Golden Sunsets Redux - 60 Years of Memories - Part 13 - 1979

A book by possibly the worlds' most famous science fiction author gets the top spot - but mainly because of a very special place in the South Indian ocean...

1979:

The trivia:

• Elvita Adams, a 29-year-old woman from the Bronx, was facing severe personal hardship. She had recently lost her job and was surviving on welfare, her landlord was threatening eviction, and she was struggling to support her 10-year-old son. In a state of deep despair, she made her way to the Empire State Building and jumped from the 86th-floor observation deck. Miraculously, instead of falling to the street below, a freak gust of wind blew her sideways, causing her to land on a narrow ledge just one story down. She was rescued by security guards and taken to Bellevue Hospital, having suffered only a fractured pelvis.

• On 14th June 1979, Anna Williams, a 63-year-old widow, received a package in the mail containing some of her personal items which she thought had been taken in a break-in a few months earlier. Accompanying the valuables was a bizarre poem titled “Oh, Anna, Why Didn’t You Appear”. It was deeply unsettling - full of menace, and lamenting the fact that she had not been home on the night of 28th April. It turned out to be from the notorious "BTK" serial killer, Dennis Radar, who had broken into her home, disabled the phone lines, and waited in her bedroom wardrobe for hours - before abandoning his murder attempt. 

• NASA’s exploratory craft Voyager 1 reached Jupiter in March 1979, capturing nearly 19,000 images of the planet, its complex cloud systems, and its many moons. Among the most surprising discoveries was the detection of a faint ring system, a phenomenon previously thought to be exclusive to Saturn. In addition, when specialists noticed an unusual plume on Io, Jupiter’s largest innermost moon, it ultimately revealed the presence of hundreds of volcanoes.

The memory:

The Fountains of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke

In the 22nd century, structural engineer Vannevar Morgan dreams of building the world's first "space elevator" - a giant tower rising from Earth and tethered via a 'hyperfilament' cable to a structure in geostationary orbit 22,000 miles above the surface. Vehicles will be able to "climb" the cable to take payloads to orbit without the need for expensive rockets - greatly speeding up the colonisation of space. The only problem is, the one suitable point for the base station of the elevator is at the top of Sri Kanda - a mountain on the equatorial island of Taprobane, which is home to an ancient order of Buddhist monks. They are one of the few holy orders left on the planet, after contact with an robotic alien probe known as "Starglider" several decades ago shook the foundations of all religious faith - and they do *not* want to move.

Morgan's struggles with the engineering, political and religious obstacles to his 'Orbital Tower' are contrasted with the story of Taprobane's ancient monarch, Kalidasa. Two thousand years ago the king built his immense palace on the nearby mountain of Yakkagala. Setting himself up as a god he adorned the peak with beautiful images and constructed a vast garden full of fountains - feats that were centuries ahead of their time. The monks of Sri Kanda were vehemently opposed to Kalidasa's works, seeing them as an affront to their philosophy - and they have the same strong outrage towards Morgan and his project. Both men were / are trying to "challenge the gods".

To demonstrate that his technology works, Morgan attempts to run a thin cable from orbit down to ground level on Taprobane , but the test is disrupted by one of the monks (the Venerable Parakarma) , who hijacks a weather-control satellite to create an artificial hurricane in the area. Unfortunately although the sabotage succeeds, it also has the side effect of sweeping huge numbers of butterflies to the top of the mountain - thus fulfilling an ancient Buddhist prophecy - and the monks have no choice but to abandon their monastery. 

The novel then subsequently deals with the construction of the base tower on Sri Panda and the initial trials of the space elevator, which proceed well until an accident strands a group several hundred miles up. Despite failing health, Morgan makes a one man trip up the cable to provide emergency supplies and oxygen until they can be rescued. On the way back down he has a vision of a series of interconnected orbital stations all serviced by elevators - with Earth as the hub of a gigantic "wheel" in space. But before he can return to Earth and tell others of his ideas and guarantee his place in the history of space engineering, Morgan suffers a heart attack and dies.

Far in the future, the builders of "Starglider" arrive at Earth and admire the construction of the artificial wheel surrounding the planet. Morgan's vision has come to pass - but in a twist of fate he is not the one immortalised, but his engineering antecedent - the marvel of the space elevator is known as "Kalidasa's Tower "...

That's the cover of my copy of the book up there  - a fabulously moody shot of the entrance to Kalidasa's palace by Chris Moore. From the first page I was fascinated by it's contents. Not only because of the all too real idea of the space elevator (as with much of Clarke's work, the science is often based on plausible and achievable concepts), but also because of the parallel tale of the ancient king of Taprobane.  The novel is part scientific journal, part adventure story and part historical fiction. However, the thing that really grabbed my attention was the author's note at the back.

You see, many of the places that Clarke describes in his book are real. Taprobane really exists - it's the historical name for his beloved Sri Lanka (albeit the island's position has been moved for story purposes). King Kalidasa? Well the name may be taken from a 5th Century Sanskrit writer, but the monarch himself ruled between 477 and 495 A.D. as Kashyapa I of Anuradhapura. His fabulous frescoed palace full of painted maidens on a mountain surrounded by gardens and fountains? Yes that's also a genuine locale - and halfway up he built a grand entrance in the shape of a lion - just like the one in the cover above. The mountain is not named "Yakkagala" though. In the island language of Sinhalese it’s called "Sigiriya" - literally "Lion Rock"...

As for the Buddhist temple on the mountain of "Sri Kanda" - you guessed it - Clarke also drew on what he knew about the holy sites of his adopted home. In central Sri Lanka lies "Sri Pada", the 'Butterfly Mountain' which has long been considered a very important religious region, mainly due to the monastery halfway up  - and most importantly the shrine near the summit which contains a large rock formation. This is held to be the footprint of Buddha (or the Hindu god Shiva or the Islamic / Christian "first man" Adam). It’s therefore also known as "Adam's Peak".

The existence of all these locations outside the fictional construct of the novel blew my mind. For several years afterwards I dreamt of travelling to Sri Lanka and climbing Adam's Peak to see the sunrise from the top and gaze upon the footprint. Of walking up the steps of Sigirya through the lion's mouth. Of stepping through history but at the same time imagining myself in the future...

But as with many dreams, it fell by the wayside as everyday life took hold. School work, exams, work, relationships, getting married, children, divorce - the time went by in a virtual blur and before I knew it twenty-odd years had passed - and dreams of visiting a teardrop-shaped island more than 5,000 miles away were a distant memory.

Then in the early years of the 21st Century, I found myself in a new relationship and engaged to be married for the second time. Talking to my bride-to be about our honeymoon plans, I asked her where on the globe she would like to go. "Well, there was always one place I wanted to visit, after reading about it in a book by Arthur C. Clarke..." she said. Fate really had dealt in my favour! Here was possibly one of the few other people in the world who shared that dream of going to Sri Lanka. It was meant to be ! 

So that's how in early September of 2004 we found ourselves flying across the oceans for eleven hours and then on a ten day tour around the most fascinating parts of the island in a minibus. There were two other couples and a single guy on his own with us, plus the tour guide Dharmin, the driver and a young man acting as general "Passepartout". 

Starting and ending in the capital Colombo (no sign of dear Arthur C. sadly), we travelled over 1,000 kilometres (620+ miles) through some of the most beautiful scenery known to man. Along the way we fed baby elephants at a special orphanage in Pinnawala, gazed in awe at 2,700 year old paintings in the Golden Temple caves of Dhambulla, experienced fire walking and the temple of the sacred tooth of Buddha in Kandy, drank tea in the mountainous plantations of Nuwara Eliya, and came face to face with a leopard in the Yala National park - I could write a whole series of posts about the tour and the numerous wonderful parts of a very special holiday.

But of course the highlight was a visit to Sigiriya - the "Lion Rock".

As you approach the site and walk through the endless series of lush gardens with their still working fountains, the rock starts to loom larger and larger. It looks impressive, but it's not until you get much closer that you realise the sheer size of this outcrop and the manpower that would have been needed to build the Sky Palace on the summit.

Approaching the foot of the mountain, we reached the Bolder Gardens, where the steps were relatively easy to climb. Vast shapes may look like they are falling together, but were used carefully to create spaces for contemplation.

Then things started to become more difficult. The stairs through the Terraced Gardens were wide, but as we began to climb the grand zig-zag up to the next level, the going became much steeper. Hugging the side of the cliff face, we reached the Mirror Wall. Once this had been painted a glowing white, so polished that you could see your reflection. Now it was a glorious orange, the surface pitted and marked with the graffiti of travellers from millennia ago.

From here we ascended a very narrow spiral staircase to a sheltered indentation in the rock. Here are the only surviving examples of the painted frescoes that once covered the face of Sigiriya. The graffiti on the Mirror Wall suggests that there may have been over five hundred at one point. Bare breasted with golden skin and elaborate headpieces, our guide told us that they may have been members of the harem of Kashyapa and were painted to show the opulence and grandeur of the home of the god-king.

Descending back down the spiral to the Mirror Wall we continued our trek. The marble stairs at this point were very steep and it took a good 20 minutes before we reached the first half-way plateau - and the part I had been looking forward to the most. This was the start of the Lion Staircase!

At one point there *was* a colossal gatehouse here in the form of a crouching lion, which you had to pass through to gain access to the private sanctum of the king. Unlike that memorable image on the front cover of "The Fountains of Paradise", the stairs did not go through the mouth of the beast, but via a hidden set of doors in the chest, which then went back and forth inside the head before emerging at the back.

The ravages of time have not been kind to the once magnificent beast however, and all that remain are the paws and the staircase. As you can see from the picture below (and yes, that is me standing at the foot of the steps), the giant feet give you an idea of the scale of what was once there. It must truly have been magnificent. At last, years after I had read about it, there I was walking in the footsteps of the real King Kashyapa - and the fictional  King Kalidasa  upon his mountain of Yakkagala. It was a spine-tingling moment

The final climb to the ruins of the Sky Palace was via a set of vertiginous narrow metal walkways that grip onto the side of the rock face. The original steps had long since vanished, but I could see the grooves carved into the rock surface where the builders had set the foundations. We had to wait for a few tense minutes before starting, because there was a large hornets next fixed to the wall and our guide had to determine if it was safe to creep past. This was definitely not an ascent to make if you were scared of heights!

At last we reached the top and the remains of the Sky Palace were all around us. It was thankfully quite cool after the hard climb and the view across the countryside and down to the Fountains of Paradise in the garden far below was spectacular. It was a journey which I will never forget.

But what about that other important location from Arthur C. Clarke' novel - the holy mountain of "Sri Pada" or "Adam's Peak"? Well sadly as wide ranging as our tour was, it didn't go close enough for us to visit the site, let alone make the pilgrimage to the top. In reality it is over 100 miles from Sigiriya, and the closest we got was a view from the distance while on the road to Ratnapura. Apparently you have to start at 2 am to get to the temple in time for the sunrise. It was a shame that we couldn't do it, but I fully intend to go back to Sri Lanka again, so one day...

It's incredible to think that a mere two hundred-odd page science fiction story led to me visiting one of the most amazing countries in the world. Who knows where the next book I read will take me?

Honourable mentions:

• Not The Nine O'Clock News - The first comedy show that I really got into, having missed the whole thing about "Monty Python". It felt like I’d discovered something grown-up - sharp, fast, and just the right side of outrageous. I loved the satirical solo pieces, the fake news reports, the anarchic sarcasm and of course the songs and sketches. Who can forget "Gerald the Gorilla", "Constable Savage", "The Ayatollah Song ", the "TV closedown" sketch, "Nice Video Shame About The Song", the drunk darts players, "I Like Trucking", etc, etc. etc. I had all the BBC LP compilations and listened to them so much I could recite the sketches verbatim. It wasn’t just funny. It was formative. It taught me that comedy could be smart and subversive - and in Pamela Stephenson, Mel Smith, Griff Rhys Jones and especially Rowan Atkinson, I found my first comedy heroes. 

• Tornado - Another short lived companion comic to 2000 AD, most memorable for artist Dave Gibbons posing as superhero editor "Big E". It was an eclectic mix of strips - from World War II escape thrillers to pulp detectives, from swaggering secret agents to Highland wild boys with a mysterious past. When it was cancelled after a mere 22 issues, only retooled Nubian slave turned alien gladiator "Blackhawk" and teenager with psi-powers "Wolfie Smith" made the transition to 2000 AD.  Okay so “Captain Klep” moved too, but that was a one page joke.  It’s a shame as I do have fond memories of Martian rebellion story "The Angry Planet" - with art from the always brilliant Massimo Bellardinelli.

• Sapphire And Steel -  The adventures of the inter-dimensional agents who battled strange occurrences throughout time (which itself was a malignant force) was one of the best SF / fantasy TV shows of the era. I avidly watched each week, even if I didn't always understand what was going on. What made "Sapphire and Steel" so compelling wasn’t just the eerie atmosphere - it was the sense that anything could happen, and often did, in ways that defied conventional storytelling. The show had a dreamlike quality, and the performances by Joanna Lumley and David McCallum were perfectly pitched - cool, enigmatic, and just a little unsettling. I remember being fascinated by these mysterious figures and their element friends. The stories lingered in the mind long after the credits rolled - especially "Assignment Two", set in an old railway station, which still gives me chills (although it didn't help that an industrial strike caused ITV to go off air for several weeks mid-way through). For some reason I missed the final story with the infamous cliffhanger on first transmission, and didn't get to see it until years later when I bought the box set on DVD. I was struck then by how well the whole show holds up as a genuinely bold and original piece of television. It’s a shame it ended so abruptly, but maybe that’s part of its longevity. Hopefully, Sapphire and Steel are still out there somewhere, suspended in time, waiting to come back...

• Micronauts - outside of 2000 AD, this is probably one of the most important and personal comics series I own. Sure I'd dabbled in the Marvel universe before, mainly through back issues of the UK black and white reprints found at jumble sales - and odd random US colour issues found in seaside newsagents (back when that was a real thing). But after stumbling across issue 4 while on holiday, I was immediately hooked. The "Micronauts" name was familiar to me from the toys that had started appearing a couple of years earlier, but here was a comic that took the basic ideas and characters and spun them into a whole incredible cosmic universe of their own. It helped that the stories were by industry legends Bill Mantlo and Michael Golden, two masters of their craft. I was so captivated that I spent the rest of the two-week trip scouring every corner shop, and dusty rack I could find, desperately searching for the earlier issues. My determination to collect the whole series also led me to dedicated comics shops - and a whole new world of titles opened up to me. Along with "Rom: Spaceknight" and "Shogun Warriors" (also based on toy lines), this was the title that made me a collector rather than just a reader. I still have every issue, and although thousands of other comics have come and gone over the intervening decades, I can't imagine I'll ever part with them.

Golden Sunsets Redux - 60 Years of Memories - Part 12 - 1978

When it came down to picking something for this year, there was just one LP I keep returning to again and again and again...

1978:

The trivia:

• In 1936, facing religious persecution, Karp Lykov fled with his wife and two children into the remote regions of southern Siberia. Over time, they had two more children, all born and raised in isolation. For over four decades, the family survived with no contact from the outside world, living a log cabin, growing their own food, and surviving off the land. They had no access to modern medicine, electricity, or even basic news - so were unaware of World War II, the moon landing, or any major global events. In 1978, a team of Soviet geologists surveying the region by helicopter spotted their cultivated land. Despite initial hesitation, the Lykovs welcomed the visitors and slowly began to learn about the modern world. Tragically, within a few years of contact, three of the children died, possibly due to exposure to unfamiliar viruses. Only the youngest daughter survived, and continues to live in the wilderness to this day. 

• Kurt Gödel was one of the most brilliant logicians of the 20th century, whose work fundamentally changed the way we understand mathematics. He was also a close friend of Albert Einstein. However, despite his towering intellect, Gödel struggled with severe anxiety and paranoia. He was particularly afraid of being poisoned, a fear that grew more intense as he aged. Because of this, he refused to eat any food unless it was prepared by his wife, Adele. When she was hospitalised for six months, Gödel, unable to trust anyone else, stopped eating. He died of starvation in January 1978, weighing just 65 pounds.

• The French created their own 1970s version of the internet called "Mintel", where you could shop, chat to friends, send mail and check stock prices. It was an interactive videotex system developed by France Télécom, accessed via small terminals connected to telephone lines. The French government distributed millions of these devices for free to encourage adoption - and it was a huge success. There were still over 800,000 terminals in use when it was finally shut down for good in 2012.

The memory:

Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War Of The Worlds

"No one would have believed, in the last years of the nineteenth century, that human affairs were being watched from the timeless worlds of space. No one could have dreamed we were being scrutinised, as someone with a microscope studies creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. Few men even considered the possibility of life on other planets and yet, across the gulf of space, minds immeasurably superior to ours regarded this Earth with envious eyes and slowly and surely, they drew their plans against us..."

How many versions of this incredible album have I bought now? The double LP (twice), the cassette, the CD (the first thing I ever bought in that format), the 7-disc Collector's Edition, the DVD of the live stage performance. The list goes on and on - and it’s never enough. Across 95 minutes, Jeff Wayne manages to tell the classic H.G. Wells story of Martian invasion through music and song in a way that has never been equalled.

Like most people I guess, I first came across the album via the song "Forever Autumn", which was released as a single and reached number five in the UK charts in August 1978. Justin Hayward's haunting vocals were perfect and as the presenters of "Top of the Pops" announced that it was from a musical version of "War of the Worlds", my ears pricked up even more. I'm sure I had read the original book by this point (I went through a phase at around age ten of borrowing all the "classics" from the library - Ivanhoe, Treasure Island, The Three Musketeers, etc).

I persuaded my parents to buy the record for me as a Christmas present and once the usual festivities were over and the relatives had all gone home, I was allowed to listen to it. I may have been familiar with the story, but what I wasn't expecting was the surprise of that opening narration from the superb Richard Burton and then those first few crashing chords. I was hooked instantly.

This was (and continues to be) a truly immersive audio experience. The thumping bass guitars, fabulous repeated themes and melodies, and extended sequences of prog-rock-esque music swept me away to Victorian London and the strangeness that was to come as a cylinder from outer space landed on Horsell Common. The sound design was just perfect - no-one can forget the noise of the cylinder unscrewing or the ear-shattering "ULLA" cry of the Martians as the tripod war machines rose above the terrified onlookers.

To help with the visualisation, the original LP version was accompanied by a 16 page booklet featuring several paintings by artists Peter Goodfellow, Geoff Taylor and Michael Trim. From that classic cover as a war machine attacks the warship Thunderchild, to the creeping of the Red Weed across the English countryside, to the crows picking at the dead flesh of the aliens after they are defeated  - the images reinforced the power of the story. I used to pour over the details for hours.

Richard Burton of course is responsible for much of the heavy-lifting of the narrative in between the music and the songs. His sonorous Welsh tones drive everything forward and if you listen to the out-takes (available in the Collector's Edition) you can hear how much he was enjoying getting his lips round the various passages of text, many lifted directly from the novel. I particularly like his reading of the description of the hideous Martian creature, as it prepares to dispense death from the heat ray:

“Its lipless mouth quivered and slavered - and snake-like tentacles writhed as the clumsy body heaved and pulsated.”

There were other versions of the narration recorded for overseas language markets, including one featuring Anthony Quinn, but nothing can supplant Mr. Burton in my memory. He is as intrinsic to the success of the production as the music and lyrics.

He's not the only excellent voice on the album though. Jeff Wayne fills out the rest of his cast with some highly talented vocalists, many of whom were / would go on to become musical legends. The previously mentioned Justin Hayward (The Moody Blues), Julie Covington, Chris Thompson (Manfred Mann's Earth Band), Phil Lynott (Thin Lizzy) as Parson Nathaniel and not forgetting David Essex as the "The Artilleryman". Each voice adds something special to the story. Essex is steadfast at first as the loyal soldier and then increasingly deranged as he wants to rebuild the world underground. Lynott is perfect as the poor religious man who finds himself doubting his own faith in the face of the Martian's overwhelming alien superiority and believing that they are heralds from Satan.

I must have listened to the record over and over and over again in those first few weeks, the headphones glued almost permanently to my ears. If this was my introduction to the idea of the "concept album" then I couldn't have picked a better one! Yes it deviated from the source novel in a few areas, but I didn't care.

As time went by "War of the Worlds" was a constant companion and then in the early-80s, the music impinged on my other burgeoning interest - computer games. I was a big devotee of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum - a primitive machine by today's standards but with it's 48K of memory and 256 colours it was a revolutionary and ridiculously successful product at the time - spawning an entire industry of software houses and home programmers. In 1984, CRL released a Spectrum version of "War of the Worlds". I bought it of course, but to be honest it was a pretty poor graphical adventure. I just kept wandering around various locations looking for the Martian base and dying of hunger. After a few days of getting nowhere (and I always considered myself pretty good at these kind of games) it was abandoned. I've found out since that you had to visit the locations in the same order as they were on the album, but even so, it's not something I have any desire to revisit.

In 1989 there was a resurgence of interest in the album when Ben Liebrand released a remixed version of the classic first track "The Eve of the War" and it got to number three in the singles charts. I still have the 12" around here somewhere. This led to other alternative mixes and eventually a double CD full of them in 2000 known as "ULLAdubULLA - The Remix Album". I think I borrowed a copy from  somewhere but a few of the alterations were too extreme and  it was veering into the club / dance genre - really not my thing. They re-released it in 2006 with even more versions but to me they are an interesting curio, nothing more.

2005 / 2006 was also the time when Jeff Wayne really began to ramp up his use of the material in the new century, partly to capitalise on the release of the Spielberg film starring Tom Cruise. First there was the 2-disc 5.1 Suround Sound Hybrid Super Audio CD set. This was then included in the 7-disc collectors set, along with a hardbound version of the booklet and 80 pages of behind the scenes photographs . Plus the best of the remixes, hours of out-takes and rare unused tracks and songs (most never heard before) and a "making of" DVD. It truly was the best set a fan could hope for and I quickly snapped up a copy. Just thinking about it makes me want to pull it down from the shelf and listen to everything again.

Jeff's next trick was a live stadium tour of the full work, complete with 48-piece string section and rock band. The centrepieces were a 11 foot high 'virtual' Richard Burton, which via image projection and lip-syncing moved along with the words of the Journalist, and a giant Martian fighting machine appearing on stage complete with heat ray. Some of the original musicians and cast returned as well - and various other singing roles were taken by performers such as tenor Russell Watson, ex-pop star Jason Donovan and a host of former reality TV singers.The tour was so successful that it went to Australia and New Zealand and mainland Europe - and continued in one form or another right through to 2011. I never got to go sadly, but I do have the DVD of the 2006 Wembley Arena show. It's a great set of performances, even if the images they used of Burton for the huge virtual head were of his younger self rather than the craggier, older looking man I remembered from his later career.

During a break from touring, Wayne worked on a *new* version of the album. Dubbed "The New Generation". it 'allowed the composer to re-interpret his music and 'use more modern production techniques'. All the major roles were recast and in a moment of absolute sacrilege (at least to this listener), Burton was dropped in favour of Irish actor Liam Neeson. "Kaiser Chiefs" frontman Ricky Wilson became the Artilleryman and "Take That"'s Gary Barlow provided vocals for the sung thoughts of the Journalist. Soul singer Joss Stone was also cast as Beth. So big question  - was it any good? 

Despite his film pedigree, Liam Neeson just couldn't compete with the golden voice and gravitas of Burton. It came across as more of an flat "audio book" performance rather than an acting one. He got quite a bit of new dialogue too, but I can't think of one line that felt like an essential addition. Gary Barlow and Ricky Wilson did actually make reasonable stabs at their roles, "Forever Autumn" was actually pretty good, if a bit less orchestral, while Wilson was no David Essex, but I quite liked his Artilleryman. Elsewhere though Joss Stone could certainly sing, but definitely NOT act. Parson Nathaniel was here played by Maverick Sabre (yes I had no idea who he was either) and the problem was a total lack of chemistry between the two, which made "Spirit of Man" just a bit of a damp squib. There were also a few bits taken from a 1998 PC strategy game (I had to look that up) including, would you believe a couple of lines of Martian dialogue. 

It was all still recognisably "War of the Worlds" with the brilliant songs and themes from before but to be perfectly frank it's been "tinkered with" a bit too much. Wayne had added lots of sound effects and extra "whoosh" noises and drumbeats - and they all stood out at right angles from the original score. It's a bit like the "updated" versions of the original "Star Wars" trilogy - the core is still there but the digital frippery around the edges detracts rather than adds to the experience - and like those CGI creatures, I think these additions will date very quickly. What was once a timeless classic became something...less.

Don't get my wrong, anyone who came to this for the first time would still be blown away by the power, excitement and vibrancy of Wayne's vision, but for those of us who grew up listening endlessly to the 1978 version, the "New Generation" recording just reinforced how good that really was. Who knows, maybe it did introduce a host of younger people to the music - personally I would have just handed them a copy of the original...

This new take on the album also went on tour under the sub-title "Alive on Stage!" between 2012 and 2013 with some of the cast repeating their roles and Liam Neeson appearing via much improved holographics. Former pop stars Marti Pellow, Brian McFadden and Shayne Ward also popped up during various iterations of the round the country performances. There was more new material in the live shows which was not present on the CD (including new scenes), plus enhanced pyrotechnics and special effects. At one point they even had actor Callum O'Neill on stage as author H.G. Wells across three ages of his life. Again I did not go to any of these shows , but bearing in mind my less than high opinion of the "New Generation" in the first place, I don't think I even considered it, nor did I get the eventual DVD.

Then in late 2014 there was a one month "Final Arena Tour". This featured the addition of Carrie's father as a new character and lyrics to "Life Begins Again". A prologue was performed as a pre-show segment with the characters performing among the audience rather than on stage.

In late 2015 it was announced that Jeff would be debuting a full theatrical "re-imagined" production in London's West End for a very limited run, conducted live on stage by the man himself. As well as the virtual Liam Neeson (no Burton sadly), the cast was to include Jimmy Nail as Parson Nathaniel, Heidi Range (Sugarbabes) as Beth, Daniel Bedingfield as the Artilleryman and  "Robin of Sherwood" star Michael Praed as "George Herbert". Most interesting of all was the news that David Essex would be returning to the Victorian era for the first time in over 35 years! I looked at my wife (also a big fan) and she looked at me - "We have to go!" we said almost simultaneously.

So on a cold Saturday in March 2016 we found ourselves in the fourth row of the Dominion Theatre, eagerly looking forward to a night of revisiting the greatest concept album ever made. Surrounding us were hundreds of other people of a similar age, and as the curtain rose and Mr. Neeson spoke those opening words, there was a ripple of excitement the air...

Hmmm. Perhaps I'd been too excited and expected too much. It was more than the previous "live on stage" shows I'd seen on DVD, that was for sure, but less than a full blown musical, so it fell somewhere in between, into a realm that was all a bit...odd. That's not to say the production team didn't throw everything at the wall. There were flame-throwers, lasers, alien tentacles, back projections of Victorian London, a full height Martian fighting machine clomping on and off stage at various moments, Liam Neeson popping in and out from all directions, diminutive Jeff Wayne sliding backwards and forwards on his podium as he conducted his heart out -  and lots and lots of people running around.

Michael Praed looked and sounded great, but when most of his lines were given to holo-Liam, he ended up spending a lot of the time just staring up at a screen. They should just have dumped the pre-recordings and let Michael do the whole lot live. Jimmy Nail was suitably boggle-eyed and raspy as the Parson experiencing a crisis of faith and Heidi Range could hold the high notes  - but the biggest surprise for me was Daniel Beddingfield, who had a really excellent voice and belted out the songs originally performed by David Essex.

David himself had the more undefined role as the "Voice of Humanity" so didn't do a huge amount of solo singing, but his croaky fading voice probably wouldn't have been up to it anyway - after all he was 69 years old - and let's be fair - his name was really there to draw in the punters. My least favorite part of the second half was the interpretative dance sequence, where red-clad ballet enthusiasts rolled around pretending to be the Red Weed. It seemed to go on for ever. I know that it's a long sequence of purely instrumental music, but maybe they could have been more ambitious.

Despite these flaws it was still an enjoyable show, and there was a deserving standing ovation for Jeff and the cast as they took their bows, The truth was, it didn't matter how much spectacle you threw at it - the main attraction was clearly the music. Even though it was the less-preferred "New Generation" version (with added bells and whooshes), it was hard to deny the thrill of hearing it played live and at full volume. It took me right back to that Christmas in 1978...

Since that big event, Jeff has continued to tour the album - in 2018, 2021/2022 and most recently in the spring of 2025. However, there have also been two other expansions to the franchise. Firstly in 2018 there was a five-hour audiobook "rendition" released via Audible.com. With more new story and musical content, the cast included Michael Sheen as the journalist, Taron Egerton as the artilleryman, Ade Edmondson as Ogilvy, Theo James as Parson Nathaniel and Jeff Wayne's daughter Anna Marie Wayne as Carrie.

Lastly, in May 2019, "Jeff Wayne's The War of the Worlds: The Immersive Experience" opened to the public in London, just a stone's throw from where I work. Set across 22,000 sq. feet, the nearly two-hour production combines music from the album, immersive theatre, virtual reality, holograms and a cast of twelve actors. As of October 2025, it's still running and has proved to be enormously popular. 

It's been a long and winding journey across the decades. There are still rumours of a full film version and despite his age Wayne shows no signs of slowing down. The power of the story and the music has been captivating listeners and audiences for more than forty-five years now  - and I have no doubt that I'll be listening to it for the rest of my life.

ULLA !!

 does last a long time - which for those who aren't a fan of the impressive interpretive dance Honourable Mentions:

• The Wild Geese - My second Richard Burton starring vehicle and what a film. What a cast. Richard Harris, Roger Moore, Stewart Granger, Frank Finlay. Hardy Kruger. The list goes on. I love the old ensemble war films like "The Guns of Navarone" and "Where Eagles Dare" and this has a similar feel, but with a darker and more modern edge. It tells the story of a bunch of ageing mercenaries contracted to rescue an Mandela-like African leader from imprisonment, with unexpected and deadly results. It’s gritty, violent, cynical and surprisingly emotional. The cast are perfect - Burton’s weary gravitas, Moore’s suave charm and Harris’s tortured intensity are supported by an ensemble of rounded and complex characters. Maybe on first viewing I didn’t grasp the politics or the moral ambiguity, but I understood the themes of loyalty and sacrifice. It’s a film that made war stories feel personal and I've lost count how many times I've seen it. Without any doubt - an absolute classic. 

• Blakes' 7 - After "Doctor Who" my second favourite British SF show and I’ll be honest, during its four series run, it held the top spot. A programme that was allowed to be clever, camp and character driven - and dared to say sometimes the heroes don’t win. There’s just so much to love - the stirring theme music, the amazing design (I’ll fight anyone who dares to tell me that the ‘Liberator’ is not the most beautiful spaceship in SF), the morally messy characters. Rebellion wasn’t easy. Heroes were flawed, villains were sometimes right and people died. It was silly and over the top and grim - and ultimately tragic. Okay, so some of the effects were a bit ropey. Maybe the performances veered towards pantomime. I didn’t care. I loved every character, every moment of adventure - even that astonishing, shocking ending. I made my own teleport bracelets out of plastic bottles and an ORAC computer out of cardboard, all so my friends and I could create our own adventures. Over the decades my love has never waned and the show’s legend has lived on, through comics, novels and full-cast audio adventures. One day I’ll write much more about it. But let’s be honest, as much as Blake was the good guy, we all wanted to be Avon…didn't we?

• Superman - Before superhero movies were brooding or ironic, there was the one that dared to make you believe a man could fly. Christopher Reeve didn’t just wear the cape, he *was* the character - that perfect balance of bumbling charm as Clark Kent and quiet strength as the Man of Steel. It's a portrayal and a film that has become so iconic that it has influenced all subsequent versions - even the comics. Maybe Gene Hackman’s Lex Luthor is not quite how I think of Superman's arch nemesis, but the other performances are so strong that it papers over any cracks. More modern interpretations may have better special effects or delve deeper into the lore of the character - and I appreciate them all in various ways - but I think my heart will always belong to the original. Knowing what Reeve faced later in life off-screen, my appreciation of the man continued to grow. He wasn’t just Superman by donning the costume, he was a superman in spirit too.

• Centennial - The 70s saw the rise of  the historical blockbuster TV mini-series, which my parents and I greatly enjoyed. Prestige “events”, mostly based on best-selling novels and stripped across the week. They had all-star casts, and a budget to match. First in 1974 there was the Burt Lancaster starring "Moses the Lawgiver". Then in 1977 there was "Roots" and "Jesus of Nazareth". But the most ambitious of these (and the one I have the most fond memories of) was "Centennial" - the 12-part, 26-hour history of a fictional town in Colorado between 1795 and the then present day. Part Western, part family saga, part history lesson, it starred almost every well-known TV actor of the time - including Richard Chamberlain, Raymond Burr and Lynn Redgrave. Its stories were of Native Americans, fur trappers, ranchers, immigrants and outlaws. The word "epic" doesn't begin to do it justice. Each episode felt like a movie, and I learned more about US history by watching than from any reference book. The series doesn’t get talked about much these days, but it paved the way for miniseries like North and South, Lonesome Dove, and Band of Brothers. What’s even better is that when I found a copy on DVD many years later, it was still just as powerful and moving. 

• Starlord - 2000 AD's more colourful, short-lived sister comic - most notable for giving the world "Strontium Dog" and "Ro-Busters". Lasting a mere 22 issues its legacy is huge. But as good as those famous strips are, there are other stories which were just as interesting and sadly now seem to have been forgotten. In the early issues a favourite was “TimeQuake”. It had everything an SF obsessed kid could want: time travel, green frog-like aliens, Nazis, Aztecs in spaceships  - and in former tramp steamer captain James Blocker, a hero who looked like he’d be more at home in a pub brawl. It featured some stunning full-colour work from Ian Kennedy and others. But my own top strip was "Mind Wars" - a complex space opera by Alan Hebden and Jesus Redondo featuring psychic twins fighting against an alien empire. It was surprisingly mature, with some high-concept storytelling, clever twists and characters with emotional depth. - paired with gorgeous art from a real master. It needs a prestige collected edition, so others can discover its wonders.

We're All Stories In The End 15 - Christmas On A Rational Planet

 Lawrence Miles seems to have an excess of ideas....

Christmas On A Rational Planet by Lawrence Miles

Seventh Doctor Adventures number: 52

Originally published: July 1996

Companions: Roz & Chris

"An end to history. An end to certainty. Is that too much to ask?"

December, 1799. Europe is recovering from the Age of Reason, the Vatican is learning to live with Napoleon, and America is celebrating a new era of independence. But in New York State, something is spreading its own brand of madness through the streets. Secret societies are crawling from the woodwork, and there's a Satanic conspiracy around every corner.

Roz Forrester is stranded in a town where festive cheer and random violence go hand-in-hand. Chris Cwej is trapped on board the TARDIS with someone who's been trained to kill him. And when Reason itself breaks down, even the Doctor can't be sure who or what he's fighting for.

Christmas is coming to town, and the end of civilisation is following close behind...

                                             

Ah - another Lawrence Miles book. My first since reviewing "Alien Bodies" way back in part one of this strand. But this time, it's his first Seventh Doctor story - and apparently his first ever published novel. Will I start to see the genius that apparently everyone else does ?

Well let's get the bad news out of the way first.

This is a book about Order versus Chaos. Or Reason versus Superstition. Or Faith versus Science. Or Man versus Woman. It has big themes and strong metaphors. It has opinions and Larry *wants* you to know what he thinks - so you'd better listen, because he's going to keep telling you, over and over and over again, until it sinks in.

That's all very well and good - I don't mind a healthy dose of subtext. The problem is, some of it's all a bit…clumsy, and other elements are just, well, dare I say it, slightly dodgy.

I don't buy this "men are the architects, women are the chaotic ones" concept one little bit. I don't mind the gynoids -  'female' robots that aren't created but 'just are' , sure that's an interesting idea - but the fact that by being female they are less rational - nah, I'm not having that. In an infinite universe are there really only two genders - and men are the important builders ? 

Sexist? Quite possibly.

The first half of the book is also confusing to the point of being incomprehensible. Maybe its deliberate. Maybe it's first novel jitters. Maybe I'm just stupid. But Miles seems to have the concentration span of a gnat. 

He flits between scenes faster than a Weeping Angel  - so much so that you've had no chance to digest what is going on before - zip - its onto the next thing. It's like literary whiplash. I only just managed to keep up, and that was only after going back a few pages because I thought I'd missed something.

Then there's the Amaranth - the most maguffiniest of macguffins, without which large sections of the story just wouldn’t work. Sure, anyone can make things up to get their story going. That's fiction. But it take a special kind of Lawrence to write yourself a "rational" device which can warp reality and solve any knotty plot corners you might get yourself into.

Okay, maybe I'm being a trifle unfair.

Lastly, Don't ask me to name any of the supporting characters. Apart from the guy who was so tightly wound he might explode, none of them were even the slightest bit memorable. And if I had to read the word "cacophony" one more time, I think I would have screamed out loud and frightened my fellow train passengers.

But after all that moaning, what *did* I like ? Lot's of bits and pieces actually - and despite my criticisms, the book does all start to come together in the second half.

The Carnival Queen was an intriguing villain, stemming from Time Lord pre-history and supposedly a representation of all their irrationality. Who knows if the tale she told was actually real or not - it could have all been a deception.

As we know from "Alien Bodies", Miles likes wrestling with Doctor Who mythology and twisting it into new weird shapes - and it's no different in this book. So here, along with the origins of the "Watchmakers", we also have the first mention of "Grandfather Paradox", a bottle universe. *and* Time Lord biodata possibly being played with,

Then there's the peculiar, if slightly disturbing idea of the game "Eighth Man Bound" - played as a way for bored young Timelords to get a glimpse into their own future. Of course the Doctor is one of the only Time-teens to see his Eighth incarnation - foreshadowing much ?

All that and a possible explanation as to why the Third Doctor had a tattoo.

It's all good fun, and you can clearly see Miles putting the building blocks in place for the kind of stories he wants to tell in the future.

I also enjoyed his consideration that the Doctor is defined by his companions and needs them to give his existence meaning - something that the new series has picked up on several times.

That along with his excellent grand speech summing up why the Doctor does things - "Reasons. Principles, truth , love and harmony. Peace and goodwill. The best of intentions". Lovely.

It all makes me think that Miles *does* understand the core character of the Doctor. Underneath all the radical concepts and challenging prose he gets it. In fact, based on the two novels of his I've read so far, I'd say he's more in tune with the Seventh Doctor than the Eighth.

The companions don't suffer too badly either. Both Roz and Chris get a bit of backstory - Roz perhaps more so - which is good for someone like me who is reading their stories out of order.

Roz is also the more competent of the two. I can't see her fiddling with things she doesn’t understand and accidently destabilising the TARDIS !

Speaking of which, the whole concept of the "Interface" and how it manifests on the TARDIS walls was a lot of fun - as were the various rooms and corridors Chris encountered on his travels. I particular enjoyed the fact that the TARDIS library's copy of "A Passage To India" contains a series of dimensional portals, each leading to a different location.

On a more sombre note, Woodwicke’s witch hunt (and it's very….localised apocalypse) is definitely a reflection of some of the paranoia, conspiracy theories and hatred for "the other" that was prevalent in the 80s and 90s. Sadly the same distasteful behaviours and cult-like ideas can be seen in the society of today, with the current persecution of ethnic minorities and those in the LGBTQIA+  community.

It seems we are always doomed to repeat the mistakes and the hatred of the past, whether in literary form or the real world…

Finally, I read that there is a fan theory that this book contains references to every Doctor Who TV story. I've no idea if that is true - but I did spot a few obvious ones, such as Chris mentioning that "We can’t change history. Not one line" and nods to Quarks, Invisible Daleks, Morbius, the Taran Wood Beast and a bit of Venusian Akido. 

Haiiii !!!!!

So, okay Mr Miles, I think you won me over with this one. A few annoyances but in the end a pretty intelligent and original first story

What do you have for us next ?

Golden Sunsets Redux - 60 Years of Memories - Part 11 - 1977

This is one of those landmark moments. A time when a whole bunch of important things came together. I can categorically say that what I read, watched, and listened to in this year changed my life forever. So although officially there is one 'memory', there are actually lots of things to talk about. Science Fiction and Fantasy was about to fill my world...

1977:

The trivia:

• On 15th August 1977 in Delaware, Ohio, a State University radio telescope known as "Big Ear" detected a 72 second long narrowband radio transmission from deep space - originating near the constellation Sagittarius. It was on a frequency that many scientists believed intelligent aliens might use. Named the "Wow!" signal (due to the word astronomer Jerry Ehman wrote while reviewing the data), it was never repeated. Despite decades of investigation and speculation, it remains unexplained - but continues to inspire new generations of enthusiasts and those involved in SETI (the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence).

• At 5.10 pm on 26th November, the audio signal for the ITV Southern Television news broadcast was hijacked for six minutes by a distorted voice. It claimed to be  from an extra-terrestrial entity named "Vrillon" ("Gillon" or "Asteron" in some transcripts)  - a representative of the "Ashtar Galactic Command". The message urged humanity to abandon our "weapons of evil", embrace peace and spiritual evolution, and prepare for a 'great awakening'. Despite local alarm, most investigations concluded that it was a technically sophisticated hoax, especially as "Ashtar" is a name associated with UFO and New Age lore dating back to the 1950s.

• A Filipino couple accidently received the equivalent of one million dollars into their account in Manila due to a clerical error by a Mellon Bank employee in the US. They promptly withdrew the whole sum and spent it on property, medical expenses and gifts to friends and family - then disappeared. Mellon Bank tried to recover the funds via legal means, and while the Philippine court initially ruled in the couples favour, that judgement was eventually overturned. But by then, the money was all gone and the couple were nowhere to be found...

The memory:

"Hang on a minute" you might think. "Surely 2000 AD should be an obvious choice for 1977 ? This is where 'Thrill Power' began isn't it?". Well, you'd be right - the writers and artists and stories within its pages shaped my love for comics in a huge way. The fact that it's the only thing from forty plus years ago that I still read today, *and* still have every single issue, is testament to its undeniable influence on my life. The spirit of 2000 AD is embedded deep in the DNA of the person I am today -  and in the subjects I enjoy writing about on this blog.

The thing is, I could never do justice to the everlasting energy of the Galaxy's Greatest Comic in just one post of a few hundred words, or limit myself to the stories of one year (as good as those from 1977 are). 2000 AD is too big and too important. I wrote about my love for the early Dan Dare stories many years ago, and M.A.C.H.1 got a hefty mention in the post for 1973, but there is much, much more to talk about - and I'll get to it all, in time. But for now, in recognition of 2000 AD's debut, here's a montage of some of the covers that came out in that first amazing year (with credit to the excellent retrosmack blog for pulling these together).

Close Encounters Of The Third Kind

So after those stunning examples of Thrill-Power, it's time to move on to the main event - and Steven Spielberg takes another slot in my favourite films of all time. Sure, "Jaws" may have wowed me with its scares and excitement, but this - this is on a whole other level. I guess it's not surprising really when you consider how, even from an early age, I was fascinated by science and space exploration and the idea of aliens from other worlds. 

Interest in UFOs was at its absolute peak in the late 70s, but much like me, Spielberg had been intrigued by them since he was a young boy. He wanted to create a film where the extra-terrestrials were benevolent, not creatures to be feared - and had begun to develop the idea years earlier under the title ’Watch The Skies’. But it was after the huge success of “Jaws” gave him more clout with the Hollywood studios, that he finally found himself with the freedom to pursue it fully. 

After securing a deal with Columbia Pictures, Spielberg assembled a team that could match his vision. He brought in special effects expert Douglas Trumbull - fresh off  “2001: A Space Odyssey” - to lead the visual effects and John Williams was on board for the score, continuing their creative partnership. By 1976, the pieces were falling into place. Filming took place in Wyoming and at a massive hanger in Alabama, while Trumbull and his effects team had to invent new techniques on the fly - combining miniatures, matte paintings and practical lighting. As the scope expanded, studio executives grew nervous and Spielberg had to fight to maintain the tone he wanted. It was a deeply personal project.

And for me, even before I saw a single frame, I knew there was a kind of buzz in the air. Posters, trailers, magazine write-ups - all hinted at something vast and mysterious. The haunting image of a lonely road leading to a glowing horizon - and the tag line of “We Are Not Alone” - was everywhere. British TV aired documentaries on alien encounters. Queen Elizabeth went to a Royal Premiere. This was a big event.

But the odd thing is, "Close Encounters" is *so* ingrained in my memories, that I'm honestly struggling to remember when I first got to watch it. Did I get taken to the cinema by my late grandfather in early 1978? (the timeline just about fits and there are memory flashes about sitting in a darkened room watching something about UFO's - and no, it wasn't that *other* famous SF film) Did I get that first feeling of astonishment when I saw it on BBC1 around age 12 or 13? Who knows for sure - I guess the exact moment doesn't matter. What does is that "CE3K" sits there in my personal history like an enormous black hole making a gravitational dent in space-time.

For those that have yet to experience it, the film is really the story of everyman Roy Neary and single mum Jillian Guiller as they have differing encounters with something not of this world. Both are deeply affected by the experiences. Gillian's three year old son vanishes. Roy gets third degree burns on his face and finds his stable family life torn apart by forces which he can't understand. The result is that both become obsessed with a mysterious mountain in Wyoming. 

Travelling to the site and avoiding the military courdon, they arrive in time to see dozens of UFOs. As government specialists communicate with the ships via colours and tonal frequencies, a gigantic mothership lands and strange aliens emerge, along with many people thought lost decades earlier -  and they haven’t aged in the intervening years. Roy is selected to join a group who are to visit the mothership and after a final conversation using simple hand gestures, the aliens ascend to the stars with their new friends.

A paltry few words can't begin to explain the sheer mesmerising power of this film. It's full of iconic moments - images I can picture immediately when I just close my eyes. The lost ship stranded in the Gobi desert. The screws unwinding in the golden light of Jillian's apartment. Roy sculpting a replica of Devil's Tower out of rubbish in his living room. The five notes played to the alien spacecraft are as recognisable now as the theme to James Bond's adventures or "Raider of the Lost Ark" (they were also the first thing I could ever copy on an electronic keyboard). All these things pale behind one of the most astounding, awe-inspiring sequences in science fiction - the mothership appearing above the mountain and then slowly turning over. I’m sure I sat there with my mouth open. Cinema doesn't get much better than this.

The film is  not without some minor faults and unanswered questions. Why did the aliens take the people in the first place? Did they lure little Barry away just to get his mother to Devil's Tower? That seems particularly cruel. Doesn't Roy Neary give up on his family and kids to go off in a spaceship just a little too easily? Yet at the time of viewing, you don't even think of these things. You are swept up in the story and visuals. 

It’s well known that Spielberg was pressurised by the studio to release the film quickly, which meant he was unable to refine things quite the way he wanted.  It was a huge success anyway, but Columbia offered him the chance to re-edit the film for a 1980 “Special Edition” re-release. It’s…okay, and the scenes inside the alien mothership are impressive, but they really weren’t needed and remove some of the wonder. The director regretted it too, so in 1988 he released a final “Director’s Cut”. While that version may be the closest to his vision, the original is still my favourite.

I think we all really want our first meeting with intelligent beings from another planet to be as peaceful and magical as that pictured in this film  - both sides putting their efforts into communicating and making friends rather than immediate aggressive actions. Sadly the current reality is probably going to be more antagonistic. As a species we are just not ready for a close encounter...

Looking back, it’s hard to overstate what “Close Encounters” meant to ten-year-old me. It wasn’t the spectacle - though the FX, music and sheer scale were unforgettable. It was more that it opened my mind to the possibilities of science fiction. That it wasn’t all heroes with ray guns. It could say something about the who were are as humans. From that moment on I was hooked. Books, films, TV shows, comics - you name it - I wanted to experience it. It was life changing.

Watch the skies...

Honourable mentions:

• The Fantastic Journey - Although it only lasted a brief ten episodes, this show is remembered, by me at least, for the Bermuda Triangle / time-travel / Mysterious Island concept and for the cast of interesting actors - including Roddy "Planet of the Apes" McDowall and Ike "Witch Mountain" Eisenmann. My favourite was Jared Martin as Varian, a "more evolved" man from the 23rd Century with his multi-purpose tuning-fork-like 'Sonic Energiser' - which looked much cooler than the Doctor's screwdriver. Sure, the things the group encountered as they travelled through the various zones were overly familiar SF plots - a giant pulsating brain controlling the population, Joan Collins as the leader of a group of female revolutionaries who overthrow their male oppressors, a society of androids fighting green-skinned aliens - but it was still thoroughly enjoyable. For some reason it's always stuck in my mind. It was only in later years that I learned of the production troubles, abandoned characters and curtailed episodes. Within a few months of its cancellation, many of the the production crew had moved on to a new show - namely:

• Logan's Run - Not the classic Michael York film (which I adore) but the 14-episode TV spin off. The premise was basically the same: in a post-apocalyptic future, survivors live in a domed city where life is a disco-tinged party - until you turn 30, when you undergo “Carousel,” a rebirth ritual that actually kills you. Logan 5 is a Sandman, hunting down “runners” trying to escape their fate, but he starts to question the system and along with rebel Jessica 6, flees the city in search of the mythical “Sanctuary”. It’s a modestly budgeted show (lots of reused sets) and the plots are again your standard hoary 70s SF fare - but my own over-riding memory is of dry-witted android companion REM (played by Donald Moffat) and the cool silver cars than the Runners and Sandmen travelled around in. Despite its brief run, the series tackled some big ideas: freedom vs. control, aging, identity, and the search for truth - but it arrived just months after the debut of that tale from a ‘galaxy far, far away’ and audiences suddenly wanted space battles and cinematic spectacle on their TV screens, not philosophical thoughtfulness…

• A Spell For Chameleon by Piers Anthony - Not the first fantasy novel I ever read (I guess that honour goes to Enid Blyton's "The Magic Faraway Tree") - nor my favourite published in this year (that's getting a mention in a later post in this strand for a different reason) - but the one that made me realise that fantasy could be charming and funny. The first in Anthony's "Xanth" series (which currently runs to an astonishing forty+ volumes) it concerns the adventures of "Bink", who is exiled from his homeland because he *doesn't* have a magical talent. It's full of strange creatures, people with amazing abilities and groan worthy puns - perfect for younger readers. I collected, read and re-read the Xanth books for several years, but eventually I grew out of them, as my tastes changed and the plots became rather repetitive - plus some of the portrayals, especially of female characters, have not aged well. The first eight or so are probably the best and at the time were a good introduction to fantasy. Terry Pratchett is far, far better though, as I was to discover in just a few short years...

• Space : Magic Fly - I still remember the first time I heard this sublime piece of French electronica. It just didn’t sound like anything else on the radio - not rock, not disco - it was something…alien. No lyrics, no vocals - just a hypnotic funky instrumental track that pulsed and shimmered like a satellite signal from another galaxy. “Space” were producer Jean-Philippe Iliesco, composer Didier Marouani and keyboardist Roland Romanelli - and they predated Daft Punk by wearing cosmonaut helmets in all their performances, adding to the mystique. Released in May 1977, “Magic Fly” became a massive hit, reaching #2 on the UK Singles Chart, predating the synthpop boom and solidifying my love for electronic music, even though it took me *years* to find the LP.  But enough talk, it’s time to get groovy…

• The Visual Encyclopedia of Science Fiction  - The first SF reference book I ever bought, from a much loved bookshop in Sudbury, Suffolk. The smell of the pages as I opened it, the glossy sheen of the illustrations, and the feeling that I was holding something important. At £3.95 it was a hefty purchase (standard paperbacks were only £1 back then) - but I had to have it. A fascinating visual and thematic history of SF, it opened with a chronology that tracked the evolution of sci-fi across books, magazines, films, TV, and fandom from 1805 to 1976 - before moving into deep-dives on things like space travel, time machines, alien contact, robots and other dimensions. All of this was accompanied by illustrations galore - cover art, comic panels, pulp magazine spreads, and film stills filled every page. I poured over this book for days, reading it cover to cover multiple times. It’s definitely nowhere near as exhaustive (or text heavy) as the later "Encyclopedia of Science Fiction", but as a time capsule from an era when the genre was exploding into the mainstream, it’s amazing. And yes, I still have the same copy on my bookshelf.

• The Man From Atlantis - Included in this list because -  incredibly - it was the series that made me stop watching Doctor Who (see here for some more details). Heresy, I know. Sure it had a suitable muscled and attractive star in Patrick Duffy as the last survivor of the lost city of Atlantis - discovered washed ashore with webbed hands, gill-like lungs, and no memory of his past. Okay, it was glossy and sun-drenched and had a weekly parade of  covert missions, government scientists, sea monsters and camp madmen. And yes, the way “Mark Harris” swam was strangely mesmerising. But honestly - what was I thinking? 

• Children Of The Stones - Seven of the scariest half hours of children's television ever transmitted. Astrophysicist Adam Brake and his son Matthew arrive in Milbury, a seemingly idyllic village surrounded by Neolithic standing stones. But something’s off. The villagers are too happy and they all seem to be under some kind of psychic influence. As Adam and Matthew investigate, they uncover a web of time loops, cosmic forces and ancient rituals. The stones aren’t just relics of history - they’re part of a sinister supernatural event. The show is notable of course for the spine-chilling music full of wailing voices, the brain-twisting existential plot and the appearance of a pre-"Blakes' 7" Gareth Thomas - not to mention Ian Cuthbertson as the terrifying Hendrick.  It also features actor Freddie Jokes and around this time I had a thing of being *very* scared of him. He seemed to be everywhere during the 1970s, and I kept coming across him in a variety of forceful roles. I think it was those extraordinary eyebrows..

• Star Wars - Nah, it'll never take off...