It's impossible to escape Dr Who in my house. My daughter is the Doctor's number one fan. She has got over the trauma of David Tennant's demise and is now madly in love with Matt Smith (she IS only 12 so discernment will hopefully come later!) She will replay episodes she's seen dozens of times before at any and every opportunity. Which probably explains why the Dr Who theme is the tune I end up with as an ear-worm more often than any other. As an aside, the other ear-worm I seem to suffer from most frequently is the Push-Bike Song, which is disturbing because it's one of the most atrocious records ever made.
Thankfully I like the Dr Who theme. It reminds me of my childhood; a time when Saturday evening TV really seemed worth watching without the danger of your intelligence being insulted by some pseudo-celebrity bollocks like X-Factor, Strictly or whatever the current cack is that they choose to inflict on us up today. Perhaps that's just me viewing retro-TV with rose tinted glasses, but there must be something in it when I'd rather watch re-runs of the Generation Game with unfunny racist knobhead Jim Davidson than the shite served up today.
Thankfully I like the Dr Who theme. It reminds me of my childhood; a time when Saturday evening TV really seemed worth watching without the danger of your intelligence being insulted by some pseudo-celebrity bollocks like X-Factor, Strictly or whatever the current cack is that they choose to inflict on us up today. Perhaps that's just me viewing retro-TV with rose tinted glasses, but there must be something in it when I'd rather watch re-runs of the Generation Game with unfunny racist knobhead Jim Davidson than the shite served up today.
I had the original version by Ron Grainger & Delia Derbyshire on a BBC EP years ago but sadly have no idea what happened to it; just one of the many records I now bitterly regret having lost, given away or sold over the years. Perhaps it's in the box of records in my sister's loft which she won't let me look at for some reason. Don't tell her, but next time she leaves me the keys to feed the cats while she's away I'm off up there with a stepladder.
Perhaps it's due to the sense of loss I feel at losing that old EP that I'm particularly fond of this version of the Dr Who theme by Devon's finest The Simmertones:
Whilst idly searching You Tube one night I also found this beauty, which I subsequently bought on vinyl (the B-side is pretty bloody good too):
And to complete the trio and ease the pain of long-lost vinyl further I've just spent 79p on this cracker from Smerins Anti-Social Club:
The Smerins version is getting a play on my SFR show this Saturday; I might even get carried away & play all three! If you fancy getting them for yourself here's the links: The Simmertones, Sandollar Sound & Smerins. I can especially recommend the Simmertones album; it's bloody brilliant and that's not me being biased - I'd say the same even if they were from Cornwall. I'm off to eBay now to search for BBC EP's. If anyone spots the Smerins version on vinyl please let me know. You can tell it's payday tomorrow!
As ever another excellent blog - and can't recommend the Simmertones album enough - it's now what, 2 years since it's release? And it still gets regular airings on my iPod!!
ReplyDeleteHaving two Dr Who mad daughters (and a similarly infatuated other half) I can sympathise with the constant bombardment of it too - that said it's not quite reached those proportions in our house and the 8 year old daughter does refer to the excellent Simmertones version as "Madness Dr Who" which is meant as a compliment (I think!!).
Thanks Graham. It could, of course, be so much worse. My daughter's previous obsession was High School Musical. That was positively painful!
ReplyDeleteAh...managed to escape the HSM thing on the basis that it's height coincided with a nice age gap difference between my daughters where the eldest was "too old" for that kind of thing, and the youngest was mercifully too young....that said the youngest has recently found a liking for One Direction and *gasp and wash her mouth out with soap* Bieber....so perhaps you got off lightly!!! :)
ReplyDeleteI escaped the Bieber-torture by the skin of my teeth. Daughter briefly decided he was great, then rapidly lost interest. Perhaps discernment isn't as lacking as I feared!
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