First viewed : Summer 1988
This is another mini-milestone as the first programme that I mainly saw on tape.
In the summer of 1988 , I got into the habit of getting a curry on the way home from the pub and then watching ITV into the early hours when this one was broadcast. You watched it in sheer disbelief that in a country the size of America they couldn't find someone a little more hip to present it.
Casey Kasem was the son of Lebanese immigrants who made his name on radio where he presented America's Top 40 from 1970 onwards. He also had a middling career as an actor where his most famous role was the voice of Shaggy on Scooby Doo. America's Top 10 was a spin-off from the radio show and Kasem called the shots. By the time ITV started showing it he was a middle-aged square in a cosy cardigan with Hughie Green swinging arm gestures and a corny showbiz catchphrase "Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars". It seemed like a joke but he was deadly serious.
Staying up late soon lost its attraction but when we got a VCR some 18 months later I'd often end up recording the programme, usually in tandem with something else, and then fast forward to the songs I liked. The show ran on until 1992 just catching the beginning of grunge with Casey announcing Smells Like Teen Spirit as " Nirvana with that song where you can't make out the lyrics",
Casey himself cancelled the show in order to launch a new format. He died of dementia in 2014.
Guess you have to remember this is a country that still had Dick Clark presenting "American Bandstand" well past his half century mark, so presumably Casey wasn't seen as much of an oddity.
ReplyDelete