THE cream of television captivates audiences with good plots and characters. Or there’s these, which were total shite apart from their theme tunes:
Round the Twist
Anyone who grew up in the Nineties will lose their shit if you mention this show and start singing ‘Have you ever, ever felt like this’ at the top of their lungs. But when pressed for further details about why it was good they will trail off and shrug because there was nothing else notable about it.
Why Don’t You
The nasal warblings of this children’s show theme was the equivalent of Subterranean Homesick Blues for generations of kids growing up in the 70s. Although in retrospect a theme tune which tells viewers to switch off their TV sets and do something less boring instead is too ironic to be truly vintage.
Are You Being Served?
This department store sitcom featured an innovative theme tune that sampled the clinking, ringing sounds of a cash register a year before Pink Floyd tried something similar in Money. Unfortunately, the show itself relied on tortuous double entendres about Mrs Slocombe’s pussy for humour, which is why nobody except your problematic uncle chooses to remember it fondly.
Sharky & George
This finger-snapping theme tune for a cartoon about two private detective fish solving crimes in Seacago is seared into the deepest recesses of your memory because it’s just so damned catchy. But the show has never been made available on streaming platforms, speaking volumes about the dire quality of the actual content.
UFO
Gerry Anderson sci-fi series UFO lured viewers in with a funky, jazzy theme tune playing over clips of a futuristic defence agency that used space-age technology like reel-to-reel tape recorders and typewriters. Then it decked out female Moonbase personnel in purple wigs and skimpy silver uniforms to prevent you from turning over. And it worked, because you’re pathetic.
BBC Cricket
The title track from Soul Limbo’s seventh studio album is an upbeat steel drum number that will always get you up on your feet and dancing. So it’s all the more odd that the song is also the theme for the BBC’s cricket coverage, a programme so punishingly dull the tune is ruined forever by association.
