THE TUBE LAUNCHES
ON CHANNEL 45 NOVEMBER 1982
Launched in the very fi rst week of Channel 4, The Tube was
intended to be as radical a music show in 1982 as Ready
Steady Go! was two decades previous. With the brief from
C4 boss Jeremy Isaacs to “make it live and give it balls”,
The Tube was proudly disordered and unpolished in a way
that no programme made by the BBC or ITV could ever
dare to be at the time.
Fronted by ex-Squeeze keyboardist Jools Holland and
former Record Mirror journo Paula Yates, it ran from 1982
to 1987, and was rarely far away from controversy,
whether it was Holland being suspended for swearing
(he’d used the phrase, “Be there or be ungroovy fuckers”
during a live teatime trailer for the show), a clearly sozzled
Rik Mayall vomiting on camera (one man in Northampton
was so appalled, he called the police) or a pre-ZTT Frankie
Goes To Hollywood performing a sexually-charged Relax
in elaborate S&M gear. All broadcast at 5.30pm on a
Friday, opposite Crackerjack.
Frankie, Fine Young Cannibals, The Proclaimers and The
Housemartins all found chart success after performing on
The Tube, while Madonna made one of her earliest
UK TV appearances thanks to a segment broadcast from
Manchester’s Haçienda club in January 1984. Blessedly,
the series signed off before it had the chance to burn out,
with Yates saying at the end, “It’s been wonderful... you’re
going to miss us when we’re gone.” Steve O’Brien© Getty ImagesCLASSIC
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