Thursday, July 20, 2006

Still on the 70's.

Later the same day I wrote about 1976 I read an extract of John Peel's 'Margreave of the Marshes'when he was at a Radio 1 Extravaganza at Mallory Park in 1978. the Bay City Rollers had been helicopted onto an island in the middle of a lake. The lake was surrounded by a racing circuit. As the Bay City Rollers emerged on a raised platform on the island, crazed teenage girls dressed in tartan started charging across the racing circuit around which sped competitors in the Dunlop Star of Tomorrow Formula Ford Championshp Race, before hurling themselves into the lake to try and reach their heroes. The members of the BBC Sub-Aqua Club dressed in flippers and wetsuits were deployed to try to grab and remove them. John Peel recalls turning from this scene for a moment to see a speedboat hurtling back and forth upon the water. In the speedboat sat a regal Tony Blackburn waving to the crowds. The speedboat was driven by a Womble. Peel grasped Johnnie Walker by the arm and said 'Look on this and marvel. You will never see anything like this again.'

That Moo, Nat, Tony and others too young to know sums up the 1970's.

10 comments:

©gloop said...

Yes, the 70s truly were a different country.

How I remember my purple, satin suit with the MASSIVE flares. The platform soles and the shoulder length hair.

"You look just like a tart" said my grandad astutely.

Nat said...

I remember a bit of the seventies.

I remember going to a wedding in the late seventies and dancing to brown girl in the ring and admiring myself in the mirrored ceilings and walls!

And I remember my mums straight straight hair with the centre parting.

Ah, I see what you mean!

Arthur Clewley said...

if you can rememeber the 70's you weren't really there nat

Holly said...

Thanks JJ, sometimes I wish I was around in the 70's

timesnewroman said...

I was in tears reading that bit in the book.

Spunky Trunks said...

I never understood the Bay City Rollers.

I just remember being amazed by the silver vision that was Gary Glitter!

Look what has happened to him now!

He needs to don his silver suit once more and rise again like a silver phoenix.

[Or maybe he should just rot in jail for the rest of his tawdry life]

Reidski said...

what a superb story from Uncle John - his dry wit is sorely missed!

J.J said...

Steve, I am sure you would have looked a totally groovy tart.

WBS, you should have sued the rollers for nicking your satorial style.

Nat, I bet you looked SO SWEET!

Arthur, I think that it may have been better had their been a figment of our collective imagination.

Moo, regretably it wasn't all quite as good as I have described
;-)

Jim - me too! A classic.

Spunky, you did n't get 'Shang-a-lang'???? On second thoughts, maybe not so strange. And yes, GG can rot where he is.

Reidski, how could I not agree with that? I'll lend you the book when I've finished it.

themoy said...

Mainly I remember the Bicentennial and what a wash it was in my hometown. Rained in buckets and the only real sign of celebration I saw on that fourth was a miserable looking, sodden twelve-year old boy dressed as Uncle Sam and waving an American flag from the back of his daddy's pick-up truck. Everyone was too busy piling sandbags on the levees to do much else.

Anonymous said...

Couldn't have been 1978 - far too late for both Wombles and the Rollers.