That was also in the RadioActive book, in a spoof advert for a book club, "Paula Yates' Pop Stars on the Toilet".

In THe Tube was so groundbreaking, what did it inspire?

Saturday Live. Which inspired... nothing format-wise, though it did put non-trad comedy on the agenda.

Other than that... the attitude, but not the format, lived on in Network 7, Club X, loads of other crap youth shows, leading inevitably to The Word.

Not much of a legacy, if you ask me.

"If The Tube..." I should have typed.

>In THe Tube was so groundbreaking, what did it inspire?
>
The Tube looks a bit dated now if you ask me, but at the time remember that the only real alternative was Top of the Pops, the format of which has never changed. The Old Grey Whistle Test had the interviews, but The Tube just added the comedy element.

>>
>The Tube looks a bit dated now if you ask me, but at the time remember that the only real alternative was Top of the Pops, the format of which has never changed. The Old Grey Whistle Test had the interviews, but The Tube just added the comedy element.

I'd like to say "hear, hear" to Dan F's comments. The Tube was also an event way back then. Just being one hour and 45 minutes long was something in itself.

The OGWT (later WT) and other shows like Eight Days a Week etc took themselves v seriously. Not so The Tube. It was great. And it had great graphics (for its time).

The Tube was also an event way back then. Just being one hour and 45 minutes long was something in itself.
>
I think the show was cut to 90 minutes in series 2 or 3 as Channel Four was starting to extend its own transmission hours. When The Tube was cancelled in 1987, Tyne Tees starting producing the TOTP clone The (pitiful) Roxy on ITV. I think it was hosted by the Kid and someone who got a lucky break on Blind Date. And they say TV is only starting to dumb down!

The Roxy was very poor, not least because it featured "wild child" (ie. posh spoilt brat) Emma Ridley, who was briefly notorious in those days along with her mate Amanda De Cadanet. Where is she now? No, I haven't wondered for 13 years either.

The worst thing about it was simply the idea that it was an improvement on TOTP.

>The Roxy was very poor, not least because it featured "wild child" (ie. posh spoilt brat) Emma Ridley, who was briefly notorious in those days along with her mate Amanda De Cadanet.

They were trying (and failing) to be Paula Yates clones, who by 1987 was entering into her 'model mother' period. So TV producers were looking for replacements. She was the original (and best). I miss her.

The Tube was fucking great, until the last series when they brought in Felix the ten-year-old (really terrible idea). Yeah, ok, so most clips that we get of it these days tend to show Tina Turner and Paul Young, but they had a remarkable range of music on it. Just about anyone between 1982 and 87 was on it. Probably the best music show on TV ever, but then I've never seen Revolver, and all the bits of Ready Steady Go I saw featured a lot of the Dave Clark Five rather than the Beatles (coincidentally, Dave Clark owned the rights to RSG). And it was certainly better than SnubTV (there, that'll start arguments).

Nowadays, Later With Jools Holland is much better than nothing, but there's precious little else for music fans on TV. Interesting, but depressing fact, btw: Chris Cowey (of Check It Out and The Tube) is now producer of the rotten current incarnation of TOTP. (Which is why there was a big logo of it behind him whenever he turned up.)

>And it was certainly better than SnubTV
>(there, that'll start arguments).

Not with me - Snub TV was ridiculous, taking whatever non-entity "band" was given column inches in the previous week's NME and giving them half an hour to look hairy, talk pseudo arty/polical bollocks and make a pathetically unimpressive buzzing sound infront of a room full of students in long-sleeved shirts, when they would otherwise have never got more attention than the average dog shit, and deservedly so.

Revolver was cool. Peter Cook presented it and it had all the best punk bands on it (and they all played live.)

Snub TV also did the amazing thing of releasing compilation videos which, instead of featuring unseen footage, actually had LESS material than the TV show.
I just got hold of an old SNUBTV video second hand. I grabbed it because it had a fondly remembered sequence of The Breeders doing Iris on it, but - whoop! - halfway through the second verse, the editor snaps away to a shot of Mark E Smith mumbling about stuff - which, in turn, cuts away halfway through to something else.
Why? Why? What possessed music programme makers in the late 80s / early 90s?

I blame Tony Wilson, or Anthony H. Wilson as he decided to become, later on.

Don't ask why, I just do.

That was the old Network 7 philosophy, that young people couldn't follow something unless - paradoxically - you kept jumping away to something else, breaking up the flow of it, and generally failing to convey as much as conventional TV styles would do.

Those were the days. Thank God they ended.

Network 7 pulled the great stunt of hiring Murray Boland as a reporter after he'd gone on 'Right To Reply' to complain about the show.

He drifted on to appear on Club X. Where is he now?

Jaswinder Bancil became a video producer and did the early East 17 vids.

Janet Street-Porter's current whereabouts are unknown.

>Network 7 pulled the great stunt of hiring Murray Boland as a reporter after he'd gone on 'Right To Reply' to complain about the show.
>
The guy from Liverpool (forgotten his name) went on to front Thames TV's late night datign show Contacts and now introduces soft porn on C5.

So he's gone more respectable?

>Janet Street-Porter's current whereabouts are unknown.

Which shows how much of an impact she's made on the Independent on Sunday

>>Janet Street-Porter's current whereabouts are unknown.
>
I thought she worked on the buses, something to do with editing tickets.

Half of the people who worked on Network 7 went on to create "Light Lunch" and so should accept the blame for Mel and Sue's careers.

And I've just thought of a new word:

"Cuntred"

As in the emotion you feel towards a cuntish person.

>Snub TV also did the amazing thing of releasing compilation videos which, instead of featuring unseen footage, actually had LESS material than the TV show.

In what sense? If you mean that it didn't feature complete shows then fair enough, but music clearance for video is different to broadcast clearance. Also, everything on those SnubTV vids was originated by the programme makers anyway. Except for the music. Obviously.

>I just got hold of an old SNUBTV video second hand. I grabbed it because it had a fondly remembered sequence of The Breeders doing Iris on it, but - whoop! - halfway through the second verse, the editor snaps away to a shot of Mark E Smith mumbling about stuff - which, in turn, cuts away halfway through to something else.

Which video, volume one(89) or two(90)? If it's volume two then it starts with The Fall, if it's volume one then you're probably right. I can't remember right now.

>Why? Why? What possessed music programme makers in the late 80s / early 90s?

This was editing within the video, not the series. SnubTV did have sudden edits but they rarely cut a song short or interrupted a thread in an interview. The Fall feature from 1989, which is on volume one, loses about five minutes for video.

Snub - best music TV ever.

The Tube - surprised no one has mentioned TFI Friday as a copyist, which began shortly after the plan to bring back Paula and Jools was scrapped. They may as well have filmed TFI in the same studio, it emulated it that much. I suspect Michael Grade leaned on Evans with the idea.

Blipvert was, of course, not involved in the show in any way whatsoever...

>The Tube - surprised no one has mentioned TFI Friday as a copyist, which began shortly after the plan to bring back Paula and Jools was scrapped. They may as well have filmed TFI in the same studio, it emulated it that much. I suspect Michael Grade leaned on Evans with the idea.

TFI Friday was no Tube.

>Half of the people who worked on Network 7 went on to create "Light Lunch" and so should accept the blame for Mel and Sue's careers.

*cowers in corner, covers head in hands out of shame*

I actually love Mel and have had more than a few vivid dreams about her.

How many is more than a few? If it's less than five, you can claim random subconcious activity. On the other hand, if you can't close your eyes without see her naked save for a Light Lunch "menu board" held cheekily over her softly curving midriff... then... er... where was I?

>Half of the people who worked on Network 7 went on to create "Light Lunch" and so should accept the blame for Mel and Sue's careers.

Sebastian Scott (who did work on N7) and Henrietta Conrad (who didn't, I don't think) formed Princess Productions. Their other main work for TV has been the execrable dotcomedy.

>>I just got hold of an old SNUBTV video second hand. I grabbed it because it had a fondly remembered sequence of The Breeders doing Iris on it, but - whoop! - halfway through the second verse, the editor snaps away to a shot of Mark E Smith mumbling about stuff - which, in turn, cuts away halfway through to something else.
>
>Which video, volume one(89) or two(90)? If it's volume two then it starts with The Fall, if it's volume one then you're probably right. I can't remember right now.
>

It was Volume II and - checks tracks - it cuts away to The Cramps, not The Fall. My mistake. But it does cut away halfway through the song. I had an old audio tape of the Breeders performance I took off the telly, and the whole song was there.
This is now mystifying me.
(Unless they performed the whole of "Doe" and only half of "Iris", in which case, why show "Iris" on the video?) (Frightened that I can remember the whole of this session all these years on...)

Anyway, I agree that SNUB was great most of the time though. It deserves immortality for making superb original videos for Dinosaur Jr's "Freakscene" and Ultra Vivid Scene's "Mercy Seat".
I wish such a show existed now, making cheap vids for cash-strapped bands so they could get BBC / MTV / M2 exposure...

>>>I just got hold of an old SNUBTV video second hand. I grabbed it because it had a fondly remembered sequence of The Breeders doing Iris on it, but - whoop! - halfway through the second verse, the editor snaps away to a shot of Mark E Smith mumbling about stuff - which, in turn, cuts away halfway through to something else.
>>
>>Which video, volume one(89) or two(90)? If it's volume two then it starts with The Fall, if it's volume one then you're probably right. I can't remember right now.
>>
>
>It was Volume II and - checks tracks - it cuts away to The Cramps, not The Fall. My mistake. But it does cut away halfway through the song. I had an old audio tape of the Breeders performance I took off the telly, and the whole song was there.
>This is now mystifying me.
>(Unless they performed the whole of "Doe" and only half of "Iris", in which case, why show "Iris" on the video?) (Frightened that I can remember the whole of this session all these years on...)
>
>Anyway, I agree that SNUB was great most of the time though. It deserves immortality for making superb original videos for Dinosaur Jr's "Freakscene" and Ultra Vivid Scene's "Mercy Seat".
>I wish such a show existed now, making cheap vids for cash-strapped bands so they could get BBC / MTV / M2 exposure...

Even though today they could buy the equipment to make their own videos from Argos for less than the cost of a drum kit?