5th October

1972: The Sweet's Steve Priest, like the more vaunted Dave Hill, was never afraid of extending the boundaries of what can be worn for a television taping, and he's not stinted here. The drummer meanwhile is so far forward some of the audience are closer to Brian Connolly than he is.

1978: A real show of contrasts, TOTP. On the one hand, Elaine Paige in all too reflective dark glasses. On the other, he may be wearing a bow tie for reasons best known to himself, but Jimmy Pursey and Sham 69 could never be confused for the former. Pursey never went anywhere without his piano-enabling hat.

1989: Unusually, Sonia begins in interview mode where she appears more excited by something happening the following week than the forthcoming performance. Oddly, she's been in position for a good while by the time the audience go nuts. Curiosity Killed The Cat clearly had the deluxe version of an answering machine.

1995: Hale & Pace presenting in character. A nation shudders, especially with the growing realisation that it's not just a gag, they only know two current bands between them. One of those isn't Pulp, with Jarvis in meaningful denouement mode. Are you allowed to do that at that time of family viewing? Candida meanwhile brought her hi-vis tabard. And one definitely isn't Sleeper, for whom the director cuts to the chase and just doesn't show any of the band other than Louise Wener properly. At least we don't get to see their full intro to Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, given Cave looks for a crucial few seconds at the start like he'd be quite willing to follow the song's example and smash their faces in with a rock. Kylie is of course a consummate professional, looking adoringly up at the brooding man singing about stoving her features in.

2001: Belying the clear fact they'd run out of inspiration if they were covering this, Steps make a visual connection with nuclear safety through both signage and lighting, while two men make a vain attempt at recreating an electronic drumbeat. One hates to stereotype, but the man we see at 0:43 probably isn't with the girl to his left.