Today in Music (1964): Top of the Pops aired for the first time

January 1, 1964 Top of the Pops launched in Britain.

The British music television show Top of the Pops launched on New Year’s Day in 1964. BBC producer Johnnie Stewart created TOTP, inspired by the Radio Luxembourg show Teen and Twenty Disc Club. Each show counted down the hits from the past week. The #1 song was featured every week, but otherwise a song did not generally appear if it had been on the previous week or was heading down the charts. The inaugural show featured The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Hollies, and Dusty Springfield. The Beatles’ “I Want to Hold Your Hand” was the #1 song that week. Each week consisted of performances of some of the most popular music artists and counted down the week’s hit singles. While the show aired live, artists actually mimed to the songs. Over the show’s history, however, there were times when songs were performed at least partially live. Traditionally TOTP aired on BBC 1 on Thursdays, but in 1996 it moved to Fridays and then in 2005 it moved to Sundays on BBC 2. The show was broadcast until July 30, 2006, becoming the world’s longest-running weekly music show. The show also aired an annual look at the best-selling singles of the year on Christmas Day. Even after the show’s cancellation, that tradition continued. Resources: Dave’s Music Database: “History Index” for more important dates in music history Dave’s Music Database: “Music Makers’ Birthdays” BBC.co.uk: Top of the Pops Wikipedia: Top of the Pops First posted 1/1/2012; updated 12/30/2023.

Taylor Swift released Reputation

Originally posted March 7, 2019.

Reputation Taylor Swift

Released: November 10, 2017 Peak: #14 US, #11 UK, #13 CN, #12 AU Sales (in millions): 3.0 US, 0.1 UK, 4.5 world (includes US and UK) Genre: pop

Tracks: (Click for codes to singles charts.) Ready for It? (9/3/17, 4 US, 26 AC, 10 A40, 7 UK, 7 CN, 3 AU, worldwide sales: 2.5 million) End Game (with Ed Sheeran & Future, 11/14/17, 18 US, 14 A40, 49 UK, 11 CN, 36 AU) I Did Something Bad Don’t Blame Me Delicate (3/12/18, 12 US, 110 AC, 14 A40, 45 UK, 20 CN, 28 AU, worldwide sales: 1.44 million) Look What You Made Me Do (8/24/17, 13 US, 19 AC, 7 A40, 12 UK, 13 CN, 12 AU, worldwide sales: 5.6 million) So It Goes Gorgeous (11/11/17, 13 US, 15 UK, 9 CN, 9 AU, worldwide sales: 0.77 million) Getaway Car King of My Heart Dancing with Our Hands Tied Dress This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things Call It What You Want (11/25/17, 27 US) New Year’s Day (11/27/17, 33 CW)

Review: For her sixth album, Taylor Swift turned to producers Jack Antonoff, Max Martin, and Shellback – all of whom she’d worked with on 1989 album. While that album completed Swift’s transition to pop stardom, this album is arguably her “first self-consciously ‘adult’ record,” AMG “preoccupied with sex, betrayal, and the scars they leave behind.” AMG Previous albums focused on “the singer/songwriter who grew up in public” AMG as “ a babe in the woods” AMG while this one deals with themes such as “handling fame and media coverage of celebrities.” WK Sonically, Reputation has been described as “brash, weaponized pop” (Neil McCormick, The Daily Telegraph) WK and “another shift, this time into electronic pop” (Greg Kot, Chicago Tribune). WK Rolling Stone’s Rob Sheffield said this album “builds on the synth-pop of 1989.” WK Reputation “achieves a steely, nocturnal sound,” AMG “dwelling on drum loops and synthesizers.” AMG This sound is established from the opening song, Ready for It?, which has been described as and “electronic-inspired…industrial pop song with elements of tropical house, dubstep, and trap music.” WK Swift said the song is “about finding your own partner in crime” WK and that it “introduces a metaphor you may hear more of throughout…this kind of Crime and Punishment metaphor.” WK Look What You Made Me Do, the lead single, treads similar electro-pop territory, interpolating “I’m Too Sexy” by the British dance-pop group Right Said Fred. The song started as a poem “about realizing that you couldn’t trust certain people, but realizing you appreciate the people you can trust.” WK The song hit #1 in at least 15 countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom and amassed more than a billion views on YouTube. Delicate, another single, was about “what happens when you meet somebody that you really want in your life and then you start worrying about what they’ve heard before they met you.” WK Swift wanted to use the vocoder on the song to create “an emotional and vulnerable sound for the track.” WK Nearly “every song on Reputation has a cool, gleaming patina that’s designed to put an alluring distance between Swift and the listener.” AMG The exception is “the delicate closer New Year’s Day,” AMG a song which “explores the flip side of the romanticism of a New Year’s Eve kiss.” WK It is about the person who “sticks around the next day to give you Adil and clean up the house.” WK There is some “awkwardness that’s distracting upon first listen but less so on revisits” AMG and “what’s left is a coming of age album anchored by some strong Swift songs” AMG which “carry Swift’s trademark blend of vulnerability, melody, and confidence.” AMG “They are deeply felt and complex, signs that all of the heavy-handed persona plays of reputation were a necessary exercise for her to mature as a singer/songwriter.” AMG Review Source(s): Taylor Swift’s DMDB Encyclopedia entry AMG All Music Guide review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine WK Wikipedia

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U2’s War released

War U2

Released: February 28, 1983 Peak: 12 US, 11 UK, 4 CN, 9 AU Sales (in millions): 4.0 US, 0.6 UK, 11.7 world (includes US and UK) Genre: college rock

Tracks: Song Title [time] (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts. Sunday Bloody Sunday [4:38] (3/21/83, 7 AR) Seconds [3:24] New Year’s Day [5:38] (1/22/83, 53 US, 2 AR, 10 UK, 41 CN, 36 AU) Like a Song… [4:48] Drowning Man [4:12] The Refugee [3:40] Two Hearts Beat As One [5:00] (4/2/83, 12 AR, 18 UK, 53 AU) Red Light [4:09] Surrender [6:01] (7/16/83, 27 AR) 40 [2:08] All songs written by U2. Total Running Time: 42:03 The Players: Bono (vocals, guitar) The Edge (guitar, backing vocals, piano, bass) Adam Clayton (bass) Larry Mullen, Jr. (drums, percussion)

Rating: 4.207 out of 5.00 (average of 18 ratings) Quotable: “U2 always aimed at greatness, but War was the first time they achieved it” – Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album: “The final album of U2’s early period, before the group broadened its sonic palette and lyrical vision, War is a brilliantly conflicted album, sounding martial and majestic while its very purpose is to tear down false idols propped up by politics.” DD “Blowing away the fuzzy, sonic indulgences of October with propulsive, martial rhythms and shards of guitar, War bristles with anger, despair, and above all, passion. Previously, Bono’s attempts at messages came across as grandstanding, but his vision becomes remarkably clear on this record.” STE “Opening with the ominous, fiery protest of Sunday Bloody Sunday, War immediately announces itself as U2’s most focused and hardest-rocking album to date.” STE That song and "40" take the subject of Ireland’s troubles head-on.” DD “New Year's Day “is about a sundered love relationship symbolic of a greater division. ‘Torn in two, we can be one,’ Bono pleads, as Edge’s guitar scratches and snarls behind him.” DD Anthems such as those and “Seconds are balanced by effective, surprisingly emotional love songs [such as] Two Hearts Beat as One” STE “and the delicate Drowning Man,” DD “which are just as desperate and pleading as [Bono’s] protests.” STE Amazon.com’s Daniel Durchholz claims these “take a back seat here, but they help make War a compelling and well-rounded album.” DD Bono “performs the difficult task of making the universal sound personal, and the band helps him out by bringing the songs crashing home with muscular, forceful performances that reveal their varied, expressive textures upon repeated listens. U2 always aimed at greatness, but War was the first time they achieved it.” STE Notes: A Deluxe Edition released in 2008 added a second disc of “b-sides, live tracks and rarities. Also includes a 32 page booklet with previously unseen photos, full lyrics, new liner notes by Niall Stokes, and explanatory notes on the bonus material by The Edge.” AZ Tracks on second disc include “Endless Deep,” “Treasure (Whatever Happened to Pete the Chop),” “Angels Too Tied to the Ground,” four remixes of “New Year’s Day,” another three of “Two Hearts Beat As One,” and live versions of “I Threw a Brick Through a Window/ A Day Without Me” and “Fire.”

Resources and Related Links: DMDB Encyclopedia entry for U2 AZ Amazon.com (Deluxe Edition) DD Daniel Durchholz, Amazon.com (original release) STE Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide Other Related DMDB Pages: First posted 3/23/2008; last updated 8/13/2021.

U2 “New Year’s Day” released

New Year’s Day U2

Writer(s): U2 (see lyrics here) Released: January 1, 1983 First Charted: January 22, 1983 Peak: 53 US, 50 CB, 2 AR, 1 CO, 10 UK, 41 CN, 36 AU, 2 DF (Click for codes to singles charts.) Sales (in millions): -- Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 56.21 video, -- streaming

Awards: Click on award for more details.

About the Song: U2 formed in Dublin, Ireland, in 1976. They built a loyal following at college rock radio with their first two albums, 1980’s Boy and 1981’s October. Their third release, War proved to be a breakthrough, reaching #12 in the United States and eventually selling more than 11 million copies worldwide. The album’s lead single, “New Year’s Day,” became a favorte at MTV. It was filmed in the dead of the Swedish winter. As such, the band only appears in the performance scenes of the video. They were too cold WK and weren’t experienced enough riders SF to do the horseback riding scenes so four Swedish teenage girls were disguised as the band with masks over their faces. There is also footage of Soviet troops advancing in winter during World War II. WK The song soared all the way to #2 on the Billboard album rock track. It was also the group’s first top-10 hit in the UK and first entry on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States. Cash Box called it an “AOR-slanted single by a thinking man’s rock ‘n’ roll band.” WK The band’s lead singer, Bono, said, “I don’t think ‘New Year’s Day’ was a pop single, certainly not in the way that [record producer] Mickie Most might define a pop single as something that lasts three minutes and three weeks in the chart. I don’t think we could have writte that kind of song.” WK Lyrically, the song started as a love song by Bono for his wife, but it evolved into a commentary on the Polish Solidarity movement. WK Poland announced they would abolish martial law after this song was recorded; coincidentally the announcement came on New Year’s Day, 1983. SF The song’s distinct bassline was the result of Adam Clayton trying to figure out the chords for the song “Fade to Grey” by Visage. WK Resources: DMDB encyclopedia entry for U2 SF Songfacts WK Wikipedia Related Links: First posted 10/1/2022.