[Neil Jones]

Somebody took the time to subtitle the Mr Blobby video?
Well perils of having a 100% subtitle requirement I suppose on your output.

(still can't believe that Mr Blobby became Christmas No 1 in 1993, what the hell was in the water at the time?)

[Kojak]

A stream doesn't count the same as one bought for download or physical single. It's 100 streams to 1 sale for the least amount of effort. It's not ideal but it's a far more accurate system to what's popular than a purely sales chart.

It's not even that because they have different stream to sale ratios for things like older records, "songs in decline" and a limit on how many songs an artist can have in the charts at once (after Ed Sheeran kept taking the entire top 10 every time he released an album), so it really isn't representative of anything any more.

---

BBC4's TOTP subtitles are now extremely informative and helpful

I think if they were hypothetically to bring back a version of TOTP, it might be better to base it around the album charts, which is what the French version did when that was a thing circa 2003.

[tellyblues]

A stream doesn't count the same as one bought for download or physical single. It's 100 streams to 1 sale for the least amount of effort. It's not ideal but it's a far more accurate system to what's popular than a purely sales chart.

It's not even that because they have different stream to sale ratios for things like older records, "songs in decline" and a limit on how many songs an artist can have in the charts at once (after Ed Sheeran kept taking the entire top 10 every time he released an album), so it really isn't representative of anything any more.

There has to be certain rules in place otherwise the industry would be at a standstill, for example, record companies not knowing when to push new artists because they don't know if/when they are going to chart. They could ask the OCC to exclude other artists on their books to allow the newer artists to chart but that would be unfair to established artists. Or they could do what happened in the old days and make records go out of print by taking down songs online. Either option is overkill and would lead to accusations of the charts being rigged. Not that they aren't manipulated to some extent with playlists but no-one is being forced to do anything and the current system is the fairest solution for all whilst making the charts appear credible and relevant.

I think if they were hypothetically to bring back a version of TOTP, it might be better to base it around the album charts, which is what the French version did when that was a thing circa 2003.

The album charts aren't much better because single tracks if streamed enough count towards sales of an album. Have a show which namechecks Elton John and Abba every week and people will start to question things. On the other hand, a show without a chart element won't work because people having a good time isn't a strong enough format.

[James2001]

Looking at the Mr Blobby video, during the Shakespear's Sister spoof bit, you can see bits of another picture around the extreme edges of the frame, like what you get on TOTP itself when there's about to be a picture transition of some kind (it's on all 4 showings of the video, so it's clearly part of the video itself, not something going on in the TOTP gallery). There isn't a picture transition following it though, so presumably it's some artifact from the editing process that they wouldn't have expected to be noticed at the time because of overscan.

There are a few music videos out there as well where the faux-letterbox bars don't entirely cover up the picture at the extreme edges- again something that wouldn't have been noticed due to overscan. Something that gets lost now with music videos rarely being seen in their correct aspect ratio- I'd personally prefer them being left alone even if it does leave black bars around the entirety of the screen.

[DE88]

Top Of The Pops: Review Of The Year 2022 confirmed to be on Christmas Eve at 10:40pm on BBC Two
www.bbc.co.uk 

TV Cream's billing is brilliant as always:

Well, who'd have thought the two longest continually running fixtures on Christmas Day would end the same year? Because, as our fun fact always had it, as The Queen took a year off in 1969, Pops had actually been on the big day for longer, not missing a Christmas Day engagement since 1967... until now! To be honest, it had been drifting back towards the morning for a few years, and if they wanted to axe it they could have done it years ago, but this is a real jolt, now in the old Val Doonican slot on Christmas Eve and on a different channel to boot. Looks like as well the model for this one is Noel [Edmonds] in the office in 1978, Clara Amfo and Jack Saunders spending much of the show linking pre-recorded performances with just a couple of acts popping in for some small-scale acoustic sets. So all change, but doubtless it'll reflect the year's pop in no-nonsense fashion, and if you're that devastated you can always watch it on iPlayer before your dinner tomorrow.

Anyone know where it's coming from this year? Riverside (as last year and the year before), or somewhere smaller?

Jack will be TOTP's 243rd presenter - the Popscene forum has Noel Fielding, Claudia Winkleman and David Tennant, all of whom popped up alongside Fearne Cotton and Reggie Yates for the 2009 Comic Relief special, as numbers 238, 239 and 240 respectively (Wossy popped up too, but he'd done it before and so is number 208), and after that there were no new presenters until Clara replaced Reggie in 2017, followed by Jordan North replacing Fearne last year.

[James2001]

It's just sausage roll ladbaby at number one again anyway, it's sucked any remaining joy there was in the Christmas charts.

[Andrew]

It's just sausage roll ladbaby at number one again anyway, it's sucked any remaining joy there was in the Christmas charts.

To think people used to complain when it was The X Factor every year

At least it was different artists with proper songs

[James2001]

You mean just taking existing songs and changing the words to be about sausage rolls 5 years in a row isn't a "proper song"

I'd rather have Mr Blobby and Bob The Builder back.

[Jon]

Of course you’re not obliged to buy or listen to that music, other music is still available. The chart is merely reflecting the sales/streams etc if that’s what’s popular then I can’t see how you can be bothered by it.

[bilky asko]

Of course you’re not obliged to buy or listen to that music, other music is still available. The chart is merely reflecting the sales/streams etc if that’s what’s popular then I can’t see how you can be bothered by it.

It's not really a topic for here, but there are plenty of reasons to object to what they have done, or the largely unquestioning, sycophantic media coverage. One of the charting songs is as a response to them getting a number one directly.