Thursday 11 December 2008

Of strikes and talent

Let's press on to 1983. By this time I had moved to Newcastle to study at university, and the Miner's Strike was in full swing. Given the North East of England was a hotbed of the National Union of Mineworkers, and the determination of Thatcher to break Arthur Scargill no matter the cost, I had the chance to see first hand the problems people had.

Why is this relevant to the Christmas number one, you say? Well, a group of actors got together to form a group that would hold concerts to support the miners, and they called themselves the Flying Pickets. To everyone's surprise, they got to number one for Christmas with this acappella cover of a hit for Yazoo - Only You.



Meanwhile, in the USA, a young man by the name of Michael Jackson was hitting the big time as a solo artist - only, when he was number one in December, it was a duet with an aging Liverpudlian.

1 comment:

Jinxo56 said...

Is that the one they did where Paul gave Michael the advice to invest in music publishing, then Michael bought the Beatles songs?