Not to make you feel old or anything, but we’re going back a full forty years on this week’s Off The Chart to revisit the UK singles chart from this day in 1981. Sorry about that. But we’ll attempt to make up for it with two hours of less obvious hits, tracks from three of the week’s new albums, a look at what was going on that day, an Italian hit from the Spanish chart, and concluding with the UK’s top five in full whether you want them or not.
- Who released their first album without having decided on a lead singer?
- Who became an overnight sensation in the UK after a decade of success in Europe?
- And which iconic bassline came about because the bassist forgot what he’d been playing?
Tune in and find out!
Listen to Off The Chart on Mad Wasp Radio at 9pm every Tuesday! You can stream Mad Wasp Radio via their website, their apps for iOS or Android, or through TuneIn and MyTuner, or ask your smart speaker to “play Mad Wasp Radio” – and don’t forget to tweet along using the hashtag #OffTheChart. If you’re not around, you can hear the show again on Mad Wasp Radio at 10am on Friday, or catch up on Mixcloud after that.
Get the Extended Mix!
If you enjoy Off The Chart but find it’s just not long enough, why not join us on Patreon or Mixcloud Select? For a small monthly subscription you get access to the exclusive Extended Mix of the show every week with bonus 12″ mixes, additional chatter and the week’s top ten singles in full!
Our subscribers also get access to exclusive shows including Further Off The Chart in which we play some of the records that come up in conversation on the regular shows. You can even download shows to listen offline in the Mixcloud app! Please consider backing us – we really appreciate it and your subscription allows us to keep producing a new episode every single week.
Spotify playlists
If you’ve missed a previous edition they’re all on our Mixcloud page, or for a taster of the music we play, listen to our Spotify playlist Way Off The Chart including one track from each show!
We also have a Spotify playlist for our #ICEOTWF feature, including all (well, most) of the international hits we’ve played since the feature began in March 2017. There are all sorts of oddities in here, all of which were hits somewhere in the world but not in the UK!
