I've never fully got to the bottom of this.
As far as I know, 'Countdown' was hosted on a TV channel which was part of the 'Veronica' TV/radio network in the Netherlands.

It may well have been called 'Veronica's Countdown' at some point in time (maybe they shortened the name over time) or it could just be a nickname, i.e 'Countdown' on 'Veronica' effectively.

I've recently got hold of the complete programme from 05/06/83 (the Blue Monday appearance) and the title credits state just 'Countdown'. However, the host introduces it by saying something along the lines of (in Dutch) "Welcome to 'Countdown', pop music by 'Veronica' on TV". Something like that, anyway.



I think this is the two-part radio documentary that was broadcast in 1988 called 'Substance'. There were two parts to this called 'I Remember When We Were Young' (the Joy Division years) and 'Now That We've Grown Up Together' (the New Order years).
It was narrated by Janice Long and broadcast on 03/03/88 and 05/03/88 respectively.

Here are the radio listings from the (excellent) BBC Genome site:

https://genome.ch.bbc.co...0f9f4e1ea2f6cb087088a059
https://genome.ch.bbc.co...349c4f14953242dddc20f353

There's discussion of the new name and fascist imagery in part 2, around the 14-15 minute mark. If you want to have a listen, just let me know and I'll wing over a copy.

Listening to it just now, this is definitely the interview you're talking about; "too much for some people", Saville discussing imagery etc.




Wow! No. Never heard of this at all!
Really interesting.
How on Earth were they able to do this (it needed a fair amount of faffing around with various synths / discs etc.) and, more to the point, why weren't S&G involved? Very strange indeed.
I'm really interested in this, as this has completely passed me by. Any other memories?

Ok, ta. Certainly if you google Veronica's Countdown you get lots of YT suggestions like, Bowie on Veronica's Countdown 1987, U2 on Veronica's Countdown 1982 etc...




Bingo! I wasn't sure if it had been covered by your extensive lists. In fact I was going to mention that I thought it was on a Saturday afternoon, and so it was! Maybe my memory isn't too bad after all! If I had more hard-drive room I'd seek a copy from you for nostalgic reasons. Maybe someone needs to put these things on YouTube or Soundcloud? (not me though, I couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery!)



Well I did say it was a crappy version of BM! I don't think it was a 7 minute one either. I remember telling a school friend about it and that the "guitar guy" looked a bit tough in his biker jacket. So Hooky must have been wearing the leather jacket. I don't think they were on a stage, just a studio floor, mostly in darkness apart from Barney and Hooky in close proximity under lights, surrounded by lots of synths. Possibly no studio audience.


Hmm, I'd forgotten about the existence of Switch. Not sure if I saw that performance at the time. But no leather jacket for Hooky and eh 'too much' S&G for it to be the performance I'm thinking of. Also I'm pretty sure it was Dutch/European. In fact the first time the Countdown footage appeared on YT I kinda expected it to be the Barney/Hooky thing, but it wasn't.


Cringing at Baywatch Regret so hard I thought my insides were gonna curdle and shit themselves out. Does that count?
(Also it's not proper TOTPs if they're on a beach in California!)

i'm really intrigued by this now.
Gonna do some checking around, but this is completely unknown to me (which is, if I do say so myself, fairly incredibly, given my penchant for anally-retentive JD/NO facts ).
Wow! I wanna see this now.

I will say though that, every now and again, something does turn up that I'm unaware of and these are mostly from outside of the UK.
One thing I've been after for years(!) is an interview with Bernard, Hooky and Rob at a charity football match that was on a programme called 'Villa Tempo' on Belgian TV on 27/01/86.
It's proved pretty elusive (I did get an audio only version of it last year, but it's not really the same - I really want to see the three of them playing footy!).

Given that the 'Blue Monday' performance you mention is live, and given that it's a bit of a 'car crash' of a performance, it seems incredible that this footage hasn't appeared on YouTube yet.
Fingers crossed that it soon does.



HaHa. Yeah. I know what you mean, although I did kind of love that performance.
I always used to find some of Steve's interviews fairly embarrassing, with him wittering on about pizzas or something similarly inane Now I find them endearing when watching back.

One other cringeworthy interview that springs to mind is that Bernard/Hooky interview from 'Les Enfants du Rock' where the former is basically really pissed off and completely switched off from the conversation. He looked like he was going to hit the interviewer... once he'd got over his hangover.

I recently found an interview from New Zealand TV where the moronic interviewer pretty much accuses them of being Nazis and juxtaposed that with being the only white act on a black label (Qwest, presumably). Very crass and pretty painful to watch. Hooky and Steve (mainly the former) had the good grace to not rise to the obvious baiting.

Yeah. Me too. That had completely passed me by until around the same time as you. 'Musik Convoy' on 16/04/84.
I don't remember it being traded amongst fans back in the 80s and 90s (else I'd have had a copy), so only really hit 'trading circles' around the time of YouTube etc. I've got a number of 'trade lists' from back in the day and I don't think any of them list it.



Yep - that was also 'Countdown' (27/04/93). Their only other appearance on that programme, as far as I know (although they definitely repeated a clip of 'Blue Monday' on at least one other show).

Considering that Blue Monday required a change of floppy discs during the song back then, it's unlikely a two man version would be possible. This is in addition to the synth bits The Other Two would be performing. Unless someone offstage was doing these things (they weren't miming back then), I say it's more likely the cameras were merely focusing on Bernard and Hooky, and that's what stayed in your memory.

Really, really interesting.



I don’t know. But my new mission in life is to find out exactly what this is.
It sounds bloody awesome!

Sounds plausible.


You think/hope he might have stuff on tape or hard drive that's never been on YT?


Sure! Hit me!

BTW You know the way we've seen one quarter of NO do The Happy One, but it probably isn't as good as all 4 quarters of NO? May I also suggest that half of NO also isn't as good as a whole NO? If this clip does turn up, I don't want you to get too excited...

Oh re 'A Midsummer Night's Tube', there is this choppy trailer for June 1984. And at 2:24 they mention Frankie's Relax (at 1am cos it's so naughty!). No mention of NO in the trailer (Is that Lesley Ash at 1:48?).
However the Wikipedia page for The Tube does list NO as one of The Tube's "selected performers", near the bottom. Do we have any hive-mind knowledge of NO performing on The Tube? (oh yeah we do in '86)
Oh also Tony Wilson is mentioned for the 2006 radio revival. If NO had played live/session on there we'd know wouldn't we?
The Wikipedia page also says "In July 2008 ITN (rights holder for The Tube) signed a deal with MUZU TV to make The Tube available online".

Edited by user 21 January 2022 14:35:19(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

There was also one in 1986.I distinctly remember because The Smiths played live on it and i remember watching them perform Panic .First time i heard that song and Morrissey seemed to repeat "Hang the DJ!" over and over forever.So much so that my mum, bless her, said "Does that man ever sing anything else than hang the DJ?" .Not that this helps in this search for the Barney and Hooky only performance of BM.

Oh the 86 one was more a "Euro Tube" thing , rather than a midsummers ?

There was a bit of rivalry between The Smiths and New Order in the 80s, would it be fair to say? I was a bit torn with it all because i did love a lot of The Smiths stuff.I bought their Queen Is Dead album upon release in summer 86 and absolutely played it to death for months.All a long time ago now but Morrissey was a massive, massive icon to a lot of people back in the day.If he was on the front cover of NME you just had to buy it to see what he had to say.Yes i recall Craig Gannon being in the band for a while, think as a second guitarist.I never saw The Smiths live but I went to a small festival in Perry Park, Birmingham in summer 2019 which included on the bill Johnny Marr (along with The Coral and Doves) and he played a lot of Smiths classics including There Is A Light. He was bloody good.

Edited by user 22 January 2022 03:42:32(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

hmm... i think i struggle at times separating the art from the artist.I can still listen to The Smiths but i am, unfortunately, conscious when doing so about what an arse Morrissey is these days.But what if an artist did an unspeakable thing like being found guilty of murder or something? Could i still listen to their music then? It'd be a tough one i'm sure.Not saying Morrissey is going to go out and murder anyone, obvs! I mean who on earth these days owns or listens to Gary Glitter's music??

I read Morrissey's autobiography when it was published.Enjoyed it , or most of it.I think it was after he wrote it that he started becoming an arse. Billy Bragg said of Morrissey a while back "There was a light but now it's gone out".

Edited by user 22 January 2022 07:23:34(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Looks like The Tube shows from that channel mentioned above have disappeared. There was no response by the owner regarding that 'Midsummer' special eitherr.
Shame.


As my 'wants' are back on page 2, I thought I'd bump 'em again here:

xx/03/1983 - 'The Jeff Cooper Show', BBC Radio Manchester, 03/83 (band introduce the first play of 'Blue Monday')
10/05/1985 - 'Round Table', BBC Radio 1, 10/05/85 (TPK review) (6 minutes)
17/05/1985 - Interview - Powerhouse, Melbourne soundcheck, 17/05/85 (Gilbert) (30 minutes)
17/05/1985 - Telephone Interview - Powerhouse, Melbourne soundcheck, 17/05/85 (Gilbert) (5 minutes)
xx/xx/1986 - Feature, Radio Scorpio, 1986 (4 x 60 minute episodes)
xx/07/1986 - Interview, Manchester Radio, 07/86 (5 minutes)
12/02/1987 - Auckland Radio, 12/02/87 (Hook)
07/08/1987 - 'Jed The Fish', KROQ-FM, Pasadena, 07/08/87 (Hook)
xx/08/1987 - WFNX Boston, 08/87 (Hague)
13/08/1987 - Capital Radio, 13/04/87 (Morris & Gilbert)
23/01/1989 - French Radio, 23/01/89 (15 minutes)
21/03/1989 - 'The Mark Findlay Show', Aberdeen Radio, 21/03/89 (Hook)

18/05/1990 - 'Joy Division Special', DT64 (East Germany), 18/05/90 (120 minutes)
21/05/1990 - 'BBC Look North', 21/05/90 (5 minutes)
17/06/1990 - 'The Bill Shaw Show', NorthSound Radio, Aberdeen, 17/06/90 (Hook) (***)
09/09/1991 - 'Newsbeat', BBC Radio 1, 09/09/91 (Morris)
xx/11/1991 - BBC Radio 1 (Morris & Gilbert), 11/91 (2 minutes)
xx/11/1991 - 'Hit The North', BBC Radio 5, 11/91 (Morris & Gilbert)
xx/12/1991 - 'Mark Goodier', BBC Radio 1, 12/91 (Morris & Gilbert) (***)
29/01/1992 - 'Hit The North', BBC Radio 5, 29/01/92 (Hook & Potts) (Revenge)
20/03/1992 - 'Bite The Wax', Radio Scotland, 20/03/92 (Wilson) (***)[/b]
15/09/1992 - BBC Radio 1, 15/09/92 (5 minutes)
xx/xx/1992 - 'Mark Goodier', BBC Radio 1, Late 1992 (Morris & Gilbert) (***)
06/02/1993 - 'Kaleidoscope - Manchester RIP?', BBC Radio 4, 06/02/93 (Feature on Factory)
xx/05/1993 - KROQ-FM Radio, 05/93 (1 minute)
19/05/1993 - 'Hit The North - Cook With Hook', BBC Radio 5 Live, 19/05/93 (Hook)
01/06/1993 - 'Cult Radio', BBC Radio 5 Live, 01/06/93 ("New Order re-invent The War of the Worlds")
11/08/1993 - 'Hit The North', BBC Radio 5, 11/08/93 (Hook) (Hook presenting - Oasis session)
30/12/1993 - BBC Radio 1, 30/12/93 (possibly Hook presenting) (***)
10/11/1994 - 'Soundbite', BBC Radio 1, 10/11/94 (retospective)
18/12/1994 - 'The Art of Noise - Part 3: Electric Dreams', BBC Radio 1,18/12/94 (Hook features)
18/05/1995 - 'Les Inrockuptibles' French Radio, 18/05/95 (JD biography)

(***) used to have these and really want to try and obtain again (lost my tape collection)