Top of the Pops

I’m sure when Chris Moyles was at Radio 1 he got several tunes into the charts by influencing his listeners to buy them. “Dominic the Donkey” was one of them, think they were often unusual songs for Radio 1.

Yes, the main one was Billie Piper’s ‘Honey to the Bee’, originally released in 1999, which he tried to get as high as possible on the chart, in order to see how effective such a campaign would be with the then-new chart rules that allowed download sales to be counted for the first time.


(Around the same time I recall a campaign to get the Spice Girls’ single ‘Stop’ to number 1 with downloads, as it had only got to number 2 on its initial release. I don't think Moyles had anything to do with that though).

There was also his fascination with ‘Hocus Pocus’ by a Dutch band called Focus, after its use in a Nike advert during the 2010 World Cup, which I don’t think he explicity campaigned to get to number 1 but reached number 57 nonetheless.

I bought Honey To The Bee on original release... should I be admitting that?

Yes, I remember Tony talking about I'm Still Waiting in an interview many years ago.

Elton John's Sacrifice was originally released in 1989 but it flopped in the charts. Steve Wright loved the song and was playing it regularly on his show in 1990. This prompted a re-release, whereupon it reached number 1.

He still mentions it pretty much every time he plays he it on the radio!

Sort of connected, here's the first 2 ITV Chart Show episodes, they tie in with this week's BBC4 episodes:

https://wetransfer.com/downloads/ffe49ddf726bceb2e1e87801fef4d08220200109092606/263578

I don't think their charts used airplay, more to do with the fact I think they compiled their own charts with a different sample of record stores to the regular charts, plus it didn't include Saturday sales, which the regular charts also did, which I think were the day most reords were sold.

I keep hoping for a new repeat run of The Chart Show, but with their TV channels now sold off to Trace and presuambly anyone connected with the original show no longer having anything to do with the channels, it's unlikely, sadly.

The first C4 run of The Chart Show in 1986 used the Network Singles and Albums Charts - with an end-credit shout-out to the Network Chart show on ILR that Sunday.

When the show's run resumed in April 1987, they switched to using their own chart - I'd assume MRIB had already sealed a deal with ITV to feature the Network Chart on the soon-to-debut Roxy.

(And it was shortly after the last edition of the Roxy that the Network Chart replaced the NME's own charts for a five-year stretch.)

No animation on any of the captions on tonight's first episode (apart from Mark Goodier & Andy Crane's caption at the start), they didn't even fade on and off, they just appeared and disappeared.