The Old Grey Whistle Test

My fave one is John Otway nearly breaking his neck while falling off the amps during "Cor , Baby That's Really Free ".
The most depressing moments were the almost complete by passing of punk music as whispering Bob hated it . I remember he dismissed a Sham 69 live song by saying "And now we move to some proper music" before introducing a 15 minute guitar solo by Jessie bloody Winchester. Sorry , I can't forgive this twat of a presenter and always switch the radio off when I hurt his weasly voice but may buy the album if Jessie Winchester is not on it and none of the proceeds go to Bob Harris!!

They are showing it on BBC2 all this week. last night was interesting for Tim Buckley footage singing Dolphins and made me reconsider a lifelong personal ban on singer songwriters, The New York Dolls (cabaret act) , Little Feet, AWB, Alex Harvey (what beards!) and finally further proof of the God Like genius of Captain Beefheart. Tonight is very promising with Patti Smith and Talking Heads.

John

Perhaps the most significant comment was Whispering Bob saying his favourite bit was Curtis Mayfield - jeez!

I used to watch this when originally broadcast but now it is too much like "Jazz Club - great!"

cheers

Nigel

Now Nigel lets get one thing straight Curtis Mayfield was the king of soul and I will not hear a word said against him! I thought he said last night that it was the hopeless and dreary John Lennon in New York that he liked best? You are right about Bob though.

John

fun to watch but it shows what a hairy blokes show it always was. mid to late 70s last night and most of the program was a guitar solo by lynard skynard (spellin?). bob harris saying "nice" after some american rockin blues combo. i laughed out loud. great to see the new york dolls. patti smith reminded me why i dont like her, the same with beefheart etc. the ogwt was even less cutting edge than jules holland is today. my priority isnt musicianship but music, even then the best thing about last night was tina weymouths bass playing. addictive viewing and tonight it doesnt clash with leeds on ch5.
ashley

That footage of Tina Wymouth was great last night and further proof of her Rock God status.David Byrne really just window dressing. I have to disagree about Patti Smith and the Captain however. Smith was fantastic. Have we had this argument before?? I have an eerie sense of daj vu (all over again).

John

Lynard Skynard were truly laughable.a

Last week's Radio Times featured an article about Uncle Bob with details of a reduced price for the Whistle Test DVD and Bob's autobigraphy.

God bless the Beeb.

"my priority isnt musicianship but music"

Well I don't think so. Bad playing doesn't improve anything. You wouldn't deliberately watch a duff football team or some painting-by-numbers artist instead of Picasso. So why listen to bad musicians?

steve

this is when i should clarify things. a long guitar solo does nowt for me. or a drum solo. or a bass solo etc etc. a lot of people i like are self confessed bad musicians but the music is great. listen to the ramones first album, 0 musical skill in the rock god sense of the word but great music. steve vai might well be a great musician but his music leaves we cold. oasis (not one of my faves) write menorable music but individually they arent great musicians. great music is the product of a great mind not necessarily great fingers (or spellin!).

do you see what i mean?
ashley.
ps a lot of the music i listen to is electronic and made by people who cant read or write music or play a scale but the music does it for me

I agree about drum solos, a particular unfave of mine too, but I do like guitar, keyboard, etc playing.

What you say does clarify things <bg>. As to electronics, Tangerine Dream & some Kraftwerk I like but the rest passes me by.

Incidentally I'm not that keen on Vai, I much prefer Joe Satriani. a guitarist of my acquaintance, himself superb, swears by Vai.

cheers

steve

good to hear. you could try suicide, or yellow magic orchestra, depeche mode, yello, DAF, thomas dolby, jarre, mark shreeve, human league, the orb, anything by andy weatherall, georgio moroder to look at some recent plays from my (sad) secord collection. i wont start on the thousands of dance acts or the more poppy electronic acts.

stevie ray vaughn.

thanks for giving me 5 mins, this is what i like about the forum. also check out what tony l recommends in his m.o.w. mine will age again as i have just found a good second hand record (yes vinyl) shop near an office i have to visit in Brentwood. eureka records, down by the side of toni and guy on the high street.
ashley.

Sorry for the coitus interuptus chaps...

I finally got hold of the OGWT DVD and have now seen the whole thing after watching disc 1 in one very very enjoyable session t'other day.

Highlights?

Captain Beefhearts totally mezmerising performance and Little Feat being so unbelievably tight and together (it's so hard to believe he was only 34 when he died - what a loss) Alex Harvey being as demented as I remember, Bill Withers being so intense he looks like he's about to explode! Randy Newman being the genius he always was, Focus (everybody I was at school with at the time wanted to be able to play that riff!) and, oh yeah The Edgar Winter Group doing Frankenstein.

As for the rest, well I can still think of countless other performances that I reckon could've been included. Disc 2 is a big let down - No Joy Division, No Magazine, No Neville Brothers etc etc

Still - with a bit of luck they might just set up the whole series so you could pick and choose and compile your own DVD?

Now that'd be nice.

TTFN

Pete

Got the Whistle Test DVD and just tried it on the PC (as I don't have a DVD player yet).

Sound and vision was slightly out of sync.

Any one else noticed this?

Not too sure about the technical Out of Synch stuff but some of the early performances certainly appear to be mimed I reckon.

In fact I can remember having the "See the Whistle Test last night? Were they miming or what?" conversations in the pub the following day at the time. This was pre VCR of course.

Bollocks, I wish I hadn't just thought of THAT - I now feel very old!!!!

TTFN

Pete

It was a P.C. problem.

Got a player now and it plays fine.

So much great stuff on there.

I met 'Whispering Bob' while doing some session bass playing years ago.

I swear that he actually projected his voice on TV. I could only understand about every
forth word through his twitching beard. I think 'Mumbling Bob' would have been more appropriate.

Bob.