For a good few decades, there was only one show that could truly seal the deal and confirm your band had ‘hit the big time’ in the UK and that was Top of the Pops. The BBC stalwart may have been the home of the official charts, providing a neat rundown of the singles released that week, but it also gave those few acts who had just made their way into the charts to be given a national audience and a TV performance that few networks could compete with.
Originally broadcast weekly between January 1st 1964 and July 30th 2006, TOTP was the world’s longest-running weekly music show, and for people of a certain generation, they remember it as a highlight of their generational musical evolution. It is incredibly difficult to summarise the cultural potency that TOTP once had, now that it is reduced to a terrible Christmas special every year.
Source: The 10 greatest ‘Top of the Pops’ debuts of all time