![]() ![]() But Everett’s hyping of their appearances as “the naughty bits” and combination of big-haired pouting girls and sexually ambiguous boys – all very much of its time and so seemingly much more daring than the staid Top of the Pops rivals, even though the routines of those acts were in fact often just as provocatively sexy – made Hot Gossip the talk of the town. ![]() Hot Gossip were essentially a dance group in the style of Pan’s People or Legs & Co., a performance interlude in the comedy show. It is, in any case, the creative high point of her career, I’m sure you’ll agree. As her fame rose, so the mention of Hot Gossip on editions of the single diminished. Hot Gossip were formed by choreographer Arlene Phillips in 1974, but only found fame in 1978, when they had the double-whammy success of a regular slot on the hugely popular Kenny Everett Video Show – then seen as the most anarchic comedy on television, shown on ITV at 7pm – and the hit single I Lost My Heart To A Starship Trooper, a disco cash-in on sci-fi mania fronted by Sarah Brightman, then one of the troupe’s performers and later, of course, to be the wife of Andrew Lloyd-Webber and star of West End musicals (the two things perhaps not being entirely coincidental). ![]() on the one hand, you have to wonder how this dance troupe ever managed to be seen as eroticism personified in the UK, given how tame their routines now seem on the other, there is no doubt that if Hot Gossip were to be featured on an early evening TV show now, there would be apoplectic rage from moralising tabloids and their readers. There’s a curious contradiction about Hot Gossip when seen now. The rise and fall of British TV’s most notoriously raunchy dance troupe and brief pop music sensations. ![]()
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