The PopCulteer
December 30, 2022

We have reached the last Friday of2022, and this afternoon on The AIR we offer up our last two new musical specialty shows of the year.  Mel Larch brings you the second part of her Giorgio Moroder tribute on a new episode of MIRRORBALL, While Syndey Fileen delivers a two-hour tribute to the late Terry Hall on Sydney’s Big Electric Cat.  The AIR is PopCult‘s sister radio station. You can hear these shows on The AIR website, or just click on the embedded player found elsewhere on this page.

At 2 PM, Mel Larch uncorks a new MIRRORBALL! The AIR’s showcase of classic Disco music presents a second collection songs produced and composed by Giorgio Moroder.

Moroder changed the landscape of Disco music with his sonic creations like Donna Summer’s hypnotic “I Feel Love.” Widely regarded as a founding father of disco and also an electronic music trailblazer, Moroder made his mark as an influential Italian producer, songwriter, performer and DJ.

Over the course of his career, Mr. Moroder has worked with some of the most famous names in music including Barbra Streisand, Elton John, Cher, Janet Jackson and David Bowie. He is heavily noted for being the key player in the Queen of Disco Donna Summer‘s rise to fame throughout the 1970s, collaborating with her on her biggest hits including “Love To Love You Baby,” “Hot Stuff” and “I Feel Love.” In 1997, Moroder and Summer won the Grammy Award for “Best Dance Recording” for the song “Carry On.”

Giorgio Moroder’s music charted success everywhere the disco craze touched down but he is also responsible for some of the most classic film scores to date including Scarface and Midnight Express, as well as timeless soundtrack numbers like Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away” (Top Gun), Irene Cara’s “Flashdance,” Blondie’s “Call Me” (American Gigolo), as well as compositions on films such as The NeverEnding Story, Superman III, Rambo III and Beverly Hills Cop II. From these, Moroder has accumulated three Academy Awards, four Golden Globes, four Grammys and more than 100 gold and platinum records. Giorgio Moroder was inducted into the Dance Music Hall of Fame in 2004.

We’ll hear more Disco classics created by Mororder and his Munich Machine cohorts, Pete Bellotte and Keith Forsey, and this is, as promised, the second MIRRORBALL devoted to this Disco icon.

Check out the playlist…

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Speed Limit “The Disco Twist”
Donna Summer “Denver Dreams”
Chris Bennett “Disco Man”
Giorgio Moroder “Love Now, Hurt Later”
Madeline Kane “Playing For Time”
Munich Machine “Space Warrior”
Giorgio Mororder “Moroder Medley”
Melissa Manchester “Thief of Hearts”

You can hear MIRRORBALL every Friday at 2 PM, with replays throughout the following week.

At 3 PM, on Sydney’s Big Electric Cat, Sydney Fileen graces us with the a tribute to Terry Hall, the former frontman for The Specials, Fun Boy Three and Colourfield, who died last week after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.  Hall joined the first incarnation of the Specials – then called the Automatics – shortly after the Coventry band formed in 1977, replacing vocalist Tim Strickland. After a stint as the Coventry Automatics, they became Special AKA, known as the Specials. The pioneering 2 Tone band rose thanks to the support of Joe Strummer, who invited them to support the Clash live, and of BBC Radio 1 DJ John Peel.

Hall formed Fun Boy Three with his Specials bandmates Staple and Lynval Golding. They also enjoyed chart success for several years, collaborating twice with girl band Bananarama, on It Ain’t What You Do (It’s the Way That You Do It) and Really Saying Something. Hall would also land a Top 10 single with Our Lips Are Sealed, a song he co-wrote with his then romantic partner,  Jane Wiedlin for her band the Go-Go’s.

Still in the New Wave era, Hall would form another band, the Colourfield, in 1984, which had a hit with Thinking of You. Syndey has assembled a tribute with music from all three of Hall’s New Wave era bands, and the show kicks off with The Specials performing live, at The Colchester Institute.

Here’s the full playlist for what you’ll hear on this week’s show…

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The Specials

“Do The Dog”
“Monkey Man”
“Rat Race”
“Blank Expression”
“Concrete Jungle”
“Too Much Too Young”
“Guns of Navarone”
“Nite Klub”
“Gangsters”
“Longshot Kick The Bucket”
“A Message To You, Rudy”
“It’s Up To You”
“Doesn’t Make It Alright”
“(Dawning of A) New Era”
“Little Bitch”
“Enjoy Yourself”
“Hey Little Rich Girl”
“International Jet Set”
“Friday Night, Saturday Morning”
“Ghost Town”

Fun Boy Three
“Way On Down”
“The Lunatics Have Taken Over The Asylum”
“It Ain’t What You Do” (with Bananarama”
“Our Lips Are Sealed”
“The More I See The Less I Believe”
“We’re Having All The Fun”
“Things We Do”

Colourfield “Running Away”
“Monkey In Winter” (with Sinead O’Connor)
“Confession”

Sydney’s Big Electric Cat is produced at Haversham Recording Institute in London, and can be heard every Friday at 3 PM, with replays Saturday afternoon,  Monday at 7 AM, Tuesday at 8 PM, Wednesday at Noon and Thursday at 10 AM, exclusively on The AIR.

That’s what’s new on The AIR Friday, and that is this week’s PopCulteer and our next to last post for 2022.   Check back Saturday for a last-minute surprise, and we’ll head into the new year with all our regular features, and hopefully more book, comic, music, toy and DVD reviews.