Retro Culture from Gangnam Style to Brotherhood of Man

I can't tell you how happy I was when my son downloaded Gangnam Style on a tablet and tried to horse dance this week.

You can see his efforts here, although you might be forgiven for thinking he was having a fit and turning a fire extinguisher on him.

Oh and for those people who might accuse me of being a hypocrite for posting a kid vid after going on about people who post their kids pictures on Facebook in my recent (spoof) blog I have a confession to make. I'm a horrible hypocrite.



At least Jackson's sudden fondness for massive one hit wonder PSY's (erm) massive one hit, comes a year too late. Which makes it more retro cool. Right. A year is a long time in the fast moving world of YouTube. Already the Korean looks date.

Although not as retro as Rolf Harris. When I was not much older than Jackson we crept across the parking lot and looked into the local gym of the school to see Rolf doing questionable things with his didgeridoo on the Rolf on Saturday show.

 

Rolf Harris

The guest act was Brotherhood of Man. Let's just say the winners of the 1976 Eurovision Song Contest were not letting fame go to their heads. Four huge Rolls Royces were parked heavily on the weeds of the parking lot. The band sauntered into the school sports hall wearing real fur coats.

I'm not sure what happened to the Rollers but Brotherhood of Man failed to become the next ABBA. They didn't even become the next Buck's Fizz.

Curiously I was checking out reconditioned washing machines in a back street lot in Portsmouth, Virginia the other day and the salesman started talking to me. He became animated when he heard my accent.

The salesman told me he used to be married to one of the female singers in Brotherhood of Man. It didn't seem like a happy experience but the guy took to me. I was the first person who had walked into the store in years who had heard of Brotherhood of Man. If I had hung around he may have given me a discount on a recondition washing machine.

Rolf Harris had a longer shelf life, probably much longer than PSY ever will. His fame lasted for three decades. Then last month he was charged with  13 child sex offences in the UK including the indecent assault of two teenage girls in the 1980s.