Nice To See You........

I’ll be brief, I promise. Seriously I have to be. There’s only 21% left on the Sky+ planner and I really need to clear some space before the weekend as the heady mix of Formula One coverage and Saturday night reality shows may blow its circuits.

Also this is a bit of a check-in to prove I’m still alive as I haven’t been prolific of late. I could blame my job as it’s been quite busy and I’ve been travelling about a bit, although mostly to Essex. I have to say that Essex is less TOWIE and more Jeremy Kyle. Seriously, it makes Swindon look dead glamorous and sophisticated.

So I could blame that as when I get home of an evening the only thing I’m thinking about is my nice comfortable bed. I could of course blame a sudden lack of inspiration or creativity. In my student radio days there used to be a sign on the wall of the studio which read something along the lines of, ‘If you have nothing to say, play a record’.  So here’s Bananarama with ‘Love in the First Degree’…….OK, maybe not.

Well, I hadn’t felt I’d done anything of note. Then I realised that hasn’t stopped me posting before so I’ve cracked on.

Mind you we did go to London last weekend. BBC TV Centre in fact, to be in the audience of ‘Strictly Come Dancing’. I love that title, it makes no sense at all and if you think it does then you’re even more crackers than I am, and I’ve got a certificate.

It all passed off well, particularly as Lulu got voted out. I don’t know what it is about Lulu, she really gets my goat. I think it may have something to do with the fact that she is known for (at best) about four songs (‘Shout’, ‘Boom-Bang-A-Bang’, that one that was a James Bond theme and ‘To Sir with Love’ - the one with Take That doesn’t count, she was just a guest vocal) yet she insists she has some sort of long-standing career and is still releasing contemporary and relevant songs today. 

Newsflash to Lulu, you’re not, now stop squawking that intro to ‘Shout’ at every available opportunity and bugger off.

And breathe….

Yet for all the Lulus in the world there’s always my favourite person involved in Strictly…....Brucie. I am joking although I don’t have the same beef with him that the present Mrs Hayward has. For some reason he makes her skin crawl and she will merrily tell you that if she had a gun with one bullet Brucie would be at the top of her list. Not some murderer or corrupt dictator, no, she would choose to take out an octogenarian light entertainer. I had to point out to her that if he happened to expire suddenly on Saturday night, no-one would believe she didn’t have a hand in it. 

No, my favourite (as Brucie would say) is the lovely, the striking, the beautiful, Aliona Vilani. I’ve never really had a laminated list but if I had she would be on it, somewhere near the top. I should have pointed this out to Aliona on Saturday night but I fear I may have got myself ejected for my troubles, and not in a good way.

It’s not just blind lust, I also respect her as a dancer, or something.

Anyway, it was a good night and I always enjoy watching a TV show being made as I spend as much time watching the camera crew and backstage people as I do watching the show itself. I also get a big thrill out of going to TV Centre. I heard someone say once that to a kid growing up in my era, BBC TV Centre was like Hollywood. When I was in Studio 1 I thought about all the shows that had probably been made in there that I used to watch as a kid…….Morecambe and Wise, Kenny Everett, Top of the Pops, Doctor Who…..the list is long and glittering. It’s a crying shame that the BBC have been allowed to flog it as the old concrete doughnut is part of our heritage. I really must do the tour before it closes.

Aliona aside though, I was also confronted with a blast from the past as in the audience were two members of Bananarama. Yes, a second mention. They were the first band I saw when I was about 14 and I had a crush on the one who replaced Siobhan, I think she was called Jacqui. This was one of many teenage crushes. I think this one came somewhere between Wonder Woman and Calley Donington off of ‘Grange Hill’.

So this brings me round to, oh yes, here’s Bananarama with ‘Love in the First Degree’…….