Molly Mania

Who amongst us doesn’t secretly hang out for the summer Rage schedule? I’m confident in saying that the only good thing about this season is seeing hours upon hours of old episodes of Countdown of a Saturday night/Sunday morning. It’s far more fun when you’re off your face - but sadly tonight I tackle this task sober.

October 7th, 1984. I love the way they don’t do this in any logical order - the last one was from 1987 and the next one will probably be the one from 1983 where Toni Basil guest hosts and sings her second single.

Guest hosted by “the cast of Sweet ‘n Sour”. I take it that they’re some sort of 80’s comedy troupe. Either that or all three of them are on the gear because they’re highly excitable.

The show in it’s entirety,

(LIVE) * The Cure - “Shake Dog Shake”
National Chartbusters
(CLIP) * David Bowie - “Blue Jean” (”up 10 places!” - Countdown. “Rubbish!” - Adam)
(CLIP) * Black Lace - “Agadoo” (Fuck you all - it was in the top ten in Sydney and Adelaide. Proves everything I’ve ever said about those particular cities. Almost certainly the worst song ever. And the tightest leather pants ever on the singer. For some reason the caption “THIS SEEMS LIKE FUN” comes up on the screen halfway through)
(CLIP) * Cyndi Lauper - “She Bop”
Yes it’s sad that I’ve basically just blogged an entire episode of Countdown. It wasn’t really labor intensive - I promise.
(CLIP) * Twisted Sister - “We’re Not Gonna Take It” (Pushed into the National Top 30 because of it’s popularity in Melbourne. You may snicker but it’s better than what Adelaide and Sydney were buying. Has anyone else ever thought of what a child abusing asshole the guy in the video for that song was?)
/Chartbusters

(VIDEO) * The Takeaways - “Glam To Wham” - From ‘Sweet ‘n’ Sour’ apparently. Doesn’t give any better indication of what the show was about but it sounds like a really povo Australian attempt to do a James Bond theme song.

(VIDEO/INTERVIEW) * Jermaine Jackson - “Dynamite” - Clip involves a jail break, a fat woman on the phone and JJ himself wearing some sort of orange and light blue jumpsuit thing. The highlight was his ’stoned like there’s no tomorrow’ throw to the song and the wet look mullet he sports during his brief interview with Molly.

Sweet ‘n Sour are back and plug their various projects before the chick mistakenly throws to a Stevie Wonder videoclip and has to be saved by a co-host. At this point they go to,

(LIVE) * Steven Cummings - “Another Kick In The Head”. I’d be tempted to say that he was off his face as well but I think he always looked like that. Unlikely to appear on any klassic kompilation of Aussie hits anytime soon. I’d like to go back 20 years and yell at him to do “Who Listens To The Radio”. Christ, this one goes on a bit.

(VIDEO) * Bon Jovi - “She Don’t Know Me”. Does a pre-video “Hi, I’m Jon Bon Jovi” link whilst sporting the biggest poodle hair mullet I’ve ever seen. He’s been the most sober looking person on the show yet. You know that’s wrong.

(VIDEO) * John Justin - “It’s Magic”. They’re only pushing him because they were the first show to feature him and were presumably hoping to cash in when he got famous. Not the worst song of the era but the video is complete bollocks. He rises a horse and horns onto a big breasted blonde woman. Then he breaks out a Jack O Lantern. What’s magic about Halloween? As the video goes on I start to dislike him and his song more and more. Where are they now? Write in. Were you inappropriately groped by Molly?

More uncertain attempts at comedy from the hosts.

(VIDEO) * ZZ Top - “Legs”. Pretty much the only thing that you still see. What was up with the ritual workplace abuse that the girl copped in this video? Thank god that dancing skanks and beardos show up and kick ass.

(LIVE) * Liquid Engineers - “Help Me”. Anyone who steals their name from a Gary Numan song is alright in my book. Even if they sport giant blonde mullets and sing a shit song. Apparently their first TV appearance. Almost certainly their last.

(VIDEO) * Stevie Wonder - “I Just Called To Say I Love You”. Cue a million people simultaneously coming up with a ‘Red Faces’ act. At the time this was the fastest selling single in British history. As if they didn’t have something better to be buying in 1984.

More awful comedy.

Humdrum
Molly on a street in Hollywood (offering?). Looks as if he’s wearing a giant wig under the hat for some reason. Talks up Cyndi Lauper.

US Top 5
5 - Lauper - “She Bop”
4 - John Waite - “Missing You”
3 - The Cars - “Drive”
2 - Stevie Wonder - “I Just Called To Say I Love You”
1 - Prince - “Let’s Go Crazy”

A terrifying zoom in onto Meldrum leads to a preview of,

(CLIP) Culture Club - “The War Song”

UK Top 5
5 - Sister Sledge - “Lost In Music”
4 - U2 - “Pride”
3 - Culture Club - “The War Song”
2 - Ray Parker Jr - “Ghostbusters”
1 - The aforementioned Stevie Wonder

Mad hair Molly is back to talk to Olivia Newton-John in one of her Koala Blue stores. There was a business venture with legs. She actually describes Purple Rain as one of the “most exciting films I’ve ever seen”. Molly then talks up the future acting prospect of Billy Idol and winks at the camera. Eek.

(VIDEO) - Billy Idol - “Flesh For Fantasy”. There’s plenty of booty slapping going on and does that dumbass sneer thing a lot. He really loses “bad boy” credability by busting out a video chock full of choreographed dancing.
/Humdrum

Australian Top 10 clips,

10 - Pointer Sisters - “Jump”
9 - Elton John - “Passengers”
8 - Bruce Springsteen - “Dancing In The Dark”
7 - ZZ Top - “Legs”
6 - Tina Turner - “What’s Love Got To Do With It”
5 - John Waite - “Missing You”
4 - U2 - “Pride”
3 - Ray Parker Jr. - “Ghostbusters”
2 - Stevie bloody Wonder again
1 - George Michael - “Careless Whisper”

The show, for some unknown bloody reason, ends with alarmingly large drag artiste Divine singing something entitled “You Think You’re A Man”. Sadly there’s no Pink Flamingos style dogshit eating live on stage. Probably the gayest thing ever seen on Australian television to that point in history. I can just see thousands of red hot Aussie bogan males ripping televisions out of the wall and declaring that they’ll never watch the ABC again. The song is pretty awful. Obviously they couldn’t sign the real #1 to come in and sing so they went for this instead.

And that’s it. I’m Adam 1.0. Goodnight Australia.

UPDATE - Yes I’m aware that I’ve just blogged an entire episode of Countdown from two decades ago. What else am I going to do? Do you expect me to sleep in these wretched conditions?

UPDATE 2 - How obvious was that? The next episode goes all the way back to 1978. I tipped this.