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Posts Tagged ‘1970’

Watch the 1970s BBC documentary: Man Alive – The Disc Jockeys

john-peel paedoIn February 1970 the BBC broadcast the documentary Man Alive: The Disc Jockeys. The series was edited by Esther Rantzen’s future hubby Desmond Wilcox. (More on them here.) The show focused on the new wave of BBC Radio 1 DJs.

As Paul Gallagher writes:

In Britain during those promiscuous 1970s, millions of youngsters were shocking their parents by going to bed with John Peel and waking up with Tony Blackburn… and his dog Arnold. The sound of the DJs could be heard everywhere—from cars, shops, kitchens, homes, factories, schoolyards and those dinky little pocket radios that everyone and their Mom seemed to have, dangling from plastic wristbands.

The music revolution of the 1960s really began with the arrival of cheap polyvinyl chloride in the fifties which meant record companies could mass produce singles and albums. Previously record discs had been made of the far more expensive Bakelite. The PVC revolution tied in very neatly with the incredible flourishing of young musical talent—and so the Swinging Sixties were born.

Suddenly youngsters wanted to hear music before they bought it, or even if they didn’t buy it. This gave rise to Pirate Radio. At the time the BBC was the only organization in Britain with the license to transmit radio shows. However a small loophole in maritime law allowed DJs to broadcast from ships anchored just outside UK waters. And so pop-pickers Pirate Radio was born.

In 1967 the BBC admitted defeat and launched Radio One—a youth radio station for pop music. Radio One became the biggest and most successful radio station in the country with generation after generation of youngsters learning their love of music or finding their inspiration to form bands from listening to the station’s DJs.

This BBC documentary from 1970 looks at the rise of the Radio One DJ and features Emperor Rosko, John Peel, Kenny Everett and Tony Blackburn—a rum bunch of four very different radio hosts. Condescending in tone throughout, the documentary voice over even has the temerity to suggest that sex with fans was one of the perks of working for the BBC—-shurely not:

Radio One belongs to the taxpayer and doesn’t splash princely salaries around for men like Emperor Rosko. He accepts the BBC’s shop policy of paying low wages as both sides know about the big big perks that can accompany the adulation of this new empire—British teeny boppers.

The interviewer then grills one poor little teenybopper about her infatuation with Emperor Rosko:

“I listen to him and I like listening to his voice and I get carried away” says one young besotted teenager about the subject of her adoration DJ Emperor Rosko:

“What do you mean you get carried away?” says Ms. Prim from the BBC

“I just hear his voice and I imagine him…” says adoring young fan.

“When you say you imagine him…you imagine him doing what?” continues our interrogator.

“Talking and smiling and…all the actions with it. It’s just good.”

“And where do you do your listen to this?”

“In the bedroom.”

It’s an interesting hour well spent and worth watching mainly to see the pure genius of Kenny Everett making one of his shows and to hear some of the mumblings of the man himself, John Peel.

Posted: 26th, February 2016 | In: Celebrities, Key Posts, Reviews, TV & Radio | Comment


Watch Aretha Franklin sing ‘RESPECT’ in 1970 live at the Antibes Jazz Festival

Aretha Franklin 1970

Aretha Franklin 1970

 

Today Aretha Franklin turns 73.

Back in 1970, the ‘Queen of Soul’ prefomed her her version of Otis Redding’s 1965 song Respect at the 11th Antibes Juan-Le-Pins Jazz Festival.

In New York on Valentine’s Day, 1967, Franklin and her backing singers – her sisters Carolyn and Erma – recored the song. They feminised Redding’s lyrics.

Redding sang:

Hey little girl, you’re so sweeter than honey
And I am about to just give you all my money

Franklin countered:

 

I’m about to give you all of my money
And all I’m askin’ in return, honey
Is to give me my profits
When you get home…

R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Find out what it means to me
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Take care, TCB

Oh (sock it to me, sock it to me,
sock it to me, sock it to me)
A little respect (sock it to me, sock it to me,
sock it to me, sock it to me)

Posted: 25th, March 2015 | In: Celebrities, Music | Comment


Watch Dock Ellis The Movie: ‘I Took LSD And Pitched A Perfect Game For the Pittsburgh Pirates’

 Pittsburgh Pirates Pitcher Dock Ellis expresses his sentiments about West Division Winners San Francisco Giants, after their win, Thursday, in this Oct. 1, 1971 file photo taken in Philadelphia, Pa. Ellis, who infamously claimed he pitched a no-hitter for Pittsburgh under the influence of LSD and later fiercely spoke out against drug and alcohol addiction, died Friday Dec. 19, 2008 of a liver ailment in Calif. He was 63.(AP Photo, FILE)

Pittsburgh Pirates Pitcher Dock Ellis expresses his sentiments about West Division Winners San Francisco Giants, after their win, Thursday, in this Oct. 1, 1971 file photo taken in Philadelphia, Pa.

 

DRUGS and sport is a familiar story.  One school of thought says all drugs cheats should be banned. Another says that since cheating is rife, why not make the drugs legal.

Dock Ellis took drugs and played pro sports. He’s the subject of the film No No: A Dockumentary.

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Posted: 7th, September 2014 | In: Film, Sports | Comment


QPR Fans Outside Loftus Road With Their Tickets For The Match Against Chelsea In 1970

QPR V Chelsea on February 15 1970:

A group of youths outside Loftus Road, the Queens Park Rangers football ground in London, with their tickets for the match against Chelsea.

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Posted: 24th, May 2014 | In: Flashback, Sports | Comment


1970-1975: The FA Cup Third Place Playoff Experiment

BACK in the Pre-Premier League days, the losing FA Cup semi-finalists competed to see which one of them qualified for a non-existent bronze medal and the other nothing. The match lasted just five years, played between 1970 and 1975.

Initially, the game was played at a neutral ground, lending it the aura of a real Cup Final. At the inaugural Cup, played one day before Chelsea and Leeds United contested the final at Wembley, Manchester United beat Watford 2-1 at Highbury. The crowd was 15,105.

Was that encouraging? Footballfansite has transcribed the Arsenal programme notes from that, which explain how the match came to happen:

THIS is the eleventh occasion we have staged a match for the Football Association on the eve of the F.A. Cup Final, and this time the fixture takes a new form. The idea of a match on this particular date on the football calendar first came about in 1954, it being felt that with people descending in thousands on London en route to Wembley the following day, many of them would welcome a game at which to spend the eve of the Final.

So, 16 years ago, England met Young England here on this corresponding night, and a crowd of 43,000 gave full justification to the experiment. The following year the title was changed to Old England v Young England (the old ‘uns cheered to a 5-0 victory by 38,000), but except for 1963 when the match was styled England v The Football League the fixture became permanently one between England and Young England. On five occasions it switched to Stamford bridge, but otherwise it remained at Highbury.

Inevitably what was basically a friendly representative match could not retain all its early novelty appeal, and after last season’s 0-0 draw at Stamford Bridge, watched by just over 18,000 spectators, the F.A. decided the time had come to change the style of the fixture. Among suggestions thrown up was a North v South match – that particular argument seems to have been going on among football fans since the game began! – but the idea to gain favour was to stage a “play-off” to decide third and fourth places between the two beaten F.A. Cup semi-finalists.

Tonight’s game is the first such fixture, and with it we have, in any case, a North v South clash, just as there will be another at Wembley tomorrow between Leeds United and Chelsea. Whether this becomes a regular fixture will, presumably, how well the fans turn out to support it……

 

 

Everton's Alan Whittle (r) beats Stoke City's goalkeeper Gordon Banks (l) to score Everton's first goal of the night. Stoke City went on to win the match 3-2 in front of just over 5,000 fans.

Everton’s Alan Whittle (r) beats Stoke City’s goalkeeper Gordon Banks (l) to score Everton’s first goal of the night. Stoke City went on to win the match 3-2 in front of just over 5,000 fans.

 

One year on and Stoke took on Everton. To further entice paying punters, the game was played one day before Arsenal played Liverpool on May 8. The footy-starved neutral and fans of the two finalists would surely lap it up. Well, that was the plan. But only 5,031 turned watched the game at Selhurst Park.

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Posted: 18th, April 2014 | In: Flashback, Sports | Comment


Circus magazine asks ‘Will they survice the 70s?’

IT’S February 1970, and Circus magazine has a question:

 

Posted: 19th, August 2012 | In: Flashback | Comment


The 1970s In Photos

THE 1970s. Time for some shameless nostalgia. Can you identify all these moments from your past?

kenneth

Image 4 of 15

 

 

Posted: 28th, October 2011 | In: Flashback, Key Posts | Comments (7)


The Worst Way To Dispose Of A Dead Whale Is With Dynamite

IN 1970, over in Florence (in the mighty United States of America, not the other more famous one), they found a great big whale on their beach.

A dead whale. A dead, stinking, rotting whale.

So what’s the best way to get rid? Cut it up and feed it to the sea? Don’t be stupid. That would take far too long. And besides, that’s positively unAmerican.

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Posted: 19th, October 2011 | In: Flashback | Comment (1)