Mike Read and Tommy Vance present this special edition of the what was top of 1982.
In 1982 unemployment in Britain had reached over 3 million. Alan Bleasdale's seminal BBC series Boys from the Blackstuff took a darkly comic look at the plight of a group of unemployed tarmac layers. Each episode focussed on a different character. The most bleakly funny and heart wrenching was Yosser's story. It launched Bernard Hill to stardom who played Yosser Hughes. Bleasdale became one of Britain's foremost dramatist.
1982 was a year where kids wanted to ride BMX bikes and every household wanted electrical sandwich makers. Those butter soaked sandwiches were not good for your waistline.
In the cinemas Sylvester Stallone introduced the world to Rambo in First Blood. A more serious action adventure film compared to its more cartoonish rivals.
In the pop charts Bananarama entered the pop world by initially collaborating with Fun Boy Three. They would become one of Britain's most successful female pop groups.
More controversially Boy George sang 'Do you really want to hurt me' with his band Culture Club. The band's first appearance on Top of the Pops was innocuous enough. However some viewers were confused to the identity of the lead singer. Was it a man or a woman? The song got to number one and Boy George sent the media into a frenzy. Imagination were another band playing around with sexual identity. Their gold lame clothes and suggestive dancing on Top of the Pops led to speculation regarding the sexuality of the lead singer.
I had a friend who once met lead singer Leee John in a nightclub. He soon discovered what kind of man Leee liked as he gave him the number of his hotel room!
The first series of The Young Ones was launched on BBC2. I found people raving about the anarchic series rather problematic. I was still at school during the time the first series was shown. No one talked about and it seemed I was the only person watching it. Things changed when the second series was shown in 1984. By which time the whole of the school were certainly talking about and most people enjoyed bands like Madness turning up in the middle of the episode.
For some reason there was no mention of The Falklands War.
