Watching the Old Grey Whistle Test Live For One Night Only at the weekend I was struck by the circuitous route the programme and I had taken together.
Back in my teenage years of the mid-70s, the Old Grey Whistle Test was the first programme I was allowed to stay up and watch on my own as neither of my parents had the slightest interest in rock music – their only proviso being that I remember to switch off the television and turn out the living room light when it had finished.
By way of irony when viewing the special edition to mark thirty years since the last episode, the rest of the household, in this case my wife, was in bed and I watched it in the dark – just as I would have done in 1975 when having the light off gave me one less thing to remember when it was time to turn in.
At that time it was, in simple terms, a current affairs programme for those who took rock music seriously and for those, such as I, compulsive viewing.
As the music that really mattered was found on albums, many, myself included, developed a haughty attitude toward the Top Twenty singles chart and if a serious rock band did stoop so low as to have a hit single, it would be better heard in the context of an LP anyway.
Besides Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd or Yes were never likely to appear on Top of the Pops – although two years later with the advent of punk, it dawned on me people did not go around humming albums, but that’s another story.
Back then Bob Harris was well established as the programme presenter, his hushed, polite tone when introducing or commenting on the acts performing on the show, were the staples linking everything together. Returning for the anniversary edition, Harris has lost none of his enthusiasm for the music nor graciousness when speaking to artists, still giving the impression there is not one act he does not like.
After a breezy introduction giving the format for how the two and a half hour special would evolve – live music and interviews from former Whistle Test favourites, a couple of new acts (one of which, Wildwood Kin, were very much in the folk-rock tradition of Stackridge or Fairport Convention and would not have been out of place on an early-70s edition) – Harris intermittently reappeared to offer an overview of the seventeen years (1971-1988) the programme ran.
The origins of the show were described by Tom Robinson, himself a Whistle Test performer with the Tom Robinson Band in the late 70s, who disingenuously made the claim there had been little in the way of music television programmes until Whistle Test came along (somewhat overlooking ‘Ready Steady Go‘ where serious young groups such as The Kinks, The Who, the Small Faces and The Yardbirds cut their television teeth).
The broader point being made, however, was no other programme had previously embraced rock music as a creditable artistic form, Whistle Test first broadcast at a time when albums had overtaken singles in terms of sales and were, year on year, expanding the boundaries of popular music.
It is worth noting there is not a like-for-like equivalent today, ‘Later with Jools Holland‘ going closest, although the reflective period pieces BBC 4 occasionally come up with have given 70s music new cache.
Such programmes are often hosted by Danny Baker, who appears early in the Whistle Test story to give a fan’s perspective, making the point the OGWT was ‘un-BBC and not a mainstream programme.’ If nothing else it shows the Corporation took a chance when creating the show, their gamble paying off as viewing figures for Whistle Test remained high for most of the decade.
Of those returning for the celebration, Kiki Dee delivered a stunning version of her 1973 hit ‘Amoureuse,’ while Peter Frampton spoke fondly of his days in Humble Pie with Steve Marriott. Forty years on from the days when he was huge news as a solo act, it struck me how closely Frampton and I, with thinning grey hair and wispy beards have come to resemble each other – how typical that I never looked like him on the cover of ‘I’m In You.’
Richard Thompson and Ian Anderson (Jethro Tull) resemble a couple of jolly, retired bank managers when they talk to Harris of bygone days, although Thompson sounds nothing like old (or jolly) in delivering a searing rendition of ‘The Rattle Within.’
The Whistle Test story following the departure of Harris in the late 70s is taken up by Annie Nightingale, who became host when the singer/songwriter and prog-rock era gave way to punk and new wave.
The mid-80s are remembered by Andy Kershaw who gives an engaging analysis of the period, to the extent I found forgiveness for the disparaging remarks he occasionally made about Bruce Springsteen.
Harris returns for a final montage of clips, most of which are highly memorable, although the year of each one along with the artist and song title would have been appreciated by this sad revisionist.
Ultimately it is not the age of this footage that is so extraordinary or how well much of the music has aged – nor even the Old Grey Whistle Test ran for seventeen years and at its peak had an audience of five million.
Most incredible is the final episode was, whisper it, thirty years ago.
Scary.
This article was first published on 26/2/2018.
NEIL SAMBROOK is the author of ‘MONTY’S DOUBLE‘ – an acclaimed thriller available as an Amazon Kindle book.