Whilst pondering what would be my theme for this week’s tunes, it came to me in a flash. Why not go for themes themselves? Or, more accurately, songs which are or were the theme tunes for tv programmes. Every tv show has music at the beginning, usually of the instantly forgettable, fairly dull instrumental variety, but there are plenty more where real songs have been used. As I’m in the UK my selections will, by definition, be related to what we can see on our tv screens, but that has always included a great many imports from elsewhere: mostly American, but also a good many excellent efforts from other countries. I’ve decided to exclude classical tunes, which rules out the likes of Danse Macabre, by Saint-Saëns, which introduces the Jonathan Creek mysteries. It also prevents me from going for the theme of the UK version of The Apprentice, which is Prokofiev’s Dance Of The Knights – anyway, Lord Sugar, who presents the show, is a narcissistic twat so I don’t watch it (given who presented it from the beginning in the US, that looks to have been the person spec for the job). I also set as a qualifier that these must be shows I have seen, even if not on a regular basis. I created a long list, and have had real difficulty in compressing it to just eight songs, so I may well come back to this at some point. Anyway, that’s more than enough from me – on with the music!

Before they jumped ship to Amazon, after the unfortunate incident when one of the show’s producers threw his nose at Jeremy Clarkson’s fist and forced the BBC to cancel it, Top Gear was one of my favourites. Childish, maybe, but the chemistry between the three presenters made it a very enjoyable watch, much more so than the various failed attempts by the BBC to recreate it with other presenters afterwards. And its theme tune isn’t too shabby, either:

Jessica was a track on The Allman Brothers Band’s fourth album, Brothers And Sisters. It was released in August 1973, and was #1 in the US and Canada, and also reached #42 in the UK, where the band were much less well known. The track was released as a single, making #65 in the US and #35 in Canada, but it didn’t chart in the UK. Obviously, Top Gear used a heavily trimmed version as their theme music – in common with all of these songs, as the full length versions would have got in the way of the shows! But Dickey Betts’ guitar solo is a thing of beauty, and makes for an instantly recognisable theme tune.

I’m going right back to my childhood for this next one. This is one of the first shows I remember watching when we got a tv, in the days when cowboy films and shows were plentiful, and were great escapism. Rather than give you the full song, I’ve found this video of the opening and closing credits:

Rawhide was the show that gave a young Clint Eastwood his first lead role (he’d had several previous minor parts), not that we knew at the time how big a star he would become. The theme tune was sung by Frankie Laine, as the end credits say. Frankie was already known for providing theme music for cowboy movies, so I guess he was the natural choice for this one. It was released as a single here in the UK, and reached #6 in our charts – an early example of the power of tv in creating a hit record.

Another one from my childhood, now. This is the full length version that was included on The Monkees’ first album, and again it is instantly recognisable for anyone of my vintage:

I featured The Monkees in my occasional Listen To The Band series last April: if you missed it, here is the link. I started with that one then, as it seemed a good place to begin! That first album, simply called The Monkees, was a #1 in both the US and the UK, but this song wasn’t released as a single, more’s the pity.

The next two tracks have both been the theme tunes for tv sports shows here in the UK. While you listen to the first one, try to guess the sport, if you don’t already know:

Given the upbeat, summery nature of that tune it could only be one sport, really: our national summer game, cricket. That was for me the prelude to many hours spent in front of the tv, usually watching the England team being slaughtered, particularly by Australia or the West Indies, but it still evokes happy memories for me. To this day, I can’t hear it without being taken back to younger days, when the BBC still had the tv rights to cricket, before the satellite channels took it over. This was the title track of Booker T And The MGs’ album Soul Limbo, released in September 1968, which reached #167 in the US but didn’t trouble the UK chart. It had earlier been released – in May 1968 – as the lead single for the album, reaching #17 in the US and #30 in the UK. I’m guessing that the cricket connection had something to do with that UK chart placing!

For a long time, John McVie’s bass solo (which begins at 3.36) with the following instrumental part of this next song was synonymous for us in the UK with the BBC’s coverage of Formula One motor racing, which has been continued by Channel 4 since they took over the terrestrial tv coverage of the sport:

Even without (or possibly despite) its F1 connection I still think that is a superb song, from one of the best albums ever released. F1 does nothing for me – I find it an extremely tedious way of destroying our environment – but the song has withstood the test of time. It was originally a track on Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours album (note the ‘u’, Transatlantic readers), released in February 1977, which as I’m sure you know was #1 just about everywhere, and has sold over 40m copies worldwide, making it one of the most successful albums ever. This wasn’t a single, though it did feature as the B-side to the single release of You Make Loving Fun, but only in France and Germany, for reasons that escape me.

I wouldn’t class myself as a big fan of Friends. I’ve watched quite a few and have always enjoyed them, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to see it. I do rather like the theme tune, though, and this official video for it is undeniably a lot of fun:

The Rembrandts released I’ll Be There For You on their third album, LP, in May 1995. It gave them their best chart placing in the US, at #23, and was their only UK chart album, peaking here at #14. This was the lead single from the album, reaching #17 in the US, #1 in Canada, and #3 in the UK, Australia and New Zealand. It is another of those tunes which is instantly associated with its tv show, and the video goes well with it. The song had been written to be the show’s theme tune, but Warner’s first choice band – R.E.M. – declined the offer to play it, so Warner turned to The Rembrandts as being the only other band on their label they thought could be suitable for it. The rest, as they say, is history.

Today’s penultimate offering is from another US tv comedy show, but in this case it is one of which I’m a huge fan. Again, this song is synonymous with the show:

Cheers ran for a total of 275 episodes between 1982 and 1993, and it’s a fair guess that I have at some point seen just about all of them. This theme tune, with its chorus of “Where everybody knows your name” giving the show its tagline, is a perfect fit and created an instantly welcoming vibe as you settled down to watch a bunch of people who, over those eleven years, became so familiar as visitors to your home that they felt like friends (as distinct from Friends). The theme song was performed by Gary Portnoy, who co-wrote it, and reached #58 in the UK singles chart and #83 in the US.

I’m really torn about this week’s final song, in terms of which version to give you. I know I ought to be true to my themes theme and play the one that was on tv, but I so much prefer the original. In true British style of compromise and indecision, I’m giving you both. Firstly the instrumental which featured as the tv theme:

As you probably gathered from that, this was used as the theme music for the BBC’s long running chart show, Top Of The Pops. Each week we were treated, if that’s the right word, to a performance by their dancing troupe (Pan’s People, who then became Legs & Co.) to one of that week’s hits – usually the routine bore no relevance to the song, but they did their best to make it fit and were undeniably an attraction. This instrumental version was a hit single in 1970 for the band CCS, reaching #13 in the UK chart. For this of us who loved the original, however, this was an abomination, especially when it become the theme for a show of chart hits, when it was by a band who never allowed their songs to be released as singles in the UK. To redress that balance, here is the real thing:

Ah, that feels better! Led Zeppelin’s Whole Lotta Love was the opening track on their Led Zeppelin II album, released in October 1969 and reaching #1 in the UK, the US, Australia, Canada and several other countries. This was a chart single hit in Australia (#1), Canada (#3) and the US (#4), but only entered the UK singles chart after that was expanded to include downloads in 2007, when the song reached #21 – not bad for a track which had been around for nearly forty years and had probably already been bought by anyone old enough to remember it!

As I said at the outset, I have several more tunes that I could have included in this set, so you might be seeing another themes theme at some point. Do feel free to suggest your favourites in the comments, but remember that they will have to be shows I watch – so there is no point in recommending Monk, Yvette, even if I do like its Randy Newman theme song! One of those I left out this week was the theme for both the movie and tv versions of its show, so I may expand into movies for my second set – again, suggestions welcome.

That’s all for today, folks. As it is now February, I think that means it is time for me to compile my review of the previous month on my blog, so expect to see that soon. Until then, stay safe and well 😊