TV Pop Diaries
Pop Music on British Television 1955 - 1999

Ex-Southern Television production legend Mike Mansfield was brought in by London Weekend to help flesh out Saturday Scene with some much needed live musical appearances. A one-off pilot was shown in March 1975 and was considered successful enough to commission for a whole series which started in September 1975. Although it was intended as a weekend show, the first series debut was played on Anglia the Wednesday before.

Supersonic appeared at an odd-time for British pop, bridging the tail-end of the more poppy faction of Glam Rock and the punk era.

Andy Bown was brought in to record the theme (also released as a single, he even made an appearance on the show to promote it). The show featured the first flops from the likes of Roy Wood, Gilbert O'Sullivan, Alvin Stardust, Slade etc. Speaking to TV Times late 1976 Mansfield claimed boredom was his motivation for the show. "I was sick of watching groups who seemed to be rooted in concrete. Any director could shoot that standing on their eyelashes. I wanted to contribute something visually. I was sure the audience was tired of staring at guitars too, they wanted to see people. But of course they have to be the right people."

The visual style was similar to the Granada produced tea-time weekday pop shows with screaming girls kept at a safe distance from the stars, but what made the show different was the visual effects. Top of the Pops could only offer dry ice and only on special occasions, but Supersonic gave us confetti cannons which would get stuck in the throat of singers, massive fans blowing G forces sideways across the stage and very tall podiums and pedestals where the singer dare not move from fear of falling. On one occasion Gary Glitter was put into a harness and flown over screaming fans for which he was insured for a million pounds.

Each act was introduced from the control room by Mansfield himself, while any passing celebrity walking through the London Weekend corridors would be roped in to help. Mansfield created his own catch phrase as every time an act was about to perform he would demand his assistant "cue the music" or "cue Roy Wood" etc. Mansfield chose all the artists who appeared and gave them reign to do something more experimental, for example allowing David Essex to perform the seven minute title song to his concept album All The Fun Of The Fair, instead of just plugging the new single.

There was briefly a tie-in magazine which in 1975 gave away a flexi disc of Mansfield talking to the Bay City Rollers. In 1976 a small corner of the studio was set aside to shoot a video for Elton John and Kiki Dee's Don't Go Breaking My Heart, also directed by Mansfield.

The show must have somehow made its mark as Benny Hill added the show to his roster of pop show spoofs along with Ready Steady Go, the Old Grey Whistle Test and Top Of The Pops.

After moving the show to tea-time it gave the first prime time exposure to punk since the Sex Pistols’ Bill Grundy outburst when the Damned appeared in February 1977 performing Neat Neat Neat.

Despite Mansfield's Busby Berkeley aspirations there was a perception that the kind of pop music that the show presented was on its way out (particularly with the advent of disco), and the show was cancelled in Spring 1977. However, clips would be sold for US syndication in the show Twiggy's Jukebox in 1978, while the show returned for a one-off on Channel 4 in 1983.

SUPERSONIC

London Weekend

1st March 1975 - 2nd April 1977