I'm going down to Alphabet Street to the Regal Music Club Prince night, tonight at 7.30. I will also, incidentally, be talking so sexy that you will want me from my head to my feet.

Wed 30th January for Prince night. This is a man who can release a 3CD hits compliation and still not have room for everything you remember. 7.30 pm. Rasperry Beret Optional.

Some Prince tracks/videos are surprisingly hard to find evidence of online. This is one of my favourites, a song completely obliterated from any compilations by the screeds of other hits. I bought all those double albums when he churned them out in the early nineties and something like this stood out inamongst all the generic funkathons

Prince - The Morning Papers video

This is, by some distance, the most honest and accurate song about the early seventies. Yes, it takes in the Chopper bikes and flares etc but it also moves through the IRA bombing of Birmingham, the bizarre one hit wonders, and the importance of reggae to large swathes of the population. In one verse alone you get Jeremy Thorpe, The Black Panthers and 1000 volts of Holt.

In the seventies I was just a kid, still knew what it was all about. I soaked it in and now it's all dripping out

Also here if video doesn't play: Denim - The Osmonds

Gearing up for our 1972 night on 16th January. For a little context, here is the scehdule of BBC 1 and 2 TV programmes from 28 July 1972. This would be smack in the middle of the school holidays, which accounts for the childrens shows in the morning, not a typical occurance, hence the weird situation where BBC 1 closed down for half an hour at 11 am. Note the Monkees at 5pm in the normal after school slot, nice. 

09:45 Camberwick Green
10:00 Casey Jones*
10:25 Play Tennis
10:50 Adventures of Tin Tin*
10:55 Magic Roundabout*
11:00 Closedown
11:25 Cricket: 4th Test
13:30 Fingerbobs
13:45 News. Weatherman Bert Foord
13:55 Telewele (First shown on BBC Wales)
14:20 Racing From Goodwood/Cricket: 4th Test
16:20 Play School
16:45 Jackanory
17:00 The Monkees
17:25 Ask Aspel
17:50 National News and Weather
18:00 Your Region Tonight*
18:20 Tom and Jerry
18:30 The Virginian
19:45 It's a Knock-Out! (Jeux sans Frontiéres)
21:00 News with Robert Dougall
21:25 The Man Outside
22:15 Dave Allen at Large
23:00 Late Night news
23:05 Summer Talk with Robin Day
23:50 Weatherman followed by Regional News and Weather (except London): Closedown

BBC2

11:00 Play School with Carol Chell, Johnny Ball
11:25 Closedown
16:30 Cricket: 4th Test
18:35 Open University*
19:30 Newsroom with Richard Whitmore
20:00 Gardeners' World
20:25 The Entertainers: The Klondyke Brothers
21:15 The Beethoven Symphonies (No. 3, Eroica)
20:15 Sport Two with Colin Welland, Ian Wooldrige
23:30 News on Two, Weather
23:35 Late Night Line-Up

Much more difficult finding ITV listings for 1972. Here is boxing day 1971 and 1972 which should give some idea of the horror of there only being three channels. A variety of Reg Varney anyone?

ITV Boxing Day 1971
8:15am Carols from Kirkare from the Castle Museum, York
9am Cartons
9:15am United Free Church Service from Princes Street Congregational Church, Norwich
10:15am A Merry Morning, with John Alderton, Daisy May
10:45am Children's Christmas Cinema
11:30am Captain Sinbad (film) starring Guy Williams
1:00pm Christmas Singalong, with The Bachelors, Moira Anderson, Sacha Distel, Howard Keel, Andee Silver
2:00pm The Kelvin Hall Circus
3:00pm The Queen speaks to the Commonwealth
3:10pm King Solomon's Mines (1950 film) starring Deborah Kerr, Stewart Granger
5:00pm A Variety of Reg Varney
6:00pm News
6:05pm Mike and Bernie Winters' All Star Christmas Comedy Carnival
8:35pm Around the World in Eighty Days (film) starring David Niven, Robert Newton, Cantinflas, Shirley MaClaine
10:00pm News
10:10pm Around the World in Eighty Days (film continued)
11:40pm It Matters to Me, with Leonard Parkin and Anne Allen

ITV Boxing Day 1972

9:00am Cliff's Kids
9:15am Mountain Rescue
9:35am Bugs Bunny
10:00am Tarzan and the Slave Girl (1950 film) starring Lex Barker, Vanessa Brown (b-w)
11:20am Professional Wrestling
12:20-2:40pm Horse Racing from Wincanton
2:40pm Dear Octopus (play)
with Peter Barkworth, Lally Bowers, Hannah Gordon, Cyril Luckham, Anna Massey, Nora Swinburne
4:10pm Cinderella, Junior Showtime Pantomime
5:00pm News
5:15pm All The Jokers - Full House
6:15pm Press for Time (1967 film) starring Norman Wisdom, Derek Bond
8:00pm Big Bad Mouse (play) with Eric Sykes, Jimmy Edwards
9:30pm The Val Doonican Show
10:30pm News
10:45pm The Mummy (1959 film) starring Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee
12:20pm Reconciliation

Hey kids, here is a lovely new blog for those who prefer not to have to sign up to anti-social media to get the club updates. Tell your friends, tell all your friends.

Next music club meeting is at 7.30pm on 16th January when we will be looking at the wild world of the 1972 music scene. Forget your David Bowie and his arm draped around Mick Ronson, the whole country was going quietly mad. Exhibit A: Lieutenant Pigeon.

 

If you can't see the video displayed, click here to view.