Reporting Live from Sounds of the 70's

2.20pm I thought this afternoon I might come live from the occasion of Johnnie Walker's last appearance as a DJ after 58 years in the job. Tony Blackburn's still at it and Bob Harris will be taking over at Sounds of the 70's but Johnnie's put in a stalwart shift as only one so dedicated to his job could.

The premise of these 60's, 70's and 80's shows is that they bring back memories for those who were there at the time but by now there are plenty of us who have entirely lost touch with current pop music and the fact that there's a 90's show seems a bit superfluous because that's the latest we know.

Johnnie's picking the whole show this afternoon so we can expect Springsteen, possibly as a blockbuster finale, plus The Eagles, maybe Jackson Browne, his mate Steve Harley and his gesture towards soul and Motown could be Smokey Robinson & the Miracles with The Tears of a Clown. While Tony, and Alan Freeman, were my preferred hosts from old Radio 1, it will be an emotional afternoon as an old trooper and legend gives way with great dignity due to poor health.

 

3.10 I hope Bob stays with the opening montage, not that long ago updated to Earth, Wind & Fire, Thelma Houston, Rebel, Rebel, C20th Boy and The Clash but that remains to be seen. Opening with What is Life? by George Harrison might have been a better candidate than many have been for 'Better than the Original' in Olivia's cover version.

 

3.25 I've had any number of favourite pop artists in my time before having to accept that a list of half a dozen doesn't really answer the question. Chic were it in 78/79 and so Sister Sledge count as a winner. I never quite 'got it' with The Who but Giving It All Away by Roger Daltrey is 'older but wiser' in the context of a farewell gig.

'Album tracks' were somehow regarded as serious business compared to singles in the 70's and Johnnie left Radio 1 in some sort of high dudgeon, it seems, in 1976 when asked not to play them. Elton and Kiki Dee was his last 'Record of the Week', showing that he could pick singles, too.

 

3.40 Peter Gabriel was the 'interesting' bit of Genesis, perhaps, but even he was a bit too much designed for teenagers taking themselves seriously. Neil Diamond doesn't register here, either. Johnnie's taken us into a bit of a doldrums and although the arrival of the first 'winner' I tipped, Jackson Browne, is some sort of success, it doesn't lift us out of there. Is this really what Johnnie really likes?

 

3.52 The jukebox, record no. 567, is Free Bird by Lynyrd Skynyrd and, yes, if you've had 566 tracks to represent the 1970's then you do need this, too. A monster hit at rock discos in the day, it now seems to progress from grand, stately opening to pyrotechnic guitar solo with undue haste but guitarists showing off how fast they could play was what happened then and that was surely a shortened 7" version. But, gladly, the Staple Singers, with Come Go with Me, restores what had been becoming, in cricket terms, a scratchy innings. That is 'soul' as in 'gospel' and something that America could do that the UK simply couldn't. 

4.00 A message from Uncle Rod Stewart was a fine tribute. Everybody's best mate, Rod was, according to Danny Baker. I think we could have done better than Sailing from almost anywhere on that album, though, and anywhere before it because he was another who spent some months as my favourite singer. In contrast, lesser known Simon & Garfunkel could have been something better, and better known, and that first half has been a bit morose. Maybe he's saving it for the second half.

4.12 Not with Nils Lofgren's Shine Silently, he isn't. I'll have to delete this whole enterprise if things don't improve. Here comes Bowie, rather deeper and more thoughtful than he needed to be, as he ever was, but hooray for the masterpiece, Drive-In Saturday.

4.22 It did have to be Bowie as the main feature. For those of us for who the 70's were the formative years, he was as important as The Beatles. Not as much a fashion setter as an assimilator of whatever he found useful to his purposes, which might be what an 'artist' is. He always talked some dubious game but he made the records that defined the generation. We were space-obsessed and Starman, with its hopeful message, was a part of what we were. He told us not to blow it, and yet we still did. 

4.32 The Skids represent the 'new wave' of 77/78 which was as influential as it was short-lived. I'd have had to have had The Sex Pistols, probably The Clash and maybe X-Ray Spex, too, but it wasn't exactly Johnnie's thing. Johnnie's interview with the difficult Lou Reed revealed that it was him that broke Walk on the Wild Side and Lou wasn't so difficult with him after that. The BBC would certainly have banned that in 1972 if they'd understood it.

 

4.47 'There'll be a lot of tears out there today', says Tiggy Stardust in tribute to Johnnie's soldiering on and it is a moving experience. Father and Son by Cat Stevens achieves what those first half records didn't and sets off the profound, long perspective, emotional charge that they couldn't. Stevie Wonder always seemed like the acceptable face of Motown for rock fans and maybe Johnnie's having a joke at his own expense with He's Misstra Know It All. One has the feeling the big finish is underway as we get the Stones. It's touch and go whether we are going to get T. Rex.

 

5.00 I didn't see Johnny Nash coming after some penultimate words towards the sign off but optimism is a brave thing. Neither the finale, Amazing Grace by Judy Collins. So, not only no Marc but no Springsteen, either. 

A bit odd in the end. I'll leave this here for a bit in case it's of interest but I think I'll delete it in due course. It had its moments but it wasn't quite the monument I was expecting.

Best wishes to Johnnie and Tiggy, though. Thanks for having been there.