Mark Thomas TV - Cunk on Britain TV - Noam Chomsky - The British at Work TV - Richard Bilton TV - Bonded By Blood 2010 - Susan George - The 80s: The Decade That Made Us TV - Michael Meacher - It Was Alright in the 1980s TV - The 80s: The Best of Bad TV TV - Back in Time For the Weekend TV - Mark Steel - Jazzy B’s 1980s: From Dole to Soul TV - Promises & Lies: The Story of UB40 TV - TwentyFourSeven 1997 - The Home that 2 Built TV - Made in the 80s: Decade that Shaped Our World TV -
In 1985 we thought Simply Red was all right. We didn’t know, we didn’t know about Mick Hucknall then. Mark Thomas Comedy Product s6e4, Channel 4 2002
It was decided to start the 1980s a year early … As well as a uterus, Mrs Thatcher had a vision. Cunk on Britain s1e5, BBC 2018
The ideological war: now, if you can’t control the population by force and you can’t even control it by propaganda the state faces a dilemma and there’s only one thing they can do in that case and that is to go underground, and that’s just what happened during the 1980s: Operation Truth went very well. Noam Chomsky, ‘Speaks Out! Oh Shut Up Ronnie!’ Youtube 58.22 1989
Risk-taking was what it was all about in the 1980s. The British at Work: To Have and Have Not 1980-1995, BBC 2011
The experience of work for millions during the 1980s was being out of work. ibid.
Mrs Thatcher’s administration simply didn’t think it was the job of the state to keep us all in work ... This new Tory administration made it clear it was time to sink or swim. ibid.
With their work hard play hard ethos, and their Bollinger and bonuses, City boys and girls are rather easy to resent and ridicule. But they aren’t just some 80s anachronism. They really were at the forefront of a revolution in the workplace – they encouraged so many of us to be ceaseless workaholics who were dedicated to and defined by our work. ibid.
In the 80s the gap between rich and poor widened by about 60%. Richard Bilton, Who Gets the Best Jobs? BBC 2011
Why am I so fucking angry? ’Cause I cant get that loving feeling no more. ’Cause the greedy bastard dealers won't give me the pills to get the job done. Times change. Music changes. Drugs change. Summer of 88: you ain’t never gonna get that again, mate. Bonded by Blood 2010 starring Tamer Hassan & Robert Fucilla & Vincent Regan & Terry Stone & Adam Deacon & Neil Maskell & Dave Legano & Johnny Palmiero & Duncan Meadows et al, director Sacha Bennett, Craig in car
The banks have made a killing in the decade of the 80s. They’ve been crying the whole time but not only the banks but the public institutions have received a total of over $1.3 trillion ... And the reward the debtor countries have received for paying their creditors $1.3 trillion in the last ten years is to be 60% more in debt than they were in 1982. So if there is no change, this can go on for ever. Dr Susan George, author The Debt Boomerang
What made the ’80s the ’80s? New beginnings, new ambitions, new coke, new money, new freedoms. The 80s: the decade that made us. The 80s: The Decade That Made Us, National Geographic 2013
Cost of a VCR in 1981 – equivalent to US $3,500 today. ibid.
Cable TV was in its infancy. ibid.
Throughout the 1980s billions of pounds of arms were being exported from this country to both Iran and Iraq by British companies with full knowledge of the British government in defiance of the government’s guidelines and in defiance of course of the UN. That is a far more significant issue. And if Scott was serious about it, he ought to interview the key businessmen who knew about the deals. Michael Meacher MP
1980s Britain was a crazy place to grow up in ... More TV than ever before. It Was Alright in the 1980s, Channel 4 2014
Mr TSW ... Good Morning Britain 1984: Faith Brown & Rustie Lee ... Blue Peter presenter wearing corsets ... You & Me 1985 & death of Squiggle the guinea pig ... The Little & Large Show (Indian racist scene) ... The Two Ronnies (Indian racist scene) ... OTT 1982 (alternative comedy v Bernard Manning) ... Ludovic Kennedy’s racist outburst about television for minorities ... Bachanal 1984 ... Horizon: Are You Racist? ... Crackerjack 1984 & Visage ... Network TV (Yoof TV) … ibid.
A celebration of those moment when events on the small screen went wrong in the most spectacular way possible. The 80s: The Best of Bad TV, Channel 5 2015
Miss Yorkshire Television 1980 ... Legs & Co replaced Pam’s People ... Grace Jones & Russell Harty ... 1981 Triangle was very slow ... 1982: Channel 4 e.g. Sin on Saturday [one deadly sin each week – pulled after three sins] ... Mini-Pops [sexualised children sin cover versions] ... 1984: a new breed of TV comedians ... Bottle Boys [sexist and racist milkmen] ... ‘Rusty Lee would laugh at almost anything’ ... 1985 Des O’Connor Tonight ... 1986 Pebble Mill at One ... 1986 Champs-Elysees [Whitney propositioned on live French TV] ... Michael Fish’s weather forecast ... 1987 Hardwicke House [violent pupils and paedo head – pulled after two episodes] ... 1988 Delia’s cookery course cf. Keith Floyd ... 1988 The Hitman and Her [early pop-house dance show] ... 1989 The Brits Sam Fox and Mick Fleetwood ... UP2U Anthea Turner ... One Hour With Jonathan Ross ... The Late Show [Keith Allen wobbly] ... Channel 4: Club X [Yoof TV] … ibid.
Home decorating becomes a national obsession. Back in Time for the Weekend IV, BBC 2016
‘It’s the tackiest taste I’ve ever seen.’ ibid. mother
I’ve heard of a VCR but I didn’t actually know what it was. They are really complicated. ibid. daughter
Even in the post-miners’ strike eighties, there were sparks of mass defiance. There was a series of enormous demonstrations against apartheid, and every party lit up when the Specials’ Free Nelson Mandela came on. Public Enemy left a trail of fury wherever they went. The Redskins accomplished the extraordinary feat of getting into the top forty with a dance song about Russia being state capitalism. But every workplace and every pub had someone who’d bought Telecom shares and their council flat, and talked loudly about how well Thatcher had tamed the unions. It also had people who despised Thatcher but were generally reticent about speaking out. Mark Steel, Reasons to be Cheerful
So that’s me and Soul II Soul: June 1989: number one around the world. The 1980s were a wild time. A decade of confrontation, innovation and revolution. And with political upheaval came political transformation. Jazzie B’s 1980s: From Dole to Soul, BBC 2016
We pioneered another scene: our scene … We were partying illegally in amazing spaces. ibid.
Reggae sound systems came here from Jamaica. ibid.
The DJ is the one who controls the pre-amp and puts the records on, and they you have your MC. ibid.
One of the most commercially successful bands of all time. Over 70 million records sold. 30 years of sold-out world tours. Still performing after four decades as two separate bands. Promises & Lies: The Story of UB40, BBC 2016
With their own record label the band release their second album Present Arms and the single One in Ten. ibid.
In the ’80s everything was a boom, a transaction. Or a big takeover. Money was God. Money is God. TwentyFourSeven 1997 starring Bob Hoskins & Danny Nussbaum & Justin Brady & James Hooton & Darren O Campbell & Karl Collins & Johann Myers & Jimmy Hynd & Mat Hand & James Corden & Frank Harper et al, director Shane Meadows
‘Gardening was suddenly regarded as sexy.’ The Home that 2 Built s1e3: Eighties, Alan Titchmarsh of fellow gardener Charlie, BBC 2014
The decade of loads-a-money: thanks to fast cash and even faster technology British home life changed quicker than ever before in the 80s. More people would own their homes, more money would be spent on them, and more time spent in them. ibid.
A third were renting from the council, almost one in three didn’t have central heating, over a million homes were declared unfit for human habitation. ibid.
Barbara Woodhouse was a dog-training dominatrix: Training Dogs the Woodhouse Way. ibid.
Margaret Thatcher’s … right-to-buy scheme gave Britain’s five million tenants a discount dead to buy their houses. ibid.
Arthur Negus Enjoys … Gardener’s World: still going strong today … ibid.
1982 Madhur Jaffrey … Ken Hom’s Chinese Cookery … Food & Drink … Keith Floyd: a complete departure from cookery programmes of the past … Floyd on France … ibid.
Richard Stillgoe [sic.]: Looking Good, Feeling Fit … Eamonn Holmes: Bazaar. ibid.
By the middle of the decade three million homes had a home computer. BBC2 crashed into the craze with the series Micro Live … ibid.
Another device that plugged into TVs: video cassette recorder: viz. Tomorrow’s World … By 1985 more households had VCRs than cars. ibid.