Spinal-Tap Archives - Medialoper

Album: Heavy Metal Memories
Year: 1982

. . .

1970 was truly a historic year for British Heavy Metal. Not only was it the year Black Sabbath and Uriah Heep released their first albums, it was also the year that a pair of British bands stopped fucking around and started kicking out the jams. The first of those bands was Deep Purple, who had made their name with with heavyish covers of Joe South & Neil Diamond songs, as well as long arty suites, and had even released a collab with the London Symphony Orchestra before solidifying with a new bassist and Jesus from Jesus Christ Superstar to release the immortal Deep Purple In Rock. The other was Spinal Tap, who, to put it frankly, were a bit of a mess.

Once upon a time, the TV networks gave a rats ass about Saturday nights. It almost seems apocryphal, but there was a fabled season long ago that had this Saturday night lineup: All in the Family, M*A*S*H, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Bob Newhart Show and The Carol Burnett Show. Three solid hours of comedy all-timers.

Slow-forward about 35 years, and what do we have on Saturday nights? As Al Swearengen might say, a huge bag of shit. Sports. Reality. Magazines. Not a single scripted comedy or drama. Saturday night has become a major TV casualty of the overabundance of entertainment choices, and the networks aren’t even bothering to address it.

But isn’t there *anything* they could do? Maybe. But it would involve taking a gamble on some programming concepts that they’ve been slow to embrace, and actually taking advantage of what I will dub “The Spinal Tap Paradox.”

Spinal-Tap

Certain Songs #2413: Spinal Tap – “Big Bottom”

Some Saturday Suggestions