" on the TOTP2 Comic Relief special? He said something along the lines of "Can you believe that was considered funny in the 70s? Aren't you glad we've moved on?"

And then followed it by saying, "and now for something that's *really* funny..." - Alexei Sayle's 'Ullo John Gotta New Motor. Hmmm...

>Best Oddie track: Boomerang Love from Clown Virus. The best of both worlds. Traditional song at the start, then works its way into funky freeform jam. As Homer Simpson would say, "Excellent guitar riff".

My favourite was "Taking You Back" from Series 4's "Camelot" - and, for those who have been lucky enough to see it, "Nothing Like A Woman" from Playgirl Club.

I'm a bit late in on this discussion, but I'd agree that you can distinguish between earlier, mid and later shows in their style.

Also, that the earlier ones had more duff episodes, but in a way, it's only to be expected of a new show finding its feet (though Bent will probably disagree). Although, when they got it right in the first few series, they were real corkers - Radio Goodies, Kitten Kong, Gender Education... (the p-take on Mary Whitehouse, Mrs Desiree Carthorse's film of "How To Make Babies By Doing... Dirty Things!")

And yes, the visual chase sequences are rather silly when you're an adult - the cleverer visual scenes are the ones that don't now seem rather childish, as quoted, the "Bunfight" scenes of poker playing and tomato ketchup fighting, and the plague of Rolf Harris's - and the classic scenes of fighting Wombles and giant Dougals and being dive-bombed by golden egg laying geese... but stuff like the running round dressed as rabbits "Invasion of the Moon Creatures" leaves me cold.

I think it's a shame, too, that more of the music recorded for the programmes wasn't released - would love Needed or Run on record... and I even had a group of 19 year-olds, who've never seen The Goodies, singing the "String" song last week!

Nah, not very keen on the LOG really...

Maybe I like Holidays so much 'cos I only had 2 on the video when I was likkle - that and Bigfoot. Oh, and Robot. Now I've only got Ballet Crazy and Robot. Damn.

il reggio de la Tim BROOKE-TAYLOR, de la ORSON WELLES, scritto de la Micheal MacLiammoir, regina de la JESUS FRANCO!!!!!!!!

It was a pretty terrible film, but never mind. (UNA SU TREDICI, poor dear Sharon Tate, yerss.)

>il reggio de la Tim BROOKE-TAYLOR, de la ORSON WELLES, scritto de la Micheal MacLiammoir, regina de la JESUS FRANCO!!!!!!!!
>
>It was a pretty terrible film, but never mind. (UNA SU TREDICI, poor dear Sharon Tate, yerss.)

Ah yes, the infamous 13 Chairs (or 12 + 1) which noone has ever seen. Featuring TBT and Willie Rushton as gay lovers apparently.

If anyone's got a copy please contact me via SOTCAA as I'd LOVE a copy.

I told Bean a while back about the lost Orson Welles short film which featured TBT. It was shot in Welles' garden and a clip appeared in the 'TX' documentary about his home movies and abandoned projects. Must dig it out, although it is brief. And naff.

>I think it's a shame, too, that more of the music recorded for the programmes wasn't released - would love Needed or Run on record... and I even had a group of 19 year-olds, who've never seen The Goodies, singing the "String" song last week!

Couldn't agree more with this, particularly with regard to the songs from the earlier episodes. If 'What Do I Have To Do To Make You Love Me?' and 'Are You Coming Out To Play?' had been one-off singles released by paisley shirt-wearing bands signed to Pye rather than television background music, they'd be changing hands for £70 by now.

>My favourite was "Taking You Back" from Series 4's "Camelot" - and, for those who have been lucky enough to see it, "Nothing Like A Woman" from Playgirl Club.

My favourites are the ones mentioned in my previous post, and of the non-TV material, 'Make A Daft Noise For Christmas', 'Baby Samba', 'Cricklewood' and 'Charles Aznovoice', which never loses any of its power to amuse no matter how many times I listen to it.

>Yet another media arsehole denying his now "un-cool" opinions of the past. Was Steve Wright ever worth respecting as a commentator or broadcaster? If so, I put it everyone that he's anymore.

I would say he never was. He was always a 'wacky' pillock with apalling taste in music.

>>There was more drive and motivation behind the exploration of vaguely topical issues
>
>Erm...Saturday Night Grease, Punky Business, Politics, A Kick In The Arts, Football Crazy even Earthanasia, were all topical.

True, but what I mean was the fact that while the above episodes and others like them took a topical issue and made humour out of it, the earlier episodes tended to have more of a sort of *drive* behind their topicality, as though there was a point to be made by the humour, whether it's about the behaviour of the police force, the heartless bureaucracy employed in clamping down on pirate radio, or the ultimate meaninglessness of crusades against sex and violence. Obviously there were later episodes that acted in much the same way - for example the Black and White Minstrels episode and 'It Might As Well Be String' - but it always just seemed to me that this became prominent later on.

And this is where Bent Halo destroys my argument with facts! ;)

>>>There was more drive and motivation behind the exploration of vaguely topical issues
>>
>>Erm...Saturday Night Grease, Punky Business, Politics, A Kick In The Arts, Football Crazy even Earthanasia, were all topical.
>
>True, but what I mean was the fact that while the above episodes and others like them took a topical issue and made humour out of it, the earlier episodes tended to have more of a sort of *drive* behind their topicality, as though there was a point to be made by the humour, whether it's about the behaviour of the police force, the heartless bureaucracy employed in clamping down on pirate radio, or the ultimate meaninglessness of crusades against sex and violence. Obviously there were later episodes that acted in much the same way - for example the Black and White Minstrels episode and 'It Might As Well Be String' - but it always just seemed to me that this became prominent later on.
>
>And this is where Bent Halo destroys my argument with facts! ;)

OK, taking my examples one by one:

Saturday Night Grease - basically a spoof of the films, not doing much in the way of social satire other than satirising a society that didn't exist in real life, but did in this episode (the mixed dancing thing).

Punky Business - a very clever satire on the nature of trends and the rise of marketing and journo-wank.

Politics - ditto, but with regards advertising campaigns for politicians.

A Kick In The Arts - not really attacking anything much here, not even really attacking the nations who boycotted Moscow.

Football Crazy - attacking the idiocy of sporting supporters getting ultra-passionate to the point of violence, a good few years before that tragic incident where people got crushed to death at a football match in the UK I think.

Earthanasia - a dark (that word again) and subtle attack on nuclear weapons.

A bit of both there TJ, to be fair.

>A bit of both there TJ, to be fair.

Yes, you're right, although in my defence I wasn't actually meaning the final BBC series in my theorising, which I accept was a lot more full of 'direct action'. Perhaps if I had actually said this it might have helped. :)

I'm also stifled in my analysis in that I have seen the eary episodes far more times than I have the later ones. Which brings us back to the BBC's attitude to the series...

>>A bit of both there TJ, to be fair.
>
>Yes, you're right, although in my defence I wasn't actually meaning the final BBC series in my theorising, which I accept was a lot more full of 'direct action'. Perhaps if I had actually said this it might have helped. :)
>
>I'm also stifled in my analysis in that I have seen the eary episodes far more times than I have the later ones. Which brings us back to the BBC's attitude to the series...

Send your nicely worded, sensible letters explaining why The Goodies should be repeated to:

Jane Root
Controller BBC-2
BBC Television Centre
Wood Lane
London
W12 0TT

Wouldn't 'Greaver' be a better name than 'Saturday Night Grease'?

>Saturday Night Grease - basically a spoof of the films, not doing much in the way of social satire other than satirising a society that didn't exist in real life, but did in this episode (the mixed dancing thing).

Actually, having spoken to a friend who was going to discos round about this time, he says that there *was* a drive towards no mixed dancing - promoted by the Church (no surprises there, then) - because they felt that the new "disco-dancing" that came in post Travolta was far too sexual (as Tim says in the episode, "choreographed canoodling") and was a bad influence on the youth culture of the day. You really weren't supposed to get too close to the opposite sex in the discos and some places did operate a kind of "bouncer" that monitored this!

>Football Crazy - attacking the idiocy of sporting supporters getting ultra-passionate to the point of violence, a good few years before that tragic incident where people got crushed to death at a football match in the UK I think.

Yes, 8 years pre-Hillsborough, but Football Crazy was more aimed at the general hooliganism that had pervaded the game since about 1974 - I think the point that was being made was that the hooligans weren't passionate about the game of football itself (hence experiments with mice in Subutteo stands), but would turn their mindless violence to whatever was fashionable at the time and where they were led, sheep-like, to practise it.

I do agree with TJ, though, that some of the earlier episodes seemed to have a more biting, more pointed satire to them, whether it worked as comedy or not.

6 years before the Hillsborough disaster, Mildred, which I believe happened in 1988.

1989, actually. But not the point.

If it helps, i've seen 13 chairs and it was fairly good.....and yon Sharon Tate would give a eunuch a stiffy.

>6 years before the Hillsborough disaster, Mildred, which I believe happened in 1988.

No, it happened in 1989 - and Football Crazy was filmed in 1981 - although broadcast early 1982...

Hillsborough was nothing to do with hooliganism, anyway. It was do do with rubbish policing of people who wanted to watch a game of football.

>Football Crazy - attacking the idiocy of sporting supporters getting ultra-passionate

Is this the one where Bill's cheering on his team, then their star striker is fouled, Bill's yelling "Get up, you pansy!", the striker is carted off the field in agony, and Bill turns up in the ambulance with him still bawling at him to stop being such a poof and get back on the pitch? One of my few childhood Goodies memories, that.

That's the one... the player was in the operating theatre too, with Bill in surgeons gown, still shouting... and at the funeral, jumping up and down, shouting "Get up, yer great nancy!! He's faking, he's faking!!"

I remember seeing the later BBC2 series as a six year old drinking Banana Flavoured Crusha milkshake. One image that stuck in my mind was The Goodies in Superman costumes and their anus' extending into flat table shapes. I did enjoy the LWT episodes but felt strong nostalgia for the BBC episodes. Just as I felt nostalgia for 1982 BBC Everett and 1978-80 ITV Everett. I forgot about one aspect of 'Bigfoot' I remember being impressed by the special effect of enlarging feet. Actually if I watch it now, it probably won't be that impressive. By the way, was 'Holidays' that episode where Bill Oddie shouted "Mint Sauce" to some sheep and a toilet was stuck to the side of the wall? I remember that clearly because it was the only episode I had on tape (don't anymore). There is an antiques store in Reading which sells stuff like 1969 issues of Topper for £2 and a double vinyl of 'The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy'. It doesn't have old VHS copies of LWT era Goodies. But it should have!

P.S. Bent Halo what would you say is your favourite episode and why?

Oh that was a silly question and one that doesn't deserve an answer.

"Hillsborough was nothing to do with hooliganism, anyway. It was do do with rubbish policing of people who wanted to watch a game of football."

Isn't it funny how the police get the blame when the culprits were quite obviously ticketless Liverpool fans.

Isn't it funny how whenever anyone says something they can't really back up, they go anonymous. I don't know too much about the Hillsborough tragedy, but it seems a touch simplistic to blame one of the worst moments in recent football history purely on some ticketless Liverpool fans. What are you, a Sun reader? As the police are in charge, and as I seem to recall one of the officers refused to open a part of the stand called Lepping Lane that would have provided space even when it became obvious that people were being crushed, I'd say the coppers played their part. (But like I say, this is just from vague memory)

>"Hillsborough was nothing to do with hooliganism, anyway. It was do do with rubbish policing of people who wanted to watch a game of football."
>
>Isn't it funny how the police get the blame when the culprits were quite obviously ticketless Liverpool fans.

Yes, fucking hilarious Jon.
>

>I forgot about one aspect of 'Bigfoot' I remember being impressed by the special effect of enlarging feet. Actually if I watch it now, it probably won't be that impressive.

It isn't. It's basically a flesh-colour balloon being inflated out of the side of a shoe.

>By the way, was 'Holidays' that episode where Bill Oddie shouted "Mint Sauce" to some sheep and a toilet was stuck to the side of the wall?

Yes.

Yes, I'm sorry to say that the enlarged feet weren't at all high-tech - the feet themselves were glass-fibre (I think?) and the illusion of them growing was, as Bean says, flesh coloured balloons. But if we're talking high-tech in that episode, the alien spaceship re-fuelling at Stonehenge was evidently on a par with Close Encounters and ET... Spielberg was indeed a Goodies fan! :o)


If you'd like an in-depth discussion on the causes of Hillsborough, maybe we should start another thread on it, although I don't think it's a fitting thread for any of this site, and certainly not The Goodies!! For what it's worth though, I was actually there 6 weeks before it, and in my view, the causes were 4-fold - the imbecilic policing, drunken/ticketless fans, dreadful stewarding and Sheff Weds' horrific pens and spiked fences.

You're right about the wrong place thing for this discussion, really. I'm a Season Ticket holder at Hillsborough, though, and have been since 1987. And there was nothing like this before.

I just don't think anybody knew how to cope with the crush. Not the police, not the Liverpool fans, and not the stewards.

Anyway, The Goodies...

>Anyway, The Goodies...

Yes indeed.

Something occured to me the day while we were having the above discussion about whether The Goodies are racist or not and similar issues are being discussed currently in the Office episode 2 thread.

That something was the bit in Brass Eye - Drugs where Chris Morris takes heroin. I refer specifically to the line where Chris says that it's OK for him to take heroin, but not for people who are less educated and less middle class than he is, like "builders and blacks".

Now there's a very funny line and clearly an ironic satire on idiotic snobbish and racist middle-class attitudes.

To my knowledge no one has ever suggested that this line is in any way racist...yet jokes which are strikingly similar in programmes like The Goodies and Till Death Us Do Part are lazily branded as racist.

Clearly the only difference between such jokes is that they are in different programmes and that these programmes were made at different times. The lazy opinion seems to be that all comedy from the 60s and 70s (except Python probably - coz that's cool) was racist and should never be shown again. This is clearly ridiculous.

And anyway, there are numerous bits of sexism in The Good Life and that's on every five minutes. Tom Good's subtle sexism to Barbara is clearly genuinely meant and doesn't always see him as a figure of ridicule, yet no one has ever described The Good Life as "poison".

There's an Australian sitcom from the 70s called Kingswood Country. In it a typical Aussie suburban biggot called Ted Bullpitt (whose name was often mis-prounced swapping the p for an s with "hilarious" results) made constant remarks about his son-in-law, a Greek Australia. He called his son-in-law a "wog" (in Australia this term of abuse is mainly directed at Greeks, Italians and Eastern Europeans) many times in each episode, for example. This show, like Till Death Us Do Part, The Goodies and others clearly had Ted Bullpitt as a figure of ridicule and has not to my knowledge been interpreted in any other way. This is the ideal situation.

People! Grow some irony glands!

A very good point, and one that is mirrored in many areas of comedy. For another example, look at the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band Edit News section, and specifically the comments about some critics' reactions to "Sir Henry At Ndidis Kraal". I don't know who the critics are who labelled it 'racist', but they couldn't miss the point more if they tried. _Sir Henry_ is racist, yes, that's his character. But the humour most definitely is not.

Similarly, it astounds me that anyone could label The Goodies as 'racist', and I would assume that they are making such observations without actually studying any of the available evidence, and instead are just following the lazy Theakstonist line that "it was in the seventies, so it must be racist". Yes, of course, just like all that racist reggae music [and that was deliberate sarcasm, before any hitherto unseen poster with a 'witty' name decides to have a go at me over it].

I have seen nothing in The Goodies that I would label racist. Instead, I have seen pointed commentary on other aspects of society and media that are, retrospectively, deemed to have been racist. If you want to take a swipe at bigotry, then you have to show bigoted attitudes in some way to begin with, and this is where a lot of people make mistakes in their analysis.
Is Till Death Us Do Part racist because of Alf Garnett's attitudes? No it isn't, because he is persistently tripped up by those selfsame attitudes. Is Spike Milligan's The Melting Pot racist? Hard to say, because the BBC still haven't seen fit to show it, but judging from the script I'd say Milligan's actual target was the appalling living conditions that immigrants of the time faced when coming to live in Britain. And in the same way, The Goodies isn't racist.

Yes Minister has some throwaway racial lines that look quite poor these days, and must have been a bit dated at the time (contempory with alternative humour.) Bad puns on "blackmail," "blackballed" and so on. They make me wince, and they don't make any great point about sending up racists - it comes across as a shared joke with the white audience. The one disappointing flaw in one of my favourite ever comedies.

> Bad puns on "blackmail"

Radio Active, on the other hand, had a fantastic one, delivered by their shoddy theatre trying to do a gritty police drama:

"He's a black... male... er... h-he's a blackmailer."

company


This word appears to have fallen out of the previous posting. I'm simpy leaving it here for posterity.

Delicious on its own or with a sentence.

Toast Rack, do you seriously think that the words blackmail and blackball are racist? And can you explain the ways in which they are used in Yes (Prime) Minister as I can't remember that at all and I know the series fairly well?

Surely the term blackmail has never refered to black people, simply the idea that the colour black is evil. I'm no expert on the origins of words but I imagine that black was considered evil because it was the colour of the night sky, not because it was the colour of the skin of people from African and the Caribbean.

"Blackball" is probably similar.

And can you explain the ways in which they are used in Yes (Prime) Minister as I can't remember that at all and I know the series fairly well?

Yes I can, Bean Is A Carrot!

"The Official Visit" is about the state visit of the President of Buranda. He's a black darkie coon type African. He blackmails Jim by threatening to say something supportive about "the Irish struggle to throw off the yoke of British Imperialism" and will only climb down if they give his government £50 million. When "blackmail" is exclaimed, the President says "are you referring to me or my proposal?" Boom boom. Audience loves it. Well, the white bit, anyway, and that's what counts.

I can't remember where "blackballed" turns up but I will happily watch all the episodes again, cheers for the excuse.

>And can you explain the ways in which they are used in Yes (Prime) Minister as I can't remember that at all and I know the series fairly well?
>
>Yes I can, Bean Is A Carrot!
>
>"The Official Visit" is about the state visit of the President of Buranda. He's a black darkie coon type African. He blackmails Jim by threatening to say something supportive about "the Irish struggle to throw off the yoke of British Imperialism" and will only climb down if they give his government £50 million. When "blackmail" is exclaimed, the President says "are you referring to me or my proposal?" Boom boom. Audience loves it. Well, the white bit, anyway, and that's what counts.

Thanks Toast Rack, I remember that episode very clearly now.

I don't see why you think that line is racist. Racist humour is offensive and nasty and represses whichever racial group it's directed at (usually Asian and/or Black).

In this situation the black man IS blackmailing Hacker and there is no other term which can be used to describe his actions. Secondly the black man clearly has the upper hand because a) he is the one with the power being in a position to blackmail Hacker and b) he is also in a position of power because he is able to put Hacker in a worse position by suggesting that the comment might have been racist. In fact it's not a racist remark, it's a pun from the writers (just wordplay, how is it offensive to black people?) and a perfectly sensible line from the character of Hacker.

>I can't remember where "blackballed" turns up but I will happily watch all the episodes again, cheers for the excuse.

I'll be interested to hear what you come up with.

>>And can you explain the ways in which they are used in Yes (Prime) Minister as I can't remember that at all and I know the series fairly well?
>>
>>Yes I can, Bean Is A Carrot!
>>
>>"The Official Visit" is about the state visit of the President of Buranda. He's a black darkie coon type African. He blackmails Jim by threatening to say something supportive about "the Irish struggle to throw off the yoke of British Imperialism" and will only climb down if they give his government £50 million. When "blackmail" is exclaimed, the President says "are you referring to me or my proposal?" Boom boom. Audience loves it. Well, the white bit, anyway, and that's what counts.
>
>Thanks Toast Rack, I remember that episode very clearly now.
>
>I don't see why you think that line is racist.

Neither do I. I said they were racial - i.e. the joke turns on a reference to race.

The point is, it's a weak joke - far too weak to have got into such tight scripts unless there was another reason for finding it funny, and there was: twenty years ago (1980 to be exact), black people were still considered to be inherently funny. They shit on the Queen's red carpet and they talk funny, and dey eat dee warter mellarn and dee corcornart. The audience is palpably tense throughout that scene, waiting for a racial reference, because you expected one in those days. Then they get one and it's like a huge release. It's not a racist joke, if you take it out of context, but take the whole package together and it's a snapshot of the racial attitudes of Britain in 1980. Any reference to race was automatically amusing, because of what it signified for the white audience at the time.

The Blackballed one is just more word play along the same lines, I think from the mouth of Bernard this time, and with the black character not in the scene to provide those nice "the black man said it so it's alright" excuses, the weakness and incongruity of the pun is even more jarring. The "joke" is that the black man has black balls. Ha ha! It reminds me of the playground joke: "Have you got a BMW? Ha ha ha! He said he's got a Black Man's Willy!" This kind of thing sticks out like a sore thumb in Yes Minister, all the more so because the other 99.9999% is sublime.

Are you familiar with Jim Davidson's "Chalky White" character?

>>I don't see why you think that line is racist.
>
>Neither do I. I said they were racial - i.e. the joke turns on a reference to race.
>
>The point is, it's a weak joke - far too weak to have got into such tight scripts unless there was another reason for finding it funny, and there was: twenty years ago (1980 to be exact), black people were still considered to be inherently funny. They shit on the Queen's red carpet and they talk funny, and dey eat dee warter mellarn and dee corcornart. The audience is palpably tense throughout that scene, waiting for a racial reference, because you expected one in those days. Then they get one and it's like a huge release. It's not a racist joke, if you take it out of context, but take the whole package together and it's a snapshot of the racial attitudes of Britain in 1980. Any reference to race was automatically amusing, because of what it signified for the white audience at the time.

I see the point you're making there Toast Rack. I think I got the wrong end of the stick as it were about your original post.

Yes, that joke certainly isn't up to the same standard of intelligent joking as the rest of Y(P)M. But then, the show was full of puns and word-play, some frighteningly clever others just silly and funny.

You could probably accuse The Goodies of doing the same thing. The scene were Bill Oddie is Rastous Watermelon springs to mind. Not racist, but definitely racial.

I don't think racial references are a bad thing - would you being objecting to them if Lenny Henry had done jokes like these? And he has. But I would like to see racial references done intelligently, with a point of some sort involved in their use. The Yes Minister blackmail one does in the sense that it makes it even harder for Hacker to cope with the blackmail situation. The Rastous Watermelon thing in The Goodies does not and is certainly a "funny black man" joke. Not a mean-spirited one, but not a particularly intelligent one either.

I'm not sure about the audience being "tense" throughout the whole scene and them "needing a release". That's largely conjecture although I would like to watch this episode now to see if there is any evidence from the way they're laughing to support your theory. Sadly my copy of it is on the other side of the world.

>The Blackballed one is just more word play along the same lines, I think from the mouth of Bernard this time, and with the black character not in the scene to provide those nice "the black man said it so it's alright" excuses, the weakness and incongruity of the pun is even more jarring. The "joke" is that the black man has black balls. Ha ha! It reminds me of the playground joke: "Have you got a BMW? Ha ha ha! He said he's got a Black Man's Willy!" This kind of thing sticks out like a sore thumb in Yes Minister, all the more so because the other 99.9999% is sublime.

It seems vaguely familiar, but I don't want to comment on it having no real recolection of the context.

>Are you familiar with Jim Davidson's "Chalky White" character?

Not at all. Do tell.

... and do the accent.

Well. It's on another level entirely to these examples. I wouldn't seriously draw a comparison. Nor has he ever done anything else of any worth to excuse himself with.

But he nicely demonstrates the attitudes of the British mainstream comedy audience in 1980. Chalky White was essentially Jim Davidson doing what he considered was a "west indian" voice and saying racial things. Imagine the exact opposite of a typical comedian these days. Someone saying racial things but taking care not to say anything remotely funny.

It was extremely popular. Jim is still a national institution amongst right-wingers, the Tory party thinks he's Pope or Swift or something, and the BBC seems to think he has some magical common touch that will guarantee lots of cockney viewers.

Davidson has an autobiography. He still has a core right-wing mad audience who probably hold secret rallies where they watch ancient banned video tapes and do racist dancing. Check out these reviews (one even mentions the Chalky White character.) Are they parodies or are they genuine? Who can say?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0751507377/202-0040103-0843868

And am nat goowin to doo dee accent, mon.

Yes, the thing about the YM audience waiting for something racial to happen is conjecture, not based on measuring the amount of racism in the laughter. But knowing what we know about polite British middle class comedy audiences of the day, they were probably blinking in amazement at the sight of a black man in a suit.

Consider Rising Damp. It's undeniably a work of genius, and as with Alf Garnet, the writer is clearly sending up the racist. But the audience lap up anything racial. Personally I don't think this detracts from the programme itself - it makes it even more fascinating as a document of various things, as well as supernaturally funny. But that reaction was there for writers to play up to if they wished.

Incidentally, by the time of YPM (late eighties) they'd got a bit wiser but no more politically correct. References to race were generally of the grumpy anti-PC variety, like cartoons from the Daily Mail. I think Hacker complains somewhere towards the end of the second series about how he was at a party meeting, and he casually looked at his watch while a black woman was speaking, and was immediately accused of "racist body-language." I've no problem with something like that being sent up, though I tend to think that the supposed problem of rampant political correctness is partly invented by right-wingers, so maybe Jay and Lynn were happy to go along with that due to their own "alignment."

There's another one, which works better because it does have a flippancy that is funny in itself. They're discussing candidates for Archbishop of somewhere, something like:

Humphrey: "He's opposed to imperialism regardless of whether it's carried out by black or white nations."

Hacker: "Oh... so he's a racist."

Interesting point - in 'Pirate Radio' from the first series, the Goodies seem quite sympathetic to the cause of the forcibly closed-down real life stations, and critical of the way in which the authorities went about shutting them down. Does anyone know if any of the three were in any way supporters of (or possibly even contributors to?) the pirate stations in the late 1960s? Certainly I would postulate that Bill Oddie had at least listened to them regularly, as his early Goodies songs sound very like the sort of psychedelic pop singles that were ignored by the BBC but given blanket play by the pirates...

>Does anyone know if any of the three were in any way supporters of (or possibly even contributors to?) the pirate stations in the late 1960s? Certainly I would postulate that Bill Oddie had at least listened to them regularly, as his early Goodies songs sound very like the sort of psychedelic pop singles that were ignored by the BBC but given blanket play by the pirates...

Yes, given his musical interests, I would assume that, as in the episode itself, the Pirate Radio Station elements of the programme were probably written by Bill. His "Hi there, cats and kittens" monologue/impression undoubtedly proves that he, at least, listened reguarly and that there was an assumption that the majority of both the studio audience and the viewers at home would get the jokes and references to the pirate stations of the day.

Interestingly too, the running joke of "A Walk In The Black Forest" carries on for several years as whenever a radio is used for an episode (Chubby Chumps, Lighthouse Keeping Loonies), the song playing on the "tranny" is always "A Walk In The Black Forest" - inferring that Radio Goodies is alive and well and still transmitting!

In my opinion, the similarities between Oddie's early Goodies songs (notably those in 'Servants' and 'Give Police A Chance') and the pysch-pop songs of the era issued by obscure outfits signed to Deram and now frantically sought-after by collectors, are so great that if it wasn't for the fact that they are hidden away inside archaic and unrepeated television shows, those same collectors would be crying out for Oddie's songs to find their way on to genre compilations. The recent "Nuggets II" box set which exhaustively chronicles the UK psych scene would have benefitted from an Oddie track, for example.

Does anyone know *why* he hasn't seen fit to release any of them?

I'd never noticed the recurrence of 'A Walk In The Black Forest', by the way, so thanks for pointing it out!

>Does anyone know *why* he hasn't seen fit to release any of them?

Allegedly Oddie's got master copies of all his songs...on 12 inch tape. Apparently this is a format which cannot be dubbed anymore as no one has a 12 inch tape machine. Mind you, Oddie says a different thing every time he's asked this. Perhaps he wants to keep them to himself? Or he doesn't think there's a market for them. If so I wish he'd think again.

>I'd never noticed the recurrence of 'A Walk In The Black Forest', by the way, so thanks for pointing it out!

Me neither. I must look out for that.

He's also said that he thinks that Decca have some of the tapes, and that if anyone can get hold of them, he'd be quite happy to see them remastered.

Some of the early stuff is available on "The Goodies Sing Songs From The Goodies/World Of The Goodies" on Decca, including the wonderful "Taking You Back", "Winter Sportsman and "Mummy I Don't Like My Meat" but unfortunately, "Run" and "Needed" etc aren't on there. Another Oddie favourite of mine that will never see the light of day is the song in "Playgirl Club" - "Nothing Like A Woman"

>He's also said that he thinks that Decca have some of the tapes, and that if anyone can get hold of them, he'd be quite happy to see them remastered.

If Decca have the tapes, then they will probably still exist.

Was he just referring to the stuff that ended up on "The World Of The Goodies", or did he supply them with a load of tapes to make their own tracklisting from?

>"Run" and "Needed" etc aren't on there. Another Oddie favourite of mine that will never see the light of day is the song in "Playgirl Club" - "Nothing Like A Woman"

They might see the light of day, though, if we can find the right person to convince and then convince them...

>Allegedly Oddie's got master copies of all his songs...on 12 inch tape. Apparently this is a format which cannot be dubbed anymore as no one has a 12 inch tape machine. Mind you, Oddie says a different thing every time he's asked this. Perhaps he wants to keep them to himself? Or he doesn't think there's a market for them. If so I wish he'd think again.

This sounds like a bit of point-evasion on his part... there are plenty of reissue-orientated record labels that can transfer that format into digital, and do so on a frequent basis.

I also suspect that if they were used in a BBC programme, then there will be copies of some description in the BBC music library.

>>Allegedly Oddie's got master copies of all his songs...on 12 inch tape. Apparently this is a format which cannot be dubbed anymore as no one has a 12 inch tape machine. Mind you, Oddie says a different thing every time he's asked this. Perhaps he wants to keep them to himself? Or he doesn't think there's a market for them. If so I wish he'd think again.
>
>This sounds like a bit of point-evasion on his part... there are plenty of reissue-orientated record labels that can transfer that format into digital, and do so on a frequent basis.

Oddie mentioned in an interview with Record Collector earlier this year that he had them on 12 inch tape. Bent Halo told me at one point that you can't transfer stuff from 12 inch tape anymore as it's not a format anyone has been able to support since the 70s.

>I also suspect that if they were used in a BBC programme, then there will be copies of some description in the BBC music library.

It seems more likely that they've been junked, but perhaps I'm being cynical.

>They might see the light of day, though, if we can find the right person to convince and then convince them...

Or perhaps someone suggesting it to Oddie? Any volunteers?

>Interestingly too, the running joke of "A Walk In The Black Forest" carries on for several years as whenever a radio is used for an episode (Chubby Chumps, Lighthouse Keeping Loonies), the song playing on the "tranny" is always "A Walk In The Black Forest" - inferring that Radio Goodies is alive and well and still transmitting!

Mildred, thinking back I certainly remember the theme from the Archers being on The Goodies' radio all the time (read in to that what you will!) but not A Walk...

Yes, The Archers featured quite a lot - especially with GG's famed Walter Gabriel impression - but it was AWITBF that was on the radio as Tim and the housewives ran down the street to the health farm in Chubby Chumps, and when Graeme switches on the radio in the lamp room in Lighthouse Keeping Loonies... - don't know if there were other instances, I've not seen every episode as yet. Certainly, in LK Loonies, the audience seemed to get the joke immediately.

>Oddie mentioned in an interview with Record Collector earlier this year that he had them on 12 inch tape. Bent Halo told me at one point that you can't transfer stuff from 12 inch tape anymore as it's not a format anyone has been able to support since the 70s.

Bent, do you mind getting techie for a minute? I would be surprised to learn that it was genuinely impossible for anyone to play and transfer such tapes (I've got plenty of reissue albums that I can only assume came from such a source), but I will be happy to be corrected on this point. Well, not happy if it means the tapes are unplayable, but you know what I mean... :)

>>I also suspect that if they were used in a BBC programme, then there will be copies of some description in the BBC music library.
>
>It seems more likely that they've been junked, but perhaps I'm being cynical.

Apparently, in total contrast to the film and videotape library, the music library is obscenely intact.

>>>I also suspect that if they were used in a BBC programme, then there will be copies of some description in the BBC music library.
>>
>>It seems more likely that they've been junked, but perhaps I'm being cynical.
>
>Apparently, in total contrast to the film and videotape library, the music library is obscenely intact.

That at least is good news. But the BBC would never initiate a release. Perhaps if Oddie were to get enthused enough to contact the archives and ask for copies of the recordings? The thing is to get Oddie motivated.

>I would be surprised to learn that it was genuinely impossible for anyone to play and transfer such tapes (I've got plenty of reissue albums that I can only assume came from such a source), but I will be happy to be corrected on this point.

I've got a reissue of Miles Davis' Kind Of Blue, which was apparently restored from the original master tapes on a "3-channel Presto tubed tape deck", whatever that is. So I would imagine that someone out there must have a useable 12-inch tape deck, even if it's 20 years old.

>I've got a reissue of Miles Davis' Kind Of Blue, which was apparently restored from the original master tapes on a "3-channel Presto tubed tape deck", whatever that is. So I would imagine that someone out there must have a useable 12-inch tape deck, even if it's 20 years old.

Interesting! I suppose in some ways, restoration from an archaic audio format wouldn't be too far removed in theory from all those episodes of Steptoe And Son being remastered from early home video recordings.

The tapes Oddie has are the un-edited "jams" from the shows, complete with Chris Spedding riffology. Presumably, only the edited versions would have made it to the BBC Sound Library. But even then, I would have thought that "raw" material would be junked once it had been edited into the final programme. Could be wrong...

I'm sure that Oddie would be interested in remastering his stuff if the tecchy aspects could be overcome, but one wonders how the licensing would work. He'd also like a version of Nothing To Do With Us on CD, if Island are listening.

hang on a minute - TWELVE inch tape? TWELVE inches? 2 inch tape, yes. Or one inch, half inch or quarter inch, but TWELVE inch? Can someone check this please?

Maybe the reels are 12 inches across?

12 inch tapes. T.W.E.L.V.E. Briefly used in the early seventies. Tape is twelve inches in width. Twelve.

Almost utterly redundant, but there are specialists out there. If Bill is willing to pass the tapes on I'm happy to convert them to digital or whatever. He said as much at Cult TV convention last year, didn't he, Bean?

>12 inch tapes. T.W.E.L.V.E. Briefly used in the early seventies. Tape is twelve inches in width. Twelve.
>
>Almost utterly redundant, but there are specialists out there. If Bill is willing to pass the tapes on I'm happy to convert them to digital or whatever. He said as much at Cult TV convention last year, didn't he, Bean?

I haven't seen the video for a while Bent, but that's what I recall that he said. We can only hope he still holds that view.

I would LOVE to see Oddie's music from The Goodies TV series released on CD. Perhaps someone with a knowledge of the process could write to him about this. His agents were London Management and Representation, Noel Street, Soho, last time I heard.

>>Almost utterly redundant, but there are specialists out there. If Bill is willing to pass the tapes on I'm happy to convert them to digital or whatever. He said as much at Cult TV convention last year, didn't he, Bean?
>
>I haven't seen the video for a while Bent, but that's what I recall that he said. We can only hope he still holds that view.

It wasn't actually said on the video, but he was asked personally about it, which is when he said about Decca having the tapes and that he would have no objection to someone remastering the stuff if they could get hold of it.

Wouldn't someone like Ampex have the facilites somewhere to convert 12" tape?

>Wouldn't someone like Ampex have the facilites somewhere to convert 12" tape?

Interesting point - the reissue market was at one stage, a couple of years back, almost flooded by CD releases of prog rock albums that had been recorded and released privately (exploting some tax loophole, I believe) in the early 1970s. As these people would have been using the same studios around the same time as Oddie...