Yes, it's a timeslip moment again - way back to an era of uncertainty and economic stagnation, 1979: the year Maggie Thatcher arrived to drag the country kicking and screaming into a new decade; the year of Ayatollah Khomeini, Jimmy Carter,
The Muppet Movie, Disco Demolition, the Carl Bridgewater murder trial,
Moonraker, the end of Pol Pot's reign of terror, Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Donna Summer, the assassination of Harvey Milk,
Life of Brian, Sandinistas, Pope John Paul II,
Mad Max, the fall of Idi Amin,
Off the Wall, SALT II, Bishop Abel Muzorewa, and the "fourth man" Anthony Blunt; the births of Sophie Ellis-Bextor, Will Young, Chris Pratt, Jamie Cullum, Shola Ama, Pink, Kerry Ellis, Cazwell, Jonny Wilkinson, Heath Ledger, Adam Levine, Sudoku, James McAvoy and the spreadsheet; and the year that Earl Mountbatten of Burma, Gracie Fields, Joyce Grenfell, Richard Rodgers, Stan Kenton, Minnie Riperton, Mary Pickford, Norman Hartnell, Barnes Wallis, Sid Vicious, Skylab, Merle Oberon, Peter Butterworth, Norrie Paramor, Van McCoy, Michael Wilding, Rhodesia, John Wayne, Barbara Hutton, Ted Cassidy ("Lurch") and Blair Peach all died.
In the news in March
forty-one years ago? MP and Thatcher confidant Airey Neave was murdered by an IRA bomb in the underground car park at the House of Commons, the Egypt–Israel Peace Treaty was signed, Scots voted for a separate assembly (but were defeated by the electoral rules) and Welsh voters rejected devolution in referenda, a general election was announced in May following a vote of no confidence in the Jim Callaghan government,
Voyager 1 sent back impressive photos of Jupiter and its rings, and the Three Mile Island nuclear accident caused mass panic Stateside; in the ascendant (literally) was the brand new Space Shuttle
Columbia, and the compact disc was launched; but we waved a fond farewell to the beauteous
Richard Beckinsale, who had a heart attack aged just 31. In our cinemas:
California Suite,
The Deer Hunter,
Damien: Omen II. On telly:
Tales of the Unexpected,
Worzel Gummidge,
Mork & Mindy.
And our charts this week in March 1979? Now That's What I Call A Top Ten:
10: Boney M - Painter Man
09: Abba - Chiquitita
08: Edwin Starr - Contact
07: Sex Pistols - Something Else/Friggin' In the Riggin'
06: Blondie - Heart Of Glass
05: Real Thing - Can You Feel The Force?
04: Lene Lovich - Lucky Number
03: Gloria Gaynor - I Will Survive
02: Elvis Costello - Oliver's Army
01: Bee Gees - Tragedy
However, lurking just outside the higher echelons were a few songs destined to upset this line-up; as eclectic a mix as what was already there, including Chic, Dire Straits, Art Garfunkel, Queen and Gary's Gang... and this lot!
Gosh. Did we actually still do the "pogo dance" in '79?! That audience doesn't seem too enamoured
[then again, half of them had probably spent the evening trying to avoid Jimmy Savile in the corridors].
Time flies, etc...
