Countdown Again

I had a look at the Countdown’s 50th Birthday special and it was kind of awkward and blah. No Molly, which didn’t help of course. Couldn’t be helped as it would appear he is now withdrawing from public life with severe health issues. For better or worse there would have been no Countdown without Ian Molly Meldrum and Australian music would have been very, very different. Allegedly.

With the benefit of a generous dollop of time I can’t help but think that in some ways the legacy of Countdown has been overstated. We do tend to over sentimentalise our little Aussie battlers. I think the thriving live music pub circuit that girdled Australia’s coast was just as important in the rise of many an Australian band in the late 70s and 80s. (I’d love to see a doco on that topic.) Bear in mind there already was plenty of commercial radio stations playing pop music and although commercial FM stations were still 6 years away in 1974, public FM radio was beginning at the same time as Countdown.

In terms of breaking bands, well for every hit there were also lots of Countdown misses and if you swing at everything eventually you will connect. Plenty of one hit that arguably should have been no hit wonders, Joe Dolce anyone. Yes, Countdown broke bands but a lot of artists that were regulars like Elton John and Rod Stewart were already well established. Madonna, The Police, Culture Club and U2 were always going to be huge. It was the Australian artists that did get a leg up, especially the pop and funk acts whose music and performance styles would not go over so well at the Bondi Lifesaver, the Playroom or the Crystal Ballroom.

Where Countdown was invaluable, as Myf Warhurst said during the show, was that Countdown brought all that action to every kid anywhere in Australia. So those who were in rural and remote locations and/or for that matter not able not old enough to get past the bouncers at any number of live music venues felt part of and knew what was going on.

For the record, it was not that hard to get past the bouncers back then. Near enough was often close enough age wise and I saw Flowers, Midnight Oil and The Swingers at Zillmere’s Homestead Hotel before I was 18.

The show itself seemed, well you could say a bit humdrum. Maybe too much time has passed or maybe we have all been hearing this story for too long but it just felt half hearted. Having Myf and the new ABC all around star Tony Armstrong host the show was ok but often he looked like a foreigner at another country’s national sport, cheering when he was told to or like a man performing on Dancing With The Stars because his manager told him it would be good for the career, not because he loves to boogie. Plus it is hard to feel nostalgia for something when you weren’t there in the first place. Myf did a better job, after all she is a seasoned pro, the whole thing had real meaning to her and she is passionate and knowledgeable about music.

 I know too that that an hour is a very limited amount of time to wrap up the whole Countdown phenomenon but to my mind the most interesting parts were the interviews with the people who pulled the show together week by week. I didn’t really need to see contemporary performers covering overseas artist’s songs from the 70s and 80s. Not sure what the point was when even with the unforgivable erasure of early episodes there is a good amount of archive material at the ABC to show. It’s not like they haven’t been.

Still Iggy Pop’s classic, off his face appearance and the calculated antics of ACDC can stand many repeat viewings. The sheer Aussie rough and readiness of the whole show was and still is part of the charm. But gee there were a lot of Aussie artists still going around who I thought might be there that were strangely absent. Great to see Kate, Marcia and Dazza and Joe Camilleri (best on ground for me) etc but where were James Reyne, Richard Clapton, Deborah Conway? Christ even Mark Holden, JPY or some Cockroaches. Also I had forgotten how many artists from the Countdown era are sadly no longer with us, talents like Renee Geyer, Micheal Hutchence, Shirley, Dragon lead singer Marc Hunter and of course the other big man of Australian music Mushroom Records boss Michael Gudinski.

And yet Molly the ringmaster, now much diminished is still here and his creation Countdown the same. I think it might be best to leave them both in peace now.

My six horrible Countdown moments

Joe Dolce- Shaddup Your Face

Christie Allen – Goosebumps

Supernaut – I Like It Both Ways

Andy Gibb – I Just Want To Be Your Everything

Bette Midler- Knight In Black Leather

Mark Holden – I Wanna To Make You My Lady

And my biggest guilty Countdown pleasure

January - Pilot

Photo by Desi Mendoza on Unsplash