This Year’s Blonde – Platinum Pop – Top Of The Pops
First broadcast: Thu 15th Oct 1981, 19:20 on BBC One
This broadcast: Fri 20th May 2016, 19:30 on BBC Four
From Wikipedia:
This Year’s Blonde (band)
This Year’s Blonde was a musical project created by Nigel Wright in 1981.
In 1981, with a craze for medley recordings making the British singles chart, record producer Nigel Wright made a medley single under the name Enigma, with musicians including those associated with Wright’s band Shakatak, plus vocalist Tracy Ackerman and drummer Robin Sellars (Ackerman’s boyfriend), who were both called into the session at the last minute.
Enigma was booked to perform on the television show Top of the Pops, but was forced to postpone; undaunted, Wright, Sellars, and Ackerman retreated to a studio in London, and recorded a medley of Blondie songs, inspired by Ackerman’s blonde hair. The resulting single, “Platinum Pop”, was released under the name This Year’s Blonde; unlike the co-vocalists for Enigma, Ackerman handled all vocals and the record sleeve only included her picture.
The single entered the UK Singles Chart for the week ending 10th October 1981, and, as if to make up for Enigma missing out on a scheduled appearance, This Year’s Blonde, unusually, performed on the show in consecutive weeks; as the playout on the 15th October show and to open the show on the 22nd, meaning the song was actually played consecutively in the show’s run. However, despite this extra publicity, the song could climb no higher than No. 46.
